This is the first customer Tolman Edition Peugeot 205 GTI

In true Blue Peter style – here’s one we made earlier. Well, we didn’t make it of course, but this is the very first customer-spec Tolman Edition Peugeot 205 GTI – a creation you’ll have seen Freddie Flintoff enjoying if you caught the latest episode of Top Gear TV on Sunday evening.

Freddie’s example was a 1.6-litre development car – the same one that featured at our Speed Week 2021 no less – and Tolman says that after ‘positive reception’ to said car, it has now started delivering restomod 205 GTIs to customers. 

This first car is a 1.9, but it has been fitted with a ported 16-valve head, a bespoke billet cam cover and a Motec ECU for around 200bhp. Oh, and it’s probably worth noting here that before he founded Tolman Engineering in 2007, Chris Tolman was responsible for building BTCC and WRC engines. Strong CV. 

All Tolman 205s are stripped to a bare shell before being rebuilt, with 700 hours of work going into each car. The very first customer clearly went big on spec too, because this particular car has a fly-by-wire throttle, Tolman’s stainless-steel exhaust, a Quaife ATB diff and the ‘big brake’ upgrade with AP Racing callipers.

All Tolman Editions also get power steering, Bilstein dampers, adjustable bottom arms and a bespoke rear anti-roll bar. The Warwickshire-based firm also rebuilds the gearbox for slicker changes and swaps out the lights for new LEDs. 

Customer number one has specced a Motec LCD dial display which replicates the look of the original dials, and there’s retrimmed seats, new carpets, an Alcantara steering wheel and a Blaupunkt audio system with DAB radio and Bluetooth. Phewf – that is a whole lot of work, but we’re told that the Tolman Edition “follows the firm’s ethos for non-invasive enhancements” and that everything can be returned to standard. Although if you’ve seen how much Freddie enjoyed the development car, we’re quite sure you won’t be needing that.

So, to the issue of price. We’re told that Tolman Edition Peugeot 205 GTIs now start at £55,000. A little bit more than the £45,000 needed for the original 1.6 development car…