An hour of fun

Hot hatchbacks, these elusive machines hard to single out from a crowd of similar looking vehicles without a trained eye. This month I had the pleasure of driving the hot hatch defining machine.

The newest generation Volkswagen Golf GTI is the car in question. The German manufacturer started the journey of the GTI way back in the 1970's during the first oil crisis. These small and nimble funboxes were created to liven up the grey days of the hard working man, and almost 40 years later, liven up my damp January afternoon.

The Mk7 Golf is all in all a great improvement from its predecessor the Mk6. It's got better engines, bigger interior and somehow it's also lost some weight by being over 50 kg lighter. All this is mighty impressive. But let us leave those figures to the boring committee and focus on the new GTI.

As the previous Golf GTI, it has a 2.0 litre turbocharged power plant driving the front wheels. But with a small increase in power from 210 to 220 horsepower. That isn't much, but the other important force making the car move forward, torque, has gone up from 280 to 350nm which is much. This propels the GTI from 0-100k/h in 6.5 seconds and top out at 245k/h in sixth gear.

There is the traditional red stripe, that the Mk7 Golf needed.

 On the subject on gears, the car I drove had the optional 6-speed DSG, which is indeed a work of German engineering magic, it's brilliant! In hard acceleration it's brutally fast but sophisticated and in normal cruising it's absolutely seamless. The gearbox itself feels like it is a mix of two, as a hot hatchback, a mix of practicality and sports car fun. I tested this by driving 50k/h with 5th gear and gave it a little squeeze on the throttle. The gearbox didn't panic and immediately kick down to 3rd, instead it let the immense torque from the engine care for the small 'overtake-like' acceleration.

Horrible day and a great car makes a great day.

 Inside the new Golf GTI then. Let's not faff about, it's as pleasant as being inside a well build performance computer. Everything important is at hand, lavished with many toys - and best of all - makes a satisfying hum, which reminds you of the power underneath. The seats are sporty but not small or uncomfortable, plastics are of extremely high quality (as is expected) and did I mention the noise. Only complaint I have about this car is the on board computer touch screen thing. It's something a driver should touch on the move. The screen is a bit too low down which takes your eyes off the road and it controls far too many things.

And there's the screen that should only be operated while stationary.

But the important thing is the new Golf GTI is fantastic. It was my first drive in a real hot hatch with a DSG flappy-paddel gearbox (which may be obvious). But all I can say is, bring me the VW Golf R. I want more.

The drving position is excelent, and best of all you can't see the upholstery while sitting on it.

Making it better

In the post titled "The hottest wasp" I wrote about my favourite new hot hatch the Ford Fiesta ST. And to spice the ST up further, a company called Mountune got their hands on the 1.6 ecoboost and gave it a little more... well... boost.

Where the standard ST has 180 hp the Mountune Performance pack buffs it up to a meaty 215 hp. Add to that a sound that's described as a "rally noise from the 60's". And even the torque figure is up from 290Nm to 320Nm. These are all great things! I can not see these making the brilliant Fiesta ST any worse.
And to top it all off this Performance pack called MP215 is only around 800€ and the fitting takes only an hour. So that in my books is the most value 800€ you're aver going to spend.

It's supposed to be lower than the normal ST but i don't see it.

To tell the knowing motorists that you've made the best decision of your life.  

And this is the normal ST. It looks better than many super cars.