ABT Sportsline

This year the 2010 Geneva Auto Show was like a buffet in which I hand-picked all the types of food. The manufacturers were the staples; steak, potatoes, a dessert platter, etc. I expected them to be there and taste good, as usual. But the real treats this year came from the tuners. They are the crazy geniuses that take a mass-produced car into their kitchens and create something extraordinary and (for better or worse) original. There were lots of tuners and coach-builders showing their wares at Geneva this year, and here are my 5 favorites in no specific order:

When the first 4.2-liter Audi R8 hit the scene, it made a nice splash, but was relegated to a performance niche (420 horsepower) that was sort of like no man's land for supercars. The original mumbo-jumbo was that Audi didn't want to compete with the upmarket Gallardo and would keep the R8 as an almost-exotic. However, when Audi finally took the gloves off and released the exquisite Audi R8 5.2 FSI, a much more emphatic reaction resulted with a collective "hell yeah!" heard from auto junkies worldwide.

But with 525 horsepower still the equivalent of "nice job Audi but we'll take it from here" amongst high end tuners, it was inevitable that some extreme performance variations would emerge. PPI delivered one of the first examples with their 580 horsepower Razor GTR and now ABT Sportline has followed suit with their 600 hp Audi R8 5.2 FSI.

Germany's Geiger Cars is a US auto importer that has been tinkering with American muscle cars and trucks for almost 30 years. Their tuning chops are well established and Geiger has modified everything from Hummers to the Ford GT. One of our favorite creations is their 809 hp Corvette Z06 Wild Thing. So, it's really no surprise that they have recently taken a special interest in America's hottest selling sports car, the Chevy Camaro.

ABT Sportsline has been providing auto customization packages for over 5 decades now and were around back when the original GTI version of the Volkswagen Golf came out in 1976. The new 2009 VW Golf GTI marks ABT's sixth pass at modifying this storied hatchback as it has received various model revisions and upgrades over the years. Of course, ABT Sportsline modifications all start with the engine and, in this case, the company is offering two substantial upgrades.

ABT Sportsline is a great tuning operation out of Germany that traditionally has focused on putting out wicked Audi mods and other cars from the Volkswagon Group. They have now teamed up with Austrian motorcycle manufacturer KTM to offer the X-Bow road racer. As the official outlet for both sales and service, ABT will have a lock-down on this ridiculously cool vehicle.

The KTM X-Bow originally was released with a 2.0L turbocharged V6 capable of 240 bhp. With a curb weight of only 1500 pounds, the car rockets from 0 to 62 mph in 3.9 seconds. With ABT's tinkering the engine output has been boosted to 300 hp. With the addition of significant carbon fiber treatment, and therefore a reduction in weight, the ABT version should be insanely fast.