Iconic Films
2 for 1 tickets to Singin' In The Rain, this coming Monday. Book now
Navigation - link to other main sections from here
Audi A3 Sportback
It's the name you can't forgive
It may turn out that Audi has been just a touch too clever with this, its new A3 Sportback. It’s called the Sportback for many reasons, one being that if they’d given it a less exciting but more accurate name, such as A3 five-door, motor journalists might not have staggered to their feet and driven it.
It’s also called Sportback because it seems that car manufacturers are no longer allowed to launch variants of existing models without ascribing painful and ultimately meaningless names to them. Finally, if part of that name contains the word “sport”, the customer thinks it is sporting, even if it isn’t.
In this business, perception is fast overtaking reality just as surely as style is overwhelming substance. Why bother making a car sporting when all you need do is create that impression with a badge?
To be fair to Audi, the Sportback is more than just its capable new Golf-based hatch with two more doors added. Its length is stretched by 83mm and its look, unique from the A-pillars backwards, is sufficiently different to give it a fresh identity.
It’s more spacious in the back, particularly in the boot, its extended roofline giving it the look of a small estate rather than a hatchback. The result is purposeful, practical, attractive and only £500 costlier than its three-door sibling, all of which may just make it a little too good.
The range starts at £16,010, which buys an age-old 1.6 litre engine. But everyone should shell out an extra £360 for the brand new FSI 1.6 litre engine with direct fuel injection. Direct injection — where fuel is injected straight into the combustion chamber rather than the inlet tract — is Audi’s current pet technology, and if you look at the comparative outputs of these two engines, you’ll appreciate why. The FSI A3 (FSI is a German acronym for direct injection) has more power (115bhp against 102bhp), better acceleration (0-62mph in 10.9 against 13.2sec) and a higher top speed (122mph rather than 114mph). Yet it uses a sight less fuel (42.8mpg against 35.3mpg) and produces significantly less carbon dioxide (156 compared with 170g/km).
The range then broadly follows the three-door A3 range through the usual blend of high and low-powered diesels, a 2 litre petrol and, ultimately a 3.2 litre 250bhp V6 variant.
But the car that interested me is the 2.0T FSI, Audi’s first attempt at applying direct injection to a turbocharged engine, save those that have powered the winning cars at Le Mans for the past four years. For £22,705 it offers 200bhp, a top speed of 145mph and a 0-62mph time of 7.1sec. Audi’s quattro 4x4 system is standard, though for the same money you can have a two-wheel-drive version with Audi’s outstanding DSG gearbox, which works convincingly as both a manual and an automatic. Annoyingly, the car you really want, with DSG and quattro, is unavailable.
Still, I’m not going to quibble, for this new engine is quite excellent — smooth in feel, characterful of tone, and responsive from idle to red line. It’s a genuinely sporting engine. But work still needs to be done on the handling, which feels as if programmed by computer.
Objectively, you can’t fault it: there’s loads of grip, direct and precise steering and moron-proof road manners. But the feel that distinguishes all properly sporting cars is still absent. It is fast, fluent and yet doggedly uninvolving to drive, despite its suggestive name.
The shame is that the Sportback is otherwise almost entirely convincing. It rides capably, is beautifully built from lovely materials and would look great parked outside anyone’s house. Unlike its three-door sibling, there’s also more than enough room for your family and their clobber.
And this is where I fear Audi may have made a marketing mistake. If there is more room in the back of an A4 Avant, it must be a matter of millimetres here and there; the A3’s luggage capacity is 1,120 litres, just 64 less than the A4. Yet this Sportback typically costs £325 less than the 2.0 FSI A4 Avant Sport (though Audi has reduced the price of the A4 Sport by £900 until October) which has no turbo and just scrapes 0-62mph in 10sec and manages a top speed slightly over 130mph. In addition, the Sportback has the better ride and, I think, is better looking.
Audi insists the main rival for the Sportback is the new BMW 1-series. I have
yet to drive the BMW so I can’t say which is the better bet, but if you are
looking to buy an A4 Avant 2.0 FSI Sport, I have some advice: save yourself
the money and get the A3 Sportback turbo.
VITAL STATISTICS
Model: Audi A3 Sportback 2.0T FSI Sport
Engine type: Four-cylinder, 1984cc
Power/Torque: 200bhp @ 6000rpm / 206 lb ft @ 1800rpm
Transmission: Six-speed manual, front-wheel drive
Fuel/CO2: 31.3mpg (combined) / 216g/km
Performance: 0-62mph: 7.1sec / top speed 145mph
Price: £22,705
Verdict: Dull handling spoils an otherwise excellent effort
THE OPPOSITION
Model: BMW 120i SE, £20,270
For: Rear-wheel-drive handling, great engine
Against: Strange-looking, and a bit cramped in the back
Model: Alfa Romeo 156 Sportwagon 2.0 JTS Veloce, £20,180
For: Great looks, fizzy engine, sharp handling
Against: Build quality is not up to the German standard