I test drove the 2.0Tq in Sportback guise this morning. What a fantastic engine! A couple of hundred miles on the clock, and it's like it's been spinning to 6000rpm for thousands. What a great sound, and I love the sound of the DV psst-ing on change up.
Acceleration is great between 0-80mph, overtaking on A-roads is a piece of the proverbial. But after that it seems to struggle a bit. It's supposed to have a top speed of over 140mph, but I wonder how long it would take get to get there. Although perhaps I should have been more ruffless in 4th before changing to 5th.
The car feels much lighter than my TDI, even with the quattro; more balanced, with far less weight on the front. Handling is as good as every - going around corners like nobodies business, and the quattro working effortlessly in tight corners where my 2 wheel drived wonder would struggle badly.
One thing is the same though. Steering is very numb. Although perhaps I'm just not a good enough driver. It was a little damp so I threw it around some roundabouts, inducing some understeer. The steering told me virtually nothing. My butt-o-meter told me that the car was going wide before the steering felt even marginally different.
It was a Sport, but the suspension felt more settled (less jittery over uneven surfaces) than the one on my TDI. Have they revised it over the last year?
All this performance does come with a price: 21 mpg over a 20 mile route. Of course I was booting it, but the same route driving in just as much gusto returned 38mpg with mine.
