Rallye G60 16V: The rarest Golf ever!

• [NOTE] In the video above filmed by our colleagues at Motor1.com Italy, please activate the English language captions found in the player under: Settings->subtitles->auto-translate->English.

It was 29 March 1974 when the first Volkswagen Golf left the Wolfsburg factory. It was the beginning of a legendary saga with over 37 million units sold!

This year therefore marks the 50th anniversary of the Golf and in the Osnabrück plant, where all Golf cabriolets have always been produced (the former Karmann factory, to be specific) and where the T-Roc Cabriolet is now produced, Volkswagen has brought together all the most spectacular sporty Golfs, one-offs, concepts, competition cars and production cars, also anticipating what will be the celebrations for the 50th anniversary of the Golf GTI, expected in 2026.

And among all these Golfs, I have chosen one, the rarest of all mass-produced ones

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5,000 Rallye Golf

We all know this one, or almost all of them. They made 5,000 of them and there are only a few left in the UK, but the Rallye Golf was immediately considered a cult object.

Bomb-shaped mudguards as was the fashion in the late 1980s (thanks to the Lancia Delta!), rectangular headlights and a rather showy aerodynamic kit, considering that it is still a Golf II.

But the real protagonist remained the G60 engine, the 1.8-litre with the addition of the snail supercharger whose duct had precisely the shape of a 'G', but reduced displacement from 1,781 to 1,760 cc, so as to make it fall within the 1700 class. However, it was equiped with a larger intercooler to compensate for the slight drop in performance due to the smaller displacement.

The road car had the same power as the GTI, 160 PS, but due to the Syncro all-wheel drive system it lost something in speed (from 134 to 130 mph) and acceleration (from 8.3 to 8.6 seconds in 0-62 mph).

The rare pearl!

Before this video, I had never seen it live and, at Volkswagen, they were quite clear in describing it as the rarest of mass-produced Golfs.

It's called the Rallye Golf G60 16V and the Volkswagen Motorsport department only produced 12 of them, and all of them with power that increases from the 160 PS of the regular Rallye to 210 PS, with the top speed touching 140 mph.

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