It’s been a big few weeks for fully prepared rally cars from car manufacturers, although the two most notable examples are as different as a Taco Bell combo meal and a lunar rover. While the Rally6-ready Lancia Ypsilon HF Racing takes a conventional, if budget-friendly, approach, the Alpine A290 Rallye is something else entirely. Sure, it’s a turn-key prepared rally car, but it’s also 100 percent electric.
If the A290 Rallye looks like a Renault 5, that’s because it basically is one. Since Alpine is Renault’s performance division, the regular A290 is a hot hatch version of the new Renault 5, with up to 217 horsepower from a single front-mounted electric motor and a 52 kWh battery pack. Unsurprisingly, output is unchanged for the A290 Rallye, but that doesn’t mean other tweaks aren’t extensive.
For instance, the A290 Rallye gets a ZF mechanical limited-slip differential to better put the power down on loose surfaces. If one wheel starts to slip, torque will be routed to the other front wheel to aid forward progress rather than simply spin one tire. Downstream of the differential, 13.8-inch front discs clamped by six-piston calipers join the party, and a set of awesome Evo Corse wheels wrapped in Michelin Pilot Sport A rubber add serious presence. Of course, any rally car worth its salt needs specialized suspension, so Alpine has tapped the expertise of ALP Racing Suspension, trusted by the likes of Team FJ and Funyo. Rounding it all off is a hydraulic handbrake for initiating rotation by locking up the rear wheels, perfect for hairpins.
Of course, modifications like those aren’t where the bulk of the money is spent building a rally car. That would be the safety department, as the FIA has a stringent set of regulations that, unfortunately, were written in blood. Legends have laid down their lives in the process of making rallying as safe as it is today, and that rulebook needs to be followed line-by-line. With that in mind, the A290 Rallye features a full FIA-spec cage, homologated Sabelt race seats, and all the safety gear needed for it to compete in sanctioned events.
Serious stuff over, let’s talk about something a bit less somber-sounding. The buzz of a small turbocharged engine is the soundtrack of rally, and it serves as warning that a car’s about to come rocketing past. Electric cars don’t make this sound, so Alpine has fitted a speaker to the outside of the A290 Rallye to bring a little more presence to its fully prepared electric rally car.
Speaking of, this isn’t just a concept, but an eRally5 car people can actually buy, with a price tag of €59,990, or about $70,500 at current conversion rates. That’s not bad, all things considered, and it’ll even come with a spec-style event. Beyond entering standard stage rally events, the Alpine A290 Rallye will get its own one-make challenge in France, with Alpine providing a whole paddock section and charging infrastructure. Want to check this thing out in person ahead of time? It’ll be on display at this year’s Goodwood Festival of Speed.
Top graphic image: Alpine
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A French racing vehicle that doesn’t make enough noise? They need a sound to warn people it is coming?
I think a recording of Yvette Horner is the only answer.
Seems cool. buy by the I time i could it to my garage, seems like it would at least $80-90K. So sorry. No thank you.
$70k!?
This makes the regular Renault 5 look like a steal at less than half the price. Same power, same shape. Hydraulic handbrake is a gimmick, you can mod the suspension later, change wheels and tires, etc. The LSD is the only worthy extra.
The A110 can cost whatever the hell it wants because it’s unique. This is just a special edition of an economy EV.
Speaker unnecessary unless it plays the national anthem of France as it zipps by (joke?). NO fake ICE noises.
How about some Zazie or the soundtrack to Notre Dame de Paris? If not them then I would go with Clash or Paint it Black by The Rolling Stones.
You had me at rally car.
The comparison really shows two worlds. The Alpine will not go to the USA, and the Corvette C8 is something we won’t see here often. The people who drive a Corvette here, really want them, in the Netherlands the grey imported ones cost 3 times as much as in the US. (€160.000 or more, $188.000 or more)
They couldn’t even make the rally special AWD or RWD… Please, Renault. You’re free of constraints with electrics, give the people what they want!
Possibly they were aiming for a specific race class which only allows 2wd?
Purely anecdotally, Rallying seems to be one of the few motorsports where FWD has an explicit fanbase (at the lower rungs of course, the big leagues are AWD or nothing now for obvious reasons).
Man can we just get a 2.0 liter turbocharged 5-speed with fulltime awd and 3 limited slip differentials.
Pretty please?
It has the face of a walrus. I guess for a machine without cylinders, it couldn’t be a seal.
It’s pretty sweet looking but wish they’d just sell more EVs that looked like this, or the Renault A5, Golf GTI looking, CRX, just fun sporty hatch back EVs. Maybe if the Rivian R3 takes off others might jump on it, if the Rivian R3 takes off at all.
I was thinking this too. I was very excited with the Ionic 5 when it came out, until I saw one and realized it was huge. For some reason I thought it was second gen BMW MINI sized but infact it was a full four door car and about 125% larger than I pictured it.
Yeah the Ionic 5 looks sweet but is pretty beefy, if they updated the Kona to look like it, that’d be good sized.
What if instead of ICE exhaust sounds, or some meep meep noises, the external speaker made Tesla coil sparking noises?
https://youtu.be/vhlxfW9dqVU?si=MrjPto-4OZIM2qHH
I really like the motor whine of my EVs, I feel like if they just muffled that less and/or channeled it a bit more, it’d sound pretty sweet.
I genuinely think that when we’re actually fully in the EV age, some kind of gap sparking like this is going to be the signifier of power for these vehicles. This external speaker ice sound bullshit’s got some real “Morse code over a telephone line” vibes – these cars are playing with power levels that would’ve covered small cities 50 years ago, lean into the Thor vibes already.
I love this and the Hyundai Insteroid. More fun, funky EVs, please!
The more rally cars the better!
Kinda sad to see Alpine now electric but the A110 will always be one of my favorite cars of all time. I finally saw one in the flesh at an auto salon in Salt Lake and it was glorious.