Hyundai continues to occasionally throw us tantalizing tidbits towards the real thing – the Ioniq-5 N version. In recent months we’ve been introduced to the division’s electric prototype cars, we’ve heard their commitment to providing pleasure well into the future, and we’ve only seen a few images of the above electric performance car shared by them. Now, they’re upping the ante again and showing a video of her skating through the freezing snow of Sweden, wheel to wheel with the rally drivers of the official WRC team (i20).
The electric Ionique N, here in a camouflaged video, is the first product of Hyundai, and one of the important ventures of Albert Beerman (former chief engineer in BMW’s M division) that mixes the worlds of pure performance with electricity in the serial aspect, which will be accessible to the public without allocations and restrictions. There is some reliable technical information about it that can be reported: apart from the fact that it will have dual drive, an 80 Kvtch battery and according to publications in Sweden around 586 horsepower and north of there, the contribution of its two electric motors which translate somewhere between 3.5-3.3 s to 100 km/h, is It will also be balanced in the weight distribution and very reinforced on the braking side due to the weight of the battery.
It was also learned that it is calibrated with specific driving modes only for it, one of which is a drift selector called N Drift Optimizer, which, among other things, changes the feedback from the steering wheel, the brakes and the grip systems to allow the driver to slide it sideways like a classic rear-wheel drive car. It is also armed with a control that simulates gear shifting (Ne-shift) and to maximize the conventional experience also a mechanism that imitates engine and gearbox sounds (N-SOUND).
At minus 30 degrees, the elephant in the room is the driving range eaten up by the freezing temperatures in Sweden, and for that there is no official answer from Hyundai or any promises. Considering that it is tested under continuous loads, and assuming that the battery is able to extract 450-500 kilometers in normal driving, it is highly likely that it will lose a significant percentage in demanding driving. On the other hand, economy and performance do not go hand in hand, and those who choose the N version do not live under illusions.
price: 58-62 thousand euros. Full official disclosure in July. Will be available in Israel in the future.