Volkswagen CEO Herbert Diess is now admitting his goal of toppling Tesla as the world’s number one electric vehicle (EV) automaker by 2025 may be a bit ambitious.

Diess had previously committed Volkswagen to becoming the world’s number one EV automaker by 2025, counting on the depth of Volkswagen’s lineup to help it achieve that goal. According to Reuters, Dies now admits that it’s going to be a tougher task than he originally anticipated, given the lead Tesla has.

“It will be a tight race but we won’t give up on it,” Diess said at the FT Future of the Car 2022 conference. “I have to say we didn’t expect our main U.S. competitor to be so fast and well-prepared.”

Volkswagen’s challenges are not likely to improve anytime soon, with Tesla opening its first Gigafactory in Germany in early 2022.