I have no idea what Opel’s Performance Centre (OPC) looks like. Maybe its some sort of lab on an industrial estate near Russelsheim filled with stern Germans who get aroused by data and high on rolled-up torque graphs. Whatever or wherever it is, the men who worked there needed a holiday, and instead of heading for an island and dancing badly on Coco-Rico at a discoteca they went to a place called the Nordschleife: The Nurburgring or The Green Hell: a nickname borrowed from American GI’s who fought the Japanese on the islands of Guadalacanal. It is as brutal, torturous and unforgiving as the island fighting of World War 2 on both cars and drivers. It has every kind of corner you can imagine and some you probably can’t, like the “Flugplatz” complex where F1 cars would regularly leave the ground. There are so many corners and lines that the circuit is impossible to learn and the sheer mesmerising diversity of twists and turns are ideal for developing a certain type of car. Whether the OPC was developed at the Nürburgring or merely carries the Nordschleife graphic on its B-pillar is also shrouded in mystery. It certainly acts like it would be a German beer barrel of laughs around there, though.
Settling into the almost wing-backed Recaro racing seats you get this great sense of being cosseted inside a proper projectile. Aesthetically, the Nurburgring Edition has changed slightly with a different rear and front bumper and is also available in two colours unique to the range: mamba green (the East Rand rejoices) and the one I had called Coppertone Henna (Jersey Shore rejoices). Mechanically they’ve added brakes by Brembo who know more about stopping abruptly than minibus taxi drivers, a Remus exhaust to provide some snarl to this angry little honey badger and importantly a mechanical slip differential the likes of which is available on the John Cooper Works MINIs. This diff basically tries to make sense of the 280nM (with Overboost) of torque and 154kW coursing through the front wheels. It reduces wheel slip when you’re gunning it in straight lines and torque steer through the twisty parts of a Boksburg parking lot pretending you’re on the Nurburgring’s Karosel corner.
Driving it hard you realise just how trick the suspension set up is courtesy of Bilstein. Angling the OPC very slowly into my rather steep driveway of an evening means one of the rear wheels pops up off the road. A skateboard’s suspension isn’t this stiff. Its on rails through corners and while there’s still a huge amount of torque steer it seems to be reigned in as the revs climb on its way to 100km/h in 6.8 seconds, 0.4 quicker than the standard OPC.
There’s no way around it, R343 000 is a lot of cash for a car this tiny and your mates will look a bit daft cramped into the back of it on Matric Holiday in Umhlanga, but for pure race bred aggression and something that stands out this much a few hard core Opel fans and spoilt boets in vests will no doubt take the plunge.
ENGINE: 1.6litre OPC Turbo
TOP SPEED: 230km/h
0-100: 6.8 secs
TORQUE: 280nM (With Overboost)
PRICE: R343 000
Written by Gavin Williams.
