The British car magazine Autocar is reporting that a Williams-prepared version of the fourth-gen Renault Clio will be launched sometime in 2014. It will borrow a lot of the technology from what the French manufacturer has managed to learn in its Formula 1 adventure. We will have to wait until this hotter model will hit the streets because right now Renault is busy with the RS version (pictured) so they don’t want to still its thunder. As you would expect, the Williams model will be even more hardcore and focused than the Clio RS aka Clio Renaultsport 200 Turbo. We don’t know for certain if Williams will be directly involved in the development of the car but this could happen given its involvement in Jaguar’s C-X75 supercar, especially in the hybrid tech.
Since Williams is a client of Renault’s F1 division, there is a high change that the British company will be a part of the development and in return will pay less for the engines that they buy from Renault for the Williams F1 cars. The new iteration of the Clio Williams is expected to be powered by the same 4-cylinder, 1.6-liter turbocharged engine but it will be tuned to churn no less than 220 hp, considerably more than the 197 hp available in the new Clio RS.
As a reminder, the original Renault Clio Williams was launched back in 1993 and it was entirely developed by Renaultsport, after Nigel Mansell managed to win the F1 championship in a Williams that was powered by a Renault engine. The French company planed initially to produce 3,800 units but due to the high demand they ended up rolling 12,100 cars.
Source: Autocar
