The boom gate lifted and within seconds the Genesis G70 was doing 135 mph down the Döttinger Höhe straight. No warm-up lap. No pleasantries. Just a white-bearded driver in yellow-tinted glasses treating a 3.3-liter twin-turbo sedan like a weapon.
That’s the Genesis Ring Taxi experience at the Nurburgring Nordschleife, where the Korean automaker stations a rear-wheel-drive G70 3.3 Sport Prestige and a roster of veteran drivers to haul passengers around all 13 miles of the world’s most demanding public circuit. It’s a service that’s been running quietly while most of the automotive press fixates on Genesis’s push into electric vehicles and its freshly launched hypercar program at Le Mans.
The G70 in question makes 368 horsepower and 376 lb-ft of torque from its twin-turbo V6, paired with an optional variable exhaust. It hits 60 mph in 4.5 seconds and tops out at 167 mph. On paper, those are respectable sports sedan numbers. On the Nordschleife, at 102-degree ambient temps with tarmac pushing 107, they become a stress test for everything — engine, 13.8-inch ventilated Brembo brakes, air conditioning, and the passenger’s stomach.
The driver assigned to the car had been racing at the Nurburgring for roughly 15 years, including stints in the annual 24-hour endurance race. On a fully booked Saturday, he logs 35 to 40 laps. His only words mid-lap, delivered at a casual 150 mph through the Kotenborn section: “First time?” Followed by, “In real life you can’t hit reset.”
Sick bags in each door pocket. That’s a detail that tells you everything about the intensity of the ride and the thoughtfulness of the program. The G70 held together through repeated flat-out passes in traffic, heavy braking zones, and sustained high-speed runs that would expose any weakness in chassis tuning or thermal management. The A/C struggled. The car did not.
Genesis doesn’t get enough credit for the G70. It launched in 2018 as a genuine shot across the bow of the BMW 3 Series and has aged into something the brand seems unsure what to do with, given its aggressive pivot toward electrification. The sedan segment is shrinking, and Genesis has publicly committed to an all-EV lineup by 2030, though that timeline has softened recently. Yet here’s the G70, still doing duty as a Ring Taxi — a role previously occupied almost exclusively by BMWs, Porsches, and the occasional Jaguar.
Putting your sedan on the Nordschleife as a commercial taxi service is a statement. It says the car can take repeated abuse at ten-tenths in extreme heat, lap after lap, day after day, and come back for more. That’s not a press release claim. That’s an operational reality.
The experience, according to veteran automotive journalist Jerry Perez — who has ridden shotgun with Max Verstappen, Tom Kristensen, and former Stig Ben Collins — ranked among the most exhilarating passenger rides of his career. That’s not a small claim from someone with a decade of professional seat time.
Genesis handed Perez a USB drive with onboard footage afterward. It was faulty. Sometimes the Nurburgring gives you a perfect lap and takes the evidence. The car, though, delivered the receipts in real time — a rear-drive Korean sports sedan, thriving in the place that has humbled supercars and shattered reputations for decades.
The G70 may not have much runway left in a world racing toward electrification. But right now, on the most punishing stretch of asphalt on earth, it belongs.
Share this Story