Wörthersee GTI Treffen Is Dead, Long Live GTI FanFest

You don’t really have to be all that into the VW scene to know about the legend of Wörthersee. Starting in 1982, the lake in Austria’s Carinthia region would play host to GTI Treffen (meeting, for those of us who can’t speak German), a pilgrimage of sorts for anyone with a keen interest in GTIs, Volkswagens and in its later years, anything within the vast VW Group.

Although never officially a Volkswagen-hosted event, it became one of the manufacturer’s most important dates on the calendars. Not only was it pumping millions into sponsoring the event over the years, but it also served as inspiration for some of its most memorable concept cars. Remember the Golf W12 of 2007? That was built especially for the Treffen.

As with many things, the Treffen was brought to a halt by Covid-19 in 2020. However, it was never to return, with its death knell rung early in 2023 by Maria Wörth, the local municipality. It cited climate change, the event outgrowing the region and ultimately the patience of the residents who weren’t all too pleased with hundreds of modified VWs descending on an otherwise sleepy lake.

This is where Volkswagen stepped in. Keen not to lose out on not-so-arguably the biggest opportunity to market to a shedload of GTI diehards, the manufacturer announced last year it would be hosting its own take on Wörthersee right on its doorstep.

Which leads me to Wolfsburg, Germany. If you’ve never visited the city before, the best way to describe it is a bit like Volkswagen’s Wonka. Within minutes of entering, you clock the fact that quite literally nearly every car on the road is a VW and if it isn’t, it’s something from one of the group’s vast number of brands.

The city skyline is dominated by the four chimneys of the manufacturer’s biggest plant, itself surrounded by the Autostadt –  a Frutiger Aero-aesthetic complex that serves as a tourist attraction and interactive museum of Volkswagen’s history.

A short walk from there is Volkswagen Arena, home of Bundesliga-level football club VfL Wolfsburg, itself with origins as a team formed by the car manufacturer’s factory workers and owned to this day by Volkswagen AG.

It’s the surrounding concourses and car parks of the stadium that play host to the new event, officially known as GTI FanFest but still dubbed the Treffen by the masses that have come along to sample the new event.

With a large corporation taking over a once very much enthusiast-hosted event, there may naturally be the fear of this becoming less of a celebration of the GTI and more of a marketing exercise. But that’s not the feeling you immediately get when walking up to the turnstiles.

Dozens of strategically placed cars litter the entrance to the event, but not the ones you’d necessarily expect. A couple of heavily-modified Mk1s are plastered in official event branding but rather than using this as a chance to market the freshly-released Mk8.5 GTI, it’s a platform for the enthusiasts.

My eyes are drawn to two bright-green matching early examples of the Golf, while across from those is a tastefully-tweaked Polo Harlequin. Further down is a track-prepped Lupo GTI and an especially sweet Mk2. Down from those are a few stretched cars, including one Pennsylvania-plated ‘Gooooolf TDI’, with a completely open rear deck adorned by a pair of parasols. And that’s just a small sample of the metal out here.

There’s a pleasant buzz inside the show itself – pretty busy, but not overly crowded. Clearly, the move west hasn’t put many people off making the pilgrimage.

Volkswagen has clearly made the most of being able to move some of its hidden-away cars across to the show with ease with little pockets of interesting stuff. There’s a display dominated by modified GTIs built for Worthersees past, while around the corner there is a line for each anniversary edition of Golf GTIs.

It hasn’t just brought across stuff limited to a Grand Touring Injection badge, either. An R-specific display has the usual suspects as well as some pretty rare items, including a unicorn-status Touareg W12 alongside a one-off Mk6 Golf with a VR6, built as a proof-of-concept for a six-cylinder, 456bhp R that would never come to be.

A short walk away and past several vendors (making sure to stop for currywurst, naturally) will take you to a stage, with some sort of interview with passionate owners constantly happening alongside their car placed front-and-centre. Volkswagen CEO Thomas Schäfer makes an appearance to address the crowd at one stage, just to emphasise how important this new Treffen is to the company.

For all the slick and well-judged displays within the show itself though, and with many of these events, the car park is the star of it all.

Here is where you’ll find the real passion. It’s naturally a sea of modified Golf GTIs and, although dominated by German-registered cars, it’s clear many have come from far and wide. There’s a strong UK contingent, a few from Scandinavia, the odd Polish plate and even a Mk1 someone had driven all the way from Kosovo.

Even more surprising is how many have made the trek from North America, with more than a handful of US and Canada-plated cars.

There are some incredibly rare treats from the wider Volkswagen and VW Group community, too. Highlights of mine include an Audi A3 modified Max Power-style complete with scissor doors, a 200bhp UK-registered Up GTI and a real treat, a Volkswagen Taro. That one requires a Google, leading to the discovery that VW once built a Toyota Hilux under licence. Who knew?  

It’s clear there are fewer cars here than you’d see in Wörthersee, so there’s no doubt a large part of the community that still needs convincing that FanFest is the place to be. It’s a good start though, and there’s no doubt VW wants to keep it growing.

With two years until the GTI badge turns 50, there’s plenty of time to win more hearts over – and based on this first year, it’s hard to doubt that possibility.