Bugatti’s early racing icons inform today’s hypercar excellence.
Bugatti has over a century of history to reminisce regarding automotive excellence, as the manufacturer has been providing the world with pioneering luxury and performance since its dawn. However, it’s recently chosen to revere the legacy of the Type 35, especially surrounding the reveal of the new Bugatti Tourbillon hypercar, which is inspired by the Type 35’s racing success.
As one of Bugatti’s most successful race cars ever, the Type 35 clinched over 1,000 race victories in its time. Its reputation for Grand Prix victories is in part thanks to its innovative weight savings, impeccable engineering, and pioneering design. A century after the Type 35’s 1924 debut, the new Bugatti Tourbillon hypercar evokes the same philosophy from which the Type 35 was born, which is to create a beautiful, luxurious car with groundbreaking performance-oriented innovation.
Like the Type 35 with its aluminum wheels and hollow axles, the new Bugatti Tourbillon goes to great lengths to save weight, compensating for its hybrid V16 powertrain by employing a carbon fiber body and 3D-printed suspension components. It’s not even only the Tourbillon that is inspired by the longstanding legacy of the Bugatti Type 35. The Bolide, Bugatti’s track-only W16-powered hypercar, also features ‘Type 35 100 Anniversaire’ motifs on its fenders, and the example that graced this year’s Goodwood Festival of Speed was finished in ‘Bleu de Lyon’ a color that is reminiscent of the Type 35 and honors its Lyon, France debut.
With an unparalleled level of automotive excellence seen in its creations both from the past and today, Bugatti has a rich history to be inspired by and build upon with its new hypercars like the 1,800-horsepower, V16 hybrid Tourbillon. With its racing success, the Bugatti Type 35 served as the perfect forefather to inform Bugatti’s latest hypercar creation.
Image Source: Bugatti
