Opel’s new Corsa OPC is Nürburgring-tested, will debut at Geneva

When the Geneva Motor Show opens its doors in a month’s time, you can expect a few new entrants into the supercar club, a few over-designed concepts and…a new hot hatch from Opel.

Now before you yawn and click away from the page, we feel we should tell you that Opel’s very serious about the new Corsa OPC.

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How serious? Well, it’s tested the 207bhp on the Nürburgring for one. It also claims the car can do 0 to 100 km/h in 6.8 seconds and that it has a maximum speed 230 km/h. That’s plenty fast in a car that small.

Given that kind of performance, it’s surprisingly subtle on the looks front. There are no racing stripes, no neon paint jobs and ludicrously large air-scoops.

That said, the front air-intakes, rear spoiler and sculpted door sills ensure that you’re unlikely to mistake this for the kind of Corsa your gran would be happy to drive (unless your gran happens to be a speed freak).

As we’ve already pointed out, its powertain — which comes in the shape of a 1.6l turbocharged petrol unit — is capable of putting 207bhp. It also has maximum torque of 245 Nm between 1 900 and 5 800 rpm with an additional 35 Nm available when required with the overboost functionality.

Given that this hot hatch is about performance, Opel hasn’t made much of the Corsa OPC’s interior tech features, focusing instead on the fact that it comes with Frequency Selective Damping (FSD), a technology which apparently “enables the damping forces to adapt to the frequency of the car, thus enabling the balancing act between uncompromising athleticism and an adequate level of comfort”. Right. Oh, there’s also an electronic stability program (ESP) and the traction control (TC).