XYZ Racing Tarmac Rally Coilovers — Audi A3 SPORTBACK 8V Φ55 (Rear Multi-Link Suspension) 2012-2020

The 8V A3 Sportback’s multi-link rear end was built for a hatchback doing school runs, not for stage work – under compression on broken tarmac it moves in ways the factory dampers were never sized to control. XYZ Racing’s Tarmac Rally coilover replaces both ends with a damper tuned specifically for sealed-stage work: fast, repeated hits from surface changes rather than the smooth, sustained loading of a circuit.

This is the spec for owners running the 8V on closed tarmac stages, where the road surface itself is the obstacle – camber changes, patched sections, mid-corner bumps taken at speed. It is not a fast-road comfort setup, and it is not tuned for slick-and-slalom circuit driving; it is built around absorbing repeated impact without unsettling the car.

What this coilover does for your 2012-2020 Audi A3 SPORTBACK

Stage tarmac throws up sharp, repeated inputs that a road-biased damper struggles to control without kicking the body around. The Tarmac Rally’s damping curve is set to absorb the jolt through a big hit – a pothole edge, a broken patch, a compression at speed – rather than transmitting it straight into the chassis. That keeps the tyre loaded and in contact with the road instead of skipping across it, which is where the traction actually comes from on a loose or patched surface. Because the front and rear rates are matched to the 8V’s multi-link rear geometry, the car settles back onto line faster after a hit instead of wallowing through the following corner. The result on your A3 Sportback is a car that stays composed when the stage surface stops being smooth – which, on a UK rally stage, is most of it.

About the Tarmac Rally coilover

The Tarmac Rally is XYZ Racing’s damper for sealed-stage competition, built to take the impact of uneven pavement without passing it straight through to the body. Internally it’s tuned to soak up big single hits – a broken road edge, a sharp compression – and suppress the resulting body movement, keeping the contact patch loaded rather than letting the tyre skip. That control is what XYZ frames as the payoff: more consistent traction through a stage rather than a single peak grip number. The valving that underpins this comes directly from XYZ’s own tarmac rally programme, carried over from their racing experience rather than derived from road-car data. The stated aim is stability that translates into handling the driver can trust corner to corner, which matters more on a stage than outright stiffness. It’s a damper built for a specific discipline, not a general-purpose performance upgrade dressed up as one.

Fitment for the Audi A3 SPORTBACK (2012-2020)

Built for the 8V-generation A3 Sportback, chassis code AU12-2, covering the 2012 to 2020 production run. This fitment is specific to the Φ55 strut-diameter, multi-link rear suspension variant of the 8V – confirm your car uses this rear axle configuration before ordering, as the 8V range was sold with more than one rear suspension layout across markets.

What buyers also search for

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Spec your 8V A3 Sportback for stage work with the Tarmac Rally kit – configure yours below.