Volkswagen would like very much for me to tell you how fuel efficient the new 2019 Jetta is. They certainly tried to tell me. Frankly, I couldn鈥檛 care less. Road & Track probably isn鈥檛 where you, dear reader, come for in-depth discussions on the fuel economy of four-cylinder sedans whose target customer falls somewhere between a just-graduated, Long Island diva, and an Uber driver. You come here for speed, and they, like I, know this. After ignoring several offers to drive the 2019 Jetta, someone at Volkswagen got wise, and figured out a way to make Road & Track pay attention: build one that goes crazy fast. Which brings me to the Bonneville Salt Flats, a place that needs virtually no introduction. The bright white salt, seemingly endless in the distance, is juxtaposed with the surprisingly close proximity to the highway, from which spectators could easily watch racing. I say seemingly endless because in truth, it鈥檚 quite a lot smaller than I鈥檇 imagined, or than the scale to which most photography makes it look.
Still, it鈥檚 a lot of salt, and it makes you tingle. I鈥檓 here to drive Volkswagen鈥檚 LSR Jetta. In quarter-mile drag racing, it鈥檚 all about horsepower, weight, grip, and gearing. When you extend the course to a half-mile or a standing mile, weight and grip begin to matter less, and aerodynamics, combined with top-gear acceleration come into play. At Bonneville, record holder, safety marshal, and legend Mike Cook tells me, weight is almost irrelevant-it鈥檚 all about power and aerodynamics. 鈥淲e鈥檝e got sleds from the 40s out here weighing in at three tons and hitting 250 MPH. Weight don鈥檛 matter on the salt-power and air matter.鈥?He should know; in 1989 Mr. Cook went 300 mph in a stock-body Ford Thunderbird SC (with a drag coefficient of just 0.31, a still-impressive number today). It鈥檚 good that weight doesn鈥檛 matter, because even without its full interior, the Jetta LSR weighs in at around 3,500 pounds, 300-ish more than stock. That鈥檚 because it has one of the most robust roll cages I鈥檝e ever seen.
The driver鈥檚 seat is practically where the back seat should be; as I get in, I realize my entire torso is behind the B-pillar. Not to undermine the effectiveness of THR鈥檚 work here, but the powertrain in the Jetta LSR is remarkably simple: The basic setup is VW鈥檚 2.0L EA888 direct-injection motor, found in the current GTI. It should also appear in the next Jetta GLI. The displacement, engine block, and cylinder head structure are completely stock. It has upgraded rods and pistons, runs more aggressive camshafts and valves, and uses (obviously) a large Borg-Warner turbocharger. The previously mentioned air-to-ice water intercooler and its cabin-mounted holding tank are the only parts of the powertrain that aren鈥檛 off the rack; these are one-offs, made by hand at THR鈥檚 Ventura, shop. On C16 race fuel, this is good for 600 horsepower to the wheels at 8500 RPM, through a stock VW six-speed manual transmission and a WaveTrac limited-slip differential. There are salt-spec tires with just a hint of tread, pumped up to 60 PSI, with saucer hubcaps. Incredibly, this Jetta is still street legal, though only by coincidence.
THR鈥檚 namesake, Tom Habrzyk, explains the importance of the massive ice tank in the passenger seat, 鈥淭he car has no radiator fans; since you鈥檙e never sitting in traffic you don鈥檛 need them. But there鈥檚 also no other type of motorsport out there where you鈥檙e full-throttle at redline for like, two minutes straight. Even on the longest circuits in the world, you lift a bit, you brake, the engine gets brief periods of rest. At Bonneville, you turn the engine on, go flat for two minutes, then turn it right off. You need the ice water for that, and it鈥檚 all melted by the time you get back. I鈥檓 not remotely scared. It was even easier. I used half-throttle through the first three gears, managing a bit of wheelspin on the salt, and then at around 100 mph in fourth, could finally roll the pedal onto the floorboard. The big turbo is laggy, and doesn鈥檛 make any real power until about 5,000 RPM, but with the long legs, speed builds consistently and easily. I shift into fifth at 120, and then into sixth at 153 mph, at which point, in top gear, the Jetta still packs on 2-3 mph per second.
