The year 1998 is a Very Special year for the Automotive world because, in the year 1998, 2 World Records were set, both by Man's favorite mode of transportation, Cars, and Motorcycles. The first record was the one set by the McLaren F1 which made the World record of the world's fastest production Cartopping out at 391 Kmph and then was the Suzuki Hayabusa which broke the record set by the Honda Firebird and went on to do a top speed of 312 Kmph, the automotive world was shaken that year! 2 Decades later, the Successor of both these Legendary machines Lives on with their newer iterations.
The F1 had its successor in the form of the Mclaren P1 which some people around the world didn’t really consider as a successor because of all the Hybrid tech and the presence of the normal 2 seats instead of the 3-seat layout of the original F1.
And now we have the Speedtail which if we look carefully is the 3rd generation of the Mclaren F1, some people consider this to be the one that really pays tribute to the original f1 because of the 3-structure layout.
The same is the case with Hayabusa, it went into Production in 1999, was made for about 10 years without an upgrade and in 2009 finally received an upgrade in terms of the power and the performance output, and in 2021 it has got some styling upgrades as well, the power has gone down a bit but the performance has stayed the same.
But these two incidents are just the highlight, there were some other things that influenced the Automotive Industry for once and for all, one of those things was the launch of the Audi 2+2 tt, which as we all know is one of the most loved sportscars around the world.
The Audi TT has also evolved from being fun to drive a cute-looking car to one of the fastest and powerful Sportscars available in the market today and many of them are being tuned to push out supercar levels of power and torque numbers.
Another incident that happened in 198 was the launch of the 2nd generation of the Renault Clio, different versions of the Clio were launched, a diesel version was launched too but the best of all was the one with the 3.0 Litre V6 engine.
The European Car of that year was the Alfa Romeo 156 which was a Wagon and it was the replacement for the Alfa Romeo 155.
This might have surprised a lot of you that Alfa Romeo also used to make such cars but it’s the truth those were some really good times when manufacturers used to experiment around with different types of body style for cars.
Last but not least Volkswagen launched a New Generation of beetle which as we all know is one of the most selling cars of all time.
I trust now you be satisfied with the significance of the year 1998 in Motoring history!
If you liked it then share it with your friends and do consider subscribing to Motordrift for more such content in the future!
Till then
Ciao
