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Comment by svara | Hacker News Reader

Note this refers to the activities of Volkswagen Motorsport GmbH [1], which races VW brand cars (and sometimes Skoda apparently?). It does not apply to Volkswagen group as a whole, which would have included Audi, Porsche, Lamborghini and many more brands.

[1] https://www.volkswagen-newsroom.com/en/press-releases/ready-...

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This move barely makes a dent to the automobile or racing industry.

VW doesn't really have extensive racing programs comparing to other marques like BMW, Mercedes, and of course VW group's own Audi and Porsche.

Well, they won the FIA WRC Driver Championship in 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016. So there is that.

Racing car market is much bigger than WRC.

Look at any semi-successfull touring car series: its prettu much guaranteed that a third of grid will be race cars from VW group.

I think it's not so much its impact on racing, it's just an indication that VW doesn't care anymore about showing off its internal combustion cars.

Agree. Big meh in the sport. Eco considerations aside it's amusing that they're using this as a platform. Racing is largely not about the powertrain. And emissions are... whoops we made them up.

How very far we’ve come in the last 15 years that “racing is largely not about the powertrain” and that an electric racing car is unremarkable.

My fault for not pointing out the irony more explicitly. VW is reportedly paying $15bn+ for cheating on emissions. If they had said they are axing all of their diesel vehicles and replacing them with electric I would be jumping for joy. They basically chose to take the smallest pain point for the largest reward by touting these credentials. Having actually built F1 cars you should think of them as aeroplanes that never take off. All of the top racing is aero dependant more than anything nowadays.

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