WORTHERSEE: Skoda Yeti goes Xtreme

Skoda has wheeled out the toughest version yet seen of its recently facelifted Yeti, as well as first pictures of a convertible version of its Citigo micro-car.

Both wacky concepts will make their world public debut at the 33rd annual Volkswagen group fan meet at Worthersee in Austria over May 28-31.

The Yeti Xtreme, meantime, features a rally car-inspired interior featuring aluminium floor panels, four individual Recaro sports seats, carbon-fibre inner door covers with integrated sand shovel and thermos flask, a ‘Super Sports’ steering wheel with gearshift paddles, iPad cradle, fire extinguisher and other rally equipment.

This is wrapped in a chunky new off-road oriented body featuring massive wheel-arch flares, a 'floating' yellow roof, gaping front air intakes and silver lower front, rear and side inserts.

Other contrasting yellow highlights can be seen on the 17-inch matt-grey wheels, which wear huge mud tyres, and the twin front recovery hooks, while beefier brakes from the Octavia RS and a height-adjustable chassis continue the hard-core theme.

In the boot there's also a spare wheel and ‘recovery tracks’, special traction mats that Skoda says can be pushed under the wheels should the car get stuck in sand.

Powering the extreme Yeti is the production version's most powerful engine, a 112kW/250Nm 1.8-litre turbo-petrol four-cylinder, matched with a six-speed DSG automated manual transmission and all-wheel drive.

The beefed-up Yeti, which also wears LED headlights and heavily tinted glass, is claimed to sprint to 100km/h in nine seconds and a top speed of 192km/h.

Meantime, the sleek Citijet mini-roadster, previewed by official sketches last week, was designed by 16 Skoda apprentices.

Featuring equipment from the special-edition Citigo SPORT, plus a 300-Watt sound system and music-reactive blue LED interior lighting, the Citijet concept has a metallic blue and white finish, blue 16-inch alloys, a handmade rear spoiler and twin exhaust outlets for the 55kW 1.0-litre petrol engine.

Like the Yeti Xtreme, the Citijet concept is unlikely to ever grace showrooms, but provides a preview of what a potential convertible version of the Citigo – which is not sold here – could look like.

This will be the fifth year that Skoda has attended the VW GTI event in Reifnitz, where about 200,000 enthusiasts are again expected to converge next weekend.

“We want to continue the positive development and to grow further with new models over the coming years,” says Skoda's sales and marketing chief Werner Eichhorn.

"Therefore we are going to strengthen the emotional vibrancy of the brand. Skoda Yeti Xtreme – as a dynamic and powerful compact SUV concept – demonstrates the brand’s strong expertise in four-wheel drive technology, as well as our know-how when it comes to rally sports.”