Pirelli Tyres Original Equipment On The Audi TT

Milan, February 16, 1999 - Pirelli has added a new and important name to the string of original equipment successes it has already achieved: the Audi TT, the styling and technological phenomenon for which the Ingolstadt manufacturer has selected the performance of Pirelli low profile tyres.

The TT has been homologated with Pirelli P6000 as original equipment - a tyre which has become a point of reference in the high performance market - in sizes 205/55 R 16 and 225/45 R 17. To the new Audi, the P6000 brings an almost unique mix of sportiness, comfort, silence, road holding: qualities which can be appreciated to the full in cars like the TT, with its permanent four-wheel drive, ASR traction control system and well over 220 horse power.
Then there is the aesthetic factor. The strong stylistic message communicated by the Audi TT makes P6000 an ideal component for the vehicle: in fact, right from its first appearance the low profile Pirelli immediately found favour with the styling centres of the automobile world due to its ability to " make design" , integrating itself perfectly with the car.

It is precisely that powerfully innovative technological/stylistic content of the TT which is already firing the imaginations of the major tuners and modifiers: the most sophisticated atelier on both sides of the Atlantic already offer low profile Pirelli tyres for the car. On the ultra-high performance front, 40 Series Pirelli PZeroes on 18 inch rims are now available.

The Audi TT is, justifiably, the pride of the Volkswagen Group, but many of the conglomerate's other models also testify to the renewed collaboration now taking place between the Group and Pirelli with the P6000. The tyre has also been adopted as original equipment for the Audi A3, S3, A4, S4 and Cabrio, while in Volkswagen the 16 inch version is standard on the Golf and Passat. And soon, Pirelli will begin to supply its tyres for the New Beetle to be sold in Europe.

Pirelli also has an active relationship with the tuners, particularly due to its wide range of high and ultra-high performance tyre sizes; some, like the 20 inch diameter PZero, are opening up new frontiers: the tuners' intense Golf IV series testing programmes are proof of that relationship, further reinforced by the Pirelli-shod Golf Kit Car, Volkswagen Motorsport's official entry in the World Rally Championship.

The link between homologation on standard production models and the more extreme tyre fitments used by tuners is, in fact, renewed commitment in the motor sport field: collaboration between Pirelli and Volkswagen Motorsport has now been extended to the Lupo Cup and the New Beetle Cup.

After a successful debut in Germany last year, the Lupo Cup Pirelli mono-tyre motor racing championship is coming to Italy and is an extremely useful motor sport " school" . The same goes for the New Beetle, which is fast becoming a millennium end motoring phenomenon: from the Los Angeles Motor Show to Essen, and Detroit it is almost impossible to count the number of elaboration specials which the adoption of Pirelli PZero and P7000 has generated of this truly " evolutionary" Volkswagen. The start in Germany of the Beetle Cup with Pirelli can only bring about more new ideas.