Volkswagen Golf GTD Coming To North America
The Volkswagen Golf GTD will indeed be offered for sale in North America. The high performance turbodiesel compact hatchback had previously been shown off at auto shows and to journalists earlier this year without a firm promise that the package would make its way across the Atlantic when the next-generation Golf was made available as a 2015 model, but VW has now set the record straight for enthusiasts excited about the model.
The Volkswagen Golf GTD combines the most interesting bits of the Golf GTI's sport suspension system with a 184 horsepower, 2.0-liter four-cylinder turbodiesel engine. Also capable of producing 280 lb-ft of torque, the motor allows the GTD to hit 100 km/h in roughly seven seconds. More importantly, the Golf GTD will also return fuel economy of 5.88 l/100 km during highway driving.
The move comes after a wave of turbodiesel popularity has caused Volkswagen's U.S. TDI sales to rise 10 percent compared to the year before. The Golf is one of the most important cars in the entire Volkswagen portfolio, and the GTD could make up as much as 10 percent of the models leaving showrooms worldwide.
