ATS
Sport 1000
Track
cars like the ATS Sport 1000 are an acquired taste in the looks department but
certainly get back to the basics of driving. ATS must be selling the things,
since it's now announced an update for the 2015 model year. The first part of
that is losing the '1000' part of the name, it's now known only as the ATS
Sport. More significant are the hundred other upgrades ATS has made to improve
the car's performance and driving characteristics.
Among
those is a new stainless steel chassis with an FIA-spec roll bar. The whole
chassis weighs just 99 pounds, just under a tenth of the car's dry weight of
1,036 pounds. ATS has revised the Sport's aerodynamics, offering a little more
wind protection in the cockpit. New component SUPPLIER partnerships have
resulted in a who's who of interior and mechanical parts--Ohlins dampers, AIM
MXL instruments, Sparco steering wheel and harnesses, Tarox 6-pot front and
rear calipers and vented discs, Tillet seats, a Quaife limited-slip
differential and Avon tyres.
There's
more: Every Sport has a full stainless steel exhaust system, 15-inch split-rim
alloy wheels, a race-spec stainless steel fuel tank with a double fuel pump and
a remote oil cooler. Aerodynamic tweaks—including a ground-effect inducing
underbody—result in up to 2,535 lbs of downforce. That's presumably at the
car's top speed, which ATS lists as 155 mph depending on gearing. The same
applies to the car's 2.5-second 0-62 mph run. What's clear is that all Sports
will be fast--any four-cylinder motorcycle engine can be used, though ATS's own
choice is the Suzuki Hayabusa's 1,300 cc unit and variations thereof--producing
between 185 and 255 horsepower.
A
turbocharged model is also available. In this case, the engine is a General
Motors-sourced 1.6-liter, producing 210 horsepower. ATS even lists this model
as Euro 5 emissions compliant. Since ATS offers a road kit for the Sport, it's
even legal for road use in some countries. That may help justify its US$ 66,000
ready-to-drive price, though an engine-less version is also available for just
under US$ 45,000.
