Let me start this feature with a question: What is dedication? The answer is simple. Dedication is not giving up, pulling through against all odds and sticking to your goals. Dedication like Stefan Spies demonstrates with his ’97 GTI.
Not many people would stick with the same car after 4 accidents, all of them financial write-offs as well. If that wasn’t enough, Stefan has owned the car now for well over 100.000 kms and the mileage is currently a stunning 340.000kms. Not bad, for a car this clean!
When Stefan got the car it was a pretty much stock GTI 20. Jahre – the anniversary model to celebrate 20 years of GTIs in europe – eqipped with the 2.0 8 valve engine. The only mod by the previous owner was a set of lowering springs.
For some reason, the previous owner also cut out the fender lip of the rear fenders – which proved to be very inviting to the diseease known as rust. Stefan had to do quite some work getting the rear end of the car back into good shape!
As mentioned earlier, over the course of the years, he’s also had 4 different accidents with the car. Each of these was a financial write-off and needed quite some repairs after the fact. Most people would have abandoned the car after the first or the second write off, but not Stefan.
Today, the car is sitting on a set of Vogtland coilovers at their lowest setting, combined with some Supersport strut bearings up front, which bring another 20mm of drop.
As for wheels, they are the stock two-piece BBS RS722 measuring 7×16 ET43 with the lips painted body colour and the centers painted gloss black. The much needed flushness was provided by 25mm spacers in the front and 30mm in the rear, pushing the offset to ET18 in the front and ET13 in the rear.
Wrapped around the wheels are a set of Hankook Ventus Evo S1 in 195/40/16, which glue the car nicely to the road. The outside remained stock apart from a set of Hella dual round headlights.
Seeing as the car was a 20. Jahre GTI, it came stock with a set of sports seats wrapped in a fabric unique to the 20 Jahre. Not paying a second thought to their exclusivety, Stefan ripped them out and replaced them with a set of black leather Recaros from a GTI Colour Concept.
The Recaros were necessary to hold him firm in his place when he tackles a certain task – lapping the Nürburgring Nordschleife.
Yes, you read that right. Stefan regularly visits the ring in his stanced Golf. So much for “Stance can’t handle”!
You may have noticed that the wheels aren’t exactly very wide (although the spacers make up for that fact certainly!), here’s a hint to get you very excited for hat he’s planning for summer this year: 9×16 on all 4 corners. And there’s also that 2.0 16v engine sitting in his garage…
So be certain to keep your eyes and ears open, for Stefan and his Mk3 will be visiting quite a number of shows this year!
That was it for this time… be sure to check in again, because car features will be a recurring theme for our posts!
