2025 Audi RS3 Breaks Nurburgring Record Before Official Reveal
The BMW M2 has lost its Nurburgring lap record to a pre-production 2025 Audi RS3, and it did so in a pretty dramatic fashion.
The all-new 2025 Audi S3 was unveiled back in April with fresh styling, more power, and even the RS3‘s drift mode, to boot. However, that same range-topper – the 2025 Audi RS3 – has yet to be completely revealed, and instead, we’ve only been treated to teasers and heavily-camouflaged prototypes at this time. That didn’t stop Audi from taking a pre-production 2025 RS3 prototype to the Nurburgring recently, where that model managed to smash the lap record for compact cars at the iconic track.
However, the 2025 Audi RS3 didn’t just set a new record for compact cars at the Nurburgring – it absolutely smashed it with an official lap time of 7:33.123 minutes, which is a whopping five plus seconds quicker than the previous record-holder, the BMW M2, a car that claimed that title less than a year ago. Audi Sport racing and development driver Frank Stippler was the hot shoe who pulled off this monumental feat.
According to Audi, it managed to set a new watermark here for a few important reasons – largely, the car’s trick tech that includes a torque splitter, fully-variable torque distribution, electronic stabilization control, wheel-selective torque control (brake torque vectoring), and the RS sports suspension’s optional adaptive dampers. The new RS3’s modular vehicle dynamics controller has also been treated to a bit of a tune to improve sensitivity and lateral dynamics, too.
“That was the key to our success. The new RS3 turns in more willingly at corner entry thanks to fine-tuning – including brake torque vectoring – which allows the vehicle to be positioned earlier and better for corner exit from the apex, at the latest,” Stippler said of his record run. “The result is a lower steering angle from apex to corner exit, which leads to less friction and earlier acceleration, allowing you to carry more momentum and speed onto each subsequent straight.”
Power for this 2025 Audi RS3 still comes from the turbocharged 2.5-liter inline-five-cylinder engine, which in European guise as seen here, churns out 395 horsepower and 369 pound-feet of torque. The record-setting 2025 Audi RS3 was also equipped with 19-inch ceramic brakes, as well as a set of super-sticky Pirelli P Zero Trofeo R semi-slick tires, a combination that proved unstoppable at Green Hell, it seems.
Photos: Audi
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