ROAD TEST AUDI RS5:IMAGINE, JUST for a second, that it hadn't all gone wrong. If the closest we had got to recession was when they ran out of rocket lettuce at Marks&Spencer. You'd be reading this fresh from your third sun holiday of the year, having been awoken by your housekeeper.
The front page of this paper would bemoan the fact that we had bailed out the Germans – again. On the way to the office, driving past the statue of Brian Cowen that they had erected outside the Central Bank, you’d catch the reflection of the BMW M3 you were driving and think that perhaps it was time for a change. Your son has been bugging you for something new for his 18th birthday so the M3 would suit him fine. The motor tax is just €2,100 on your BMW, so maybe you will after all try out the new Audi RS5. You’ve just made a killing on that property you bought in Greece so you have the cash. What could possibly go wrong?
It would be nice if all of this were true. And for a while recently we could pretend it was. Picking up the Audi RS5 in leafy Ballsbridge in Dublin, we were transported back to a different, more affluent time. This year the Government have made almost €9.5 million from the motor tax on the majority of new cars sold. If we all bought Audi RS5’s they would make €170.5 million from road tax alone.
Instead, we are “Ireland AG”, London is burning, and the world economy is falling apart. But at least if you put your money under the bed instead of in a bank you might have the means to buy yourself a new, high-performance coupé and the RS5 is bound to be on your wish list.
And we really can see why. For a start it looks awesome. Actually, make that sinister. The A5 is a pretty car anyway, but adding a front-end with huge gaping air intakes, massive wheel arches housing 20-inch alloy wheel, and exhaust pipes your children could get lost in, make it really look magnificent. Inside, the cabin is awash with Alcantara, chrome and carbon fibre and, in the case of our test car, an additional €20,000 of optional extras. The “advanced key” costs €1,086, although if you lose it, it still won’t find its own way back to you which makes it a fairly normal key in my books. And it costs €529 to get Bluetooth, which you get for free in a Nissan Micra. The suede steering wheel feels superb, although it wouldn’t last long if you are the perspiring type, and there is no manual gearbox. Audi is perhaps wise not to trust us with a clutch and that power, but instead there is a double-clutch transmission with seven speeds.
Under the bonnet is a 450bhp 4.2-litre V8, not something we see a lot of in these days of miserly four-cylinder diesels, with Stop/Start. Start it up and the windows of your house vibrate and your pets will flee. It is a thunderous sound. Around town it will grumble along nicely, inhaling vast quantities of air and burning litres of fuel for fun. It is only when you get out of town and briefly stamp down on the throttle pedal that the fire and brimstone truly begins. It is a bit like running down the street banging a steel drum. Everyone stares and looks a little puzzled at first. This is no Nissan Leaf.
You are thankful for the S-Tronic transmission very soon, because it would probably be very difficult to temper the gear change under normal conditions in this car and the gear changes are so silky smooth that they are almost imperceptible. There is no jerkiness at all, even if you opt for really fast downshifts.
We could say to you that we’d be more than happy with the 3.0-litre TDi, which would cost half as much to buy and about a third as much to run, but in this case you can’t compare diesel and petrol. This is an out-and-out brutal muscle car. Plant your right foot and the RS5 responds like lightning. You don’t feel like you are being pushed along, more like you are being pulled forward because the quattro all-wheel drive does such a good job of putting down the power on to the road. It doesn’t matter whether it is wet or dry, the result is the same; the car goes where you put it, pretty much as fast as you like. You can feel your licence shriek every time you get into the car. A few days of this and, worryingly, you get a little blase about the power. On a daily basis, being able to avail of astonishing grip and seemingly infinite power and torque makes you feel really brave and would by no means set you up to drive anything else with the same ability. You would need to be very ham-fisted not to drive this car competently.
Yet for all this, it is missing something. It sat for a curious amount of time in the driveway, whereas if it had been a BMW M3 or Mercedes-Benz C63 AMG, it would have been on its fourth tank of fuel in four days and covered in muck and flies. The steering doesn’t feel the way we expected it to. It does its job perfectly well. Turn it in the direction of the corner and the car duly obliged, but without the kind of engaging information flow we’d have wished for. The power is not always delivered as smoothly as you would hope either. Such big bursts of power are not always welcome in a rural setting, and because the car is perhaps a little too refined in places, it can feel a little anaesthetised. There is no doubt that on the roads around Rhonda in Spain or on a racetrack this car would come into its own, but this writer would be happier with something a little more delicate. The BMW M3 still feels a little more engaging than the RS5, but for me the Mercedes C63 AMG is still the king of this bunch. Yes, it is brutally fast and muscular in the same way as the RS5, but it gives you more feel through the steering wheel and more butterflies in your tummy and tingles down your spine. Plus, opt for the new C63 AMG Coupé and you get 600Nm of torque compared to the RS5’s “mere” 450Nm. Finally, in chastened times the Mercedes is €6,300 cheaper than the Audi.
What a lovely problem it would be to be choosing between the M3, C63 AMG or Audi RS5, something we know few of you will do in 2011, 2012 or for a while to come. The RS5 is brilliant at what it sets out to do. It is biblically fast, practically idiot-proof and a technological masterpiece. But like the classic break-up line, we loved it, but we weren’t in love with it.
Factfile
Engine4,163cc V8 petrol engine putting out 450bhp at 8,250rpm, with 430Nm of torque at 4,000rpm with a seven-speed dual clutch gearbox
0-100km/h4.6 secs
L/100km (mpg)urban – 14.9 (19); extra-urban – 8.5 (33); combined – 10.8 (26)
Emissions(motor tax) 252g/km (€2,100)
Specification19-inch five-arm structure design alloys, Audi drive select, anti-theft alarm with immobiliser, Audi music interface, Xenon lights with LED daytime running lights, vehicle tracker interface, silk Nappa leather with piping, RS5 Sports suspension, acoustic front and rear parking, cruise control, concert radio system, carbon fibre inlays, Climate Control with sun sensors, front Sports seats with RS5 logo, metallic /pearl-effect paint, RS5 leather mufu sports steering wheel with shift paddles, RS5 gear selector knob, RS5 bumpers with enlarged air intakes at front and diffusor at rear, retractable rear spoiler, quattro with sports differential, light and rain sensor, interior lighting package, exhaust pipers – dual branch exhaust system
Options fitted to test carMMI Navigation €4,325, 20-inch five-arm rotor-design alloys €3,000, memory function for the driver seat €363, Audi exclusive steering wheel in suede €1,412, Sports exhaust system €1,765, dynamic steering €1,765, panoramic sunroof, electric €1,994, seat heating for front seats €619, advanced key €1,086, Audi exclusive black styling package €759, Electric folding mirrors with anti-glare and memory €574, Bluetooth interface €529, Bang Olufsen sound system €1,228
Price€102,800 before options