Opel Insignia GSi quicker than Insignia OPC at the Nürburgring

If you were worried that the incoming ‘Eurodore’ wouldn’t be quick, here’s something to put your mind at ease.

It turns out Opel is quite good at making its new cars go faster than its older cars, even if the new cars have smaller engines.

To prove this, Opel sent the ‘top-spec’ Insignia GSi around the Nurbugring with its director of performance cars and motorsport, Volker Strycek, at the wheel.

Opel hasn’t confirmed a lap time, but says the car was “up to twelve seconds per lap quicker than previous Insignia OPC.”

But if anyone was likely to get a good time out of the Insignia, it was Strycek. Aside from being Opel’s fast car guru, he was also the inaugural DTM champion during its first year in 1984, and has since been racing on and off.

And, just to make sure both cars had equal chances, he drove the more powerful OPC around the ring back when it was being tested.

More importantly, he won the Nürburgring 24-hour race in an Opel Astra V8 Coupé in 2003.

What made the GSi so much quicker? Strycek says it was down to agility.

“As soon as the course becomes more demanding such as in the corners or stretches with low friction, i.e. when the car needs to react in an especially agile and precise manner, the GSi is definitely faster and easy to control.”

It also probably helps on that front that the GSi is more than 160kg lighter than the OPC.