FIRST DRIVE
Y
ou wriggle over the side brace for
the rollcage and into a simple,
fixed racing seat. You then buckle a
six-point Momo racing harness. Straight
ahead, behind the perfectly sized Momo
Prototipo three-spoke steering wheel, is a
binnacle with a large tach on the left and a
speedo on the right flanking a tiny vertical
element with water and oil temperature
displays. Three smaller dials—fuel gauge,
oil pressure gauge, and an analog clock—
march across the dash. At first glance, the
instruments look as though they’ve been
lifted from an old Volvo P1800. Then you
notice the tach is redlined at just under
8,000 rpm, and the speedo reads all the
way to 260 kph—162 mph.
Yes, the P1800 Cyan is a Volvo, built
from an original P1800 by Cyan Racing,
Volvo’s official racing partner.
Turn the tiny key on the dash, and the
2.0-liter turbo-four barks to life. The tall,
spindly shifter rattles and buzzes. It’s a
dogleg box, so first gear is across to the
left and back; the throw is long, but the
action is as satisfying as cocking an 1873
Winchester. Reach down to the left of the
seat, squeezing your hand past the rollcage
brace, and release the vintage handbrake.
The clutch is nicely weighted and the bite
point concise. With only modest revs, the
P1800 Cyan pulls away cleanly and crisply.
The engine impresses with its sharp
response, and then—after a few miles,
when everything ’s warmed up—stuns with
its lion-hearted thrust all the way to the
7,700-rpm redline. It has the muscular
punch you’d expect of a turbo mill, but it’s
been tuned so both its power and torque
delivery are much more like those of a
naturally aspirated engine. Peak torque of2021 Volvo P1800 Cyan
336 lb-ft doesn’t arrive until 6,000 rpm;
power peaks at 413 hp at 7,000 rpm.
Despite those numbers, it’s smooth
throughout the rev range, able to whisk
the feathery P1800 Cyan along at brisk
speeds from as little as 1,500 rpm.
Weighing less than 2,200 pounds, the
power-to-weight ratio is better than a
Porsche 911 Turbo S. But to keep the
tach above 5,000 rpm is to discover a
happy place. Yours and the car’s.
It’s an immediate, viscerally mechan-
ical thing, this Volvo. The engine barks
and snarls, the transmission buzzes
and whines, the suspension clonks and
clunks. There’s a precision to the brake
pedal feel, a meatiness to the steering,
and firm control over the roll angles
through corners that leaves you in no
doubt the P1800 Cyan was engineered
by people who build race cars for a
living. Yet the absence of electronic
minders means you still drive it like
a powerful 1960s GT car, braking in
a straight line on corner entry, then
turning in and getting on the throttle
early to balance the chassis, the gas
pedal’s long travel helping you more
easily control the traction.
That’s the exuberance. The irrational
bit is the $500,000 base price.
Angus MacKenzieSPECS 2021* Volvo P1800 Cyan
BASE PRICE $500,000 (est) LAYOUT Front-
engine, RWD, 2-pass, 2-door coupe
ENGINE 2.0L/413-hp/336-lb-ft turbo DOHC
16-valve I-4 TRANSMISSION 5-speed manual
CURB WEIGHT 2,200 lb (mfr) WHEELBASE 96.3 in
L x W x H 165.5 x 68.8 x 48.0 in
EPA FUEL ECON Not rated ON SALE Now
*These restomod vehicles are registered using
the donor P1800’s original 1961-1972 VIN