ON THE ROAD
“The progressive power delivery on normal throttle application makes the RSIII easy to drive at a more leisurely pace on real world roads”
THE VERITAS LEGEND The original Veritas company was founded in 1946 by BMW engineers Ernst Loof, Lorenz Dietrich and Georg Meier. Their aim was to make a race winning sportscar powered by a BMW engine. Ernst was a member of the original BMW race team and then chief stylist after the war. His most famous design was the BMW 328 Mille Miglia car, so it was no surprise that he based his own car on these proven and familiar mechanicals. One of the performance advantages of the Veritas came about by default as steel was hard to come by in post-war Germany. The team used aluminium instead, and the weight saving gave them a winning edge. Veritas was very successful in motor racing in the hands of some big name drivers. In fact its first outright win was down to Karl Kling, who swept the board at the 1948 Nurburging race with an average speed of 161km/h.
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The Veritas RS also finished well in the 1948 Hockenheim event, and by 1949 Veritas cars dominated the 2.0 litre sports car class in Germany. Kling was only beaten twice that season. Despite many competition successes, Veritas eventually ran out of money and Loof closed the firm in 1953, returning to BMW. It is thought that around 78 cars were built, including single-seaters, rennspyders and coupes. The Veritas name was revived in 2000, when a new company, Vermot AG, was founded to create a 21st century interpretation of the classic Veritas. The original firm had occupied several different factories over the years, ending
up at the Nurburgring. It is thus fitting that the new Veritas headquarters should be located on a new industrial estate close to the ‘Ring. The new car is as radical today as the original was in its time, and continues the ideology of using racing technology in a road legal super sports car. Like its forebearer, the Veritas RSIII uses state-ofthe-art BMW power. The first running prototype was completed in 2008 using a 420hp BMW M3 V8 motor, but the production car will roll out of the factory powered by the V10 engine from the M5. To maintain exclusivity, production will be capped at 50 cars.