For Sale: 1988 Audi 200 Quattro Trans-Am
Images via Canepa
This Audi 200 Quattro Trans-Am, driven in its time by Hans-Joachim Stuck and Walter Röhrl, played a significant role in Audi’s domination of the 1988 Trans-Am Championship. It’s up for sale at Canepa.
Audi’s 200 Quattro Trans-Am was the first competitor to run an all wheel drive system in Trans-Am and pitted a 2.1-litre turbocharged 5-cylinder against the might of the American V8 muscle that dominated the series.
TA/4 would run under the #14 race number with another Audi 200 Quattro – TA/2. Throughout the season Hans-Joachim Stuck and Walter Röhrl would handle driving duties for that #14 car, while a third chassis, TA/3, was driven by Hurley Haywood under #44.
The car debuted in April of 1988 at the Long Beach circuit with Hans-Joachim Stuck driving. It finished a somewhat unflattering 29th, although the #44 car would place second with Hurley Haywood at the wheel. Haywood went one better in the following race and claimed Audi’s first Trans-Am win in Dallas.
Throughout the season #14 would win five times, including an impressive four race streak in which Röhrl won the Niagara Falls race and Hans-Joachim Stuck followed up in Cleveland, Brainerd and Meadowlands. Stuck would win once more at Mid-Ohio in September, and TA/4 would add a final win to its tally in St. Petersberg under race number 4.
The Audis were hot property, and won eight of the championship’s thirteen races despite increasing SCCA restrictions that saw them gaining 100 kilograms and a more severe air restrictor. Audi claimed the 1988 Trans-Am Constructors’ Championship, with Hurley Haywood taking the drivers’ crown.
When 1989 came around the SCCA banned all-wheel-drive from the series and mandated American engines for the cars, so Audi was unable to put on an encore performance.
TA/4 was sold to AudiSport South Africa in 1989 and raced in the Wesbank Modified Saloon championship with eleven time South African Rally Driver Champion ‘Supervan’ Sarel Van Der Merwe at the wheel. Van der Merwe was back in the car for 1990, before it took on a Minolta sponsorship in 1991 and was driven by Terry Moss to the championship.
From there the car went back to AudiSport Germany, who sold it to Steve Zlotkin in California – the car’s one and only private owner.
Zlotkin returned the car to its original 1988 Trans-Am spec, and that’s how it’s presented today. It’s ready to race and has competed successfully at the Rolex Monterey Motorsports Reunion and the Sonoma Historics, and was shown earlier in 2016 at the Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance.
It’s sold with a full set of spares and would be more than welcome at historic racing events around the world.
For the full details, head to Canepa’s website here.
Images via Canepa
