Hyundai Ioniq 5 N ready to tame 20km Pikes Peak hill challenge

The 103rd running of what is without a doubt the most iconic hill climb event in the world, Pikes Peak, kicks off this weekend.

First ran back in 1916, it’s a high-altitude hill climb that tests man and machine equally with its 156 corners and 20km of flat-out racing. With no room for error and the outrageously high speeds attained, there is always action a plenty.

The defending champion is Romain Dumas. He blitzed the hill in a time of eight minutes 53.553 seconds in a Ford F-150 Lightning SuperTruck to be crowned King of the Mountain. Dumas is no stranger to the Pikes Peak Hill Climb, having competed in the event nine times already. He is the current overall Pikes Peak record holder with a time of 7:57.148. A feat he achieved back in 2018 while driving the Volkswagen I.D. R.

Hyundai Ioniq 5 N enters fray

Pikes Peak is an event that attracts all sorts of entries. One such entry that caught our eye is the Evasive Motorsports Hyundai Ioniq 5 N Pikes Peak car. Established in 2002 and based in Cerritos, Southern California, this new collaboration with Hyundai North America is Evasive Motorsports’ most ambitious EV project to date. They have taken a 2025 Hyundai Ioniq 5 N off the showroom floor and engineered it into a hill climb monster.

Here’s the kicker, because the electric motors of the Hyundai Ioniq 5 N can’t be tuned, they will be left in standard road-going trim. And believe it or not, even though this setup offers 478kW of power and 770Nm of instant torque (with N Grin Boost activated), it’s not enough to take a class win.

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Shedding some weight

Evasive Motorsports have prioritised other areas of the car to find the pace they require. These measures come in the form of extra downforce and weight saving, where their in-house EVS Tuning division successfully shaved 226kg from the car. This was achieved by stripping the interior and fabricating four doors and the tailgate from carbon fibre.

Voltex Japan provided its expertise in crafting the one-off aero-enhancing components using 3D scans. These parts include a front lip, carbon fibre splitter, side skirts, fender flares, underbody aero panels, and a massive rear wing to provide the necessary downforce for the Evasive Motorsports Hyundai Ioniq 5 N that takes on the Pikes Peak Hill Climb in Colorado in the United States.

Krontec air jacks allow easy removal of the lightweight forged racing wheels. You have 11-inch Titan 7 T-P10 alloys running on 310/690 VR19 Yokohama A005 racing slicks doing duty here.

Veteran behind steering wheel

Additional modifications include prototype EVS Tuning anti-roll bars front and rear, a custom six-point roll cage fabricated by Eimer Engineering. The Evasive Motorsports Hyundai Ioniq 5 N Pikes Peak car also features a one-off Moton coilover suspension designed by Mike Kojima from MotoIQ.

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Returning for this 2025 Pikes Peak attempt is veteran driver Rob Walker who has competed in the Evasive Motorsports Scion FR-S and Toyota 86 from 2013 to 2016. Walker is eager to get back into his Pikes Peak race rhythm and has been using sim racing to refresh his muscle memory of the 20km sprint.