What does the TT stand for on the Audi TT?

Answer 1

Helen's close, but it's actually the abbreviation for Tourist Trophy (which is what the Isle of Man TT is short for, too). Back in the Thirties, when Audi's predecessor Auto Union made the most powerful Grand Prix cars in the world, there was a prestigious series of races throughout the British Isles called Tourist Trophies. The premise behind a Tourist Trophy dates back to the Edwardian era, and is also the rationale behind British Racing Green.

When the automobile was first available in Britain, it was subject to heavy legislation (for years, cars had to be preceded by a man walking and waving a red flag to warn oncoming horse and pedestrian traffic that a motor vehicle was approaching). One of the restrictions on motor vehicles in Britain was that racing was prohibited on any public roadway, even if the road was closed for the event (this after a disastrous race from Paris to Bordeaux at the end of the 19th century). The Irish, however, being always up for a bit of sport, invited the British to come across and race on THEIR circuits. Thus was born the Ulster Tourist Trophy, and the Isle of Man, and several others.

To honor the Irish for providing a venue for motor racing, it became traditional for British racing teams to paint their cars green, after the Emerald Isle. Even as late as the 1960s, it was common for Grand Prix cars to be painted the color of their team's national origin -- green for England, red for Ferrari, blue with white for Scotland, white for Japan, etc.

The one exception was Germany, which ties back to Audi. In the Thirties, when the Auto Union D Type was one of the fastest and most dangerous racing cars in the world, Germany's national racing color was white. However, in an effort to make the cars lighter, one of the German teams (and I now can't remember whether it was Mercedes or Audi) sanded the paint off the car and raced in bare aluminium. The cars came to be known as the "Silberpfeile" or Silver Arrows, and silver became the traditional color of Audi and Mercedes racing cars. After the war, when the head engineer of Auto Union formed his own company under his own name, his racing cars were also painted silver. His name? Ferdinand Porsche.

Ferdinand's daughter Louise married an Austrian engineer; she named her son after her father, and that boy, Ferdinand Piech, headed up some of the greatest projects in all of motor racing -- the Porsche 906, 908, 910, and the second most dominant vehicle in racing history, the 917. He then undertook to turn Audi from a so-what maker of technically interesting but unknown cars in the early Seventies to a technological powerhouse, first with the original quattro all-wheel-drive rally car in 1980, and then to Audi's road-racing successes with the Sports Car Club of America, IMSA, and European Touring Cars. Finally, he ended his career by leading the company in the production of one of the only racing vehicles to eclipse the dominance of the 917 that had marked his early success: the Audi R8 which has steamrollered endurance racing since 2000.

In recent years, the Isle of Man TT has become famous as one of the world's greatest motorcycle races, but it was also a race for automobiles in the past. This is the 100th anniversary of the Isle of Man TT, and the article in Wikipedia has more to say about its history. I've also included some pictures of cars from the 1930s, including the Auto Union D Type. Incredible cars!

Answer 2

The name is an abbreviation of "Tourist Trophy", an annual road race on the Isle of Man (see: Isle of Man TT), not "twin turbo" as is sometimes assumed. Turbocharged models only feature a single turbocharger

Answer 3

Time trial, as in the Isle of Man TT (Time Trial) :-)

Answer 4

Tints & Tails it's a code hairdressers use, the main buyers of the car.

Answer 5

I JUST WANT TO SAY HI FARLEY!

I WAS TRYING TO THINK OF A FUNNY ANSWER, BUT THEN, I COULDNT! SORRY! I BET YOU GET THE PETROL HEADS ON IN A MINUTE QUOTING ALL THE GEEKY TECHNOLOGY ABOUT THE TT'S!!!

Answer 6

Used to be Trophy Touring.

Answer 7

This is a great question, and one that has been the source of confusion for me for many years.

Answer 8

Torque turbocharger

Answer 9

i would have said twin turbo but after looking at the web site i'm not sure that's the case :

http://www.audi.com.au/content/Rollover.aspx?s=1900

Answer 10

It's tourist trophy. I'm completely sure of it.