Top Gear Magazine UK Hot Hatch Mega Test

[Treza360]

Just picked this one up. A pretty good test as it puts all of VW's current hot hatches and a bunch of others up against eachother.

The lineup is as follows:
VW Golf R (MkVI)
VW Golf GTI (MkVI)
VW Polo GTI (New Polo)
VW Scirocco R
Seat Ibiza Bocanegra
Alfa Romeo MiTo Cloverleaf
Fiat 500 Abarth Essesse
Ford Focus RS500
Subaru Impreza WRX STI Cosworth
Renault Megane RS Cup
Renault Clio RS Cup

Haven't actually read the full article yet but the winner was not anything from VAG. Will post up once I've read it and worked out how they broke them all down.

Video Preview

Issue Overview

Cheers,
Trent

[sabloke]

Got the scanned pages for the winner and have to say I totally agree with their conclusions. Some might argue that I am biased though
I have been looking to buy the mag in Adelaide but no luck so far... Quite curious to find out what they said about the R.

Got the mag today from David Jones Plaza newsagent in Adelaide. Very interesting read indeed, loved the direct comparo between GTI, Scirocco and R. Looks like the new Polo GTI is a bit of a disapointment... Keen to discuss

[Treza360]

Bottom Five (In No Particular Order):
Seat Ibiza Bocanegra
Alfa Romeo MiTo Cloverleaf
Fiat 500 Abarth Essesse
VW Polo GTI (New Polo)
VW Scirocco R

Middle Five (In No Particular Order):
Ford Focus RS500
Subaru Impreza WRX STI Cosworth
Renault Megane RS Cup
VW Golf R (MkVI)
VW Golf GTI (MkVI)

Winner:
Renault Clio RS Cup

Would've also been nice to see the following but oh well:
BMW 130 and/or 135 Hatch
Mini Cooper S and JCW
Mazda 3 MPS
Honda Civic Type R (UK and JDM models)

Cheers,
Trent

[sabloke]

I think the Middle Five was in the following order:

Subaru Impreza WRX STI Cosworth
Ford Focus RS500
Renault Megane RS Cup
VW Golf GTI (MkVI)
VW Golf R (MkVI)

The BMWs don't follow the hot hatch formula and the 130i had some poor reviews anyway. The 135i is a coupe not a hatch, isn't it?
You don't seriously think the MPS would have standed a chance in this test.
I wonder what top 5 would have looked like with some Minis in the mix
The Type R was left out due to European bias maybe? The Subaru is in though, however one with Cosworth's fingerprints allover the engine. Who knows...

Sad to see the Scirocco and the new Polo GTI dismissed so early in the test. Not bad cars by any means but in this company they made the bottom of the list... Maybe is not that much of a loss the Roc R didn't make it down under after all.

The winner

[shakespeare]

I read this on the plane last week and was not suprised by the results, but surprised that some hot hatches were left out, would have liked to have seen the results of the MPS in comparison to the others. Some other magazine tests show the Gen I MPS as being quicker than a Mk V GTI on the track and acceleration, again part of the decision on the cars chosen comes down to what's available and what the TG crew prefer to drive!

Overall my impression on the article has not altered my purchase of the R, a comment somewhere in the umpteen pages was that the Stig preferred driving the R!

Anyway was a good read

[sabloke]

Fact is, the test was not about finding the fastest car. Hot hatches have grown up and we expect them to be refined. More importantly, a good hot hatch has to give us confidence even when we're not the sharpest drivers and to keep us smiling behind the wheel. At the end of the day, if shear acceleration is what you want, you get a V8. Then you supercharge it. Done. Upgrading a chassis though, not that simple to do...
I agree that the R is the best big power hatch in the test. Probably that's why Stig liked it so much The Subaru and the RS500 are extreme machines, hardly daily drive propositions IMHO. The Megane is an interesting one, can't wait to see how it goes when tested down under. The GTI, well, is still the legend it always was. They're all great cars. I think we're living happy times with such a vast hothatchness offer for us to chose from!

[Treza360]

The BMWs don't follow the hot hatch formula and the 130i had some poor reviews anyway. The 135i is a coupe not a hatch, isn't it?

Yeah wasn't sure if BMW did the 135 in hatch or if it was coupe only (hence I put both down). However a comment or something as to why these and the others were left out would've been nice at the very least.
Cheers,
Trent

[sabloke]

Done a quick OCR today. Not perfect by any means but if you care reading is easy to get an idea. Hope I won't get accused of spamming...

"I'M DRIVING A TRULY brilliant hot hatch. There are five more ahead of me, and another five behind, tracing a long beautiful line down this wriggly Cumbrian pass. Somewhere close, the whine of a turbine crescendos into an ear-splitting howl, the prelude to a Gazelle helicopter swooping an arm's-reach overhead, the duff a-duffa-duffa of its blades beating hard on our roofs. Just then the morning sun breaks over the saddle of Honister and washes us in a blaze of gold. Barry, hanging out of the helicopter, starts pressing the button on his Nikon, and this rather wonderful convoy sets off down the road. These really are superabundant days for lovers of hot hatchbacks. The breed is flourishing like never before. We've got 11 of them on this road, and not one is a makeweight. All had their supporters as we made up the list. The runners and riders include two of the most scorching of the kind ever to breathe the air of the public road: a 350bhp five-cylinder front-drive Focus and a 4WD Impreza comprehensively re-engineered, with the factory's blessing, by Cosworth. That one makes 400bhp. Between them they cost £85,000. Do they stretch the definition of hot hatch beyond breaking point? Maybe, but what the heck, you can hardly blame us for wanting to find out. They're the two slightly evil black presences that bookend this convoy. Down the road between them, an assortment in dolly-mixture colours. There's the seriously powerful RenaultSport Megane 250, VW Golf Rand Scirocco R. Then we cascade through a couple of benchmarks, the facelifted RenaultSport Clio 200 Cup and the Golf GTI Mk6. We've also got an Alfa MiTo, the new Cloverleaf with the intriguing MultiAir engine and new adaptive chassis. At the lower end of the power scale, the cheery little Abarth 500 EsseEsse, Seat Bocanegra and Polo GTI -and they're hardly meek are they? And just to prove that brilliant hot hatches really are busting out all over, remember even our chosen 11 don't make up an exhaustive survey of all that's good about the type. We've not managed to include some of the juicily awaited up comers like the Citroen DS3 Racing or Alfa Giulietta Cloverleaf. Nor did we bring along others that are truly loved but have been covered here often before -Focus ST, Civic Type R and Cooper S among them. Right now you find us in Cumbria. Get up early in the morning and there are some brilliant drives around here, with open visibility through the difficult bumpy corners, and all with the backdrop of what is, no question, England's most epic scenery. It's an area that suits these quick-witted and compact cars perfectly, but its bumps and unpredictable corners will let us burrow deep into each car's abilities and sort them out."

About the Polo GTI:
The 180bhp supercharged-and-turbocharged engine they share is an easy thing to use, with torque everywhere. But the throttle response is never actually that urgent or the sound very inspiring, so it ends up being a bit dull. The seven-speed DSG drives us all potty. I thought it was just me that hated it, but everyone eventually chips in to say they hate the way the manual position refuses to be properly manual. On a car that won't go above 140mph, seven gears is too many and we get lost among them. The Polo is probably a marginally better car than the Seat, but no one wanted to take it home after this test. Its trouble is the Golf GTI. The Polo's just a cheaper and not-as-good version of the Golf. It doesn't really press home the advantage of being a smaller car. Being smaller presents the opportunity to be more fun, more agile or more endearing. The Polo doesn't capitalise. It's just. .. a lesser car.

Abarth 500 EsseEsse
Whereas the Abarth 500 EsseEsse is exactly a small, fun, agile and endearing car. You find yourself patting it on the door mirror every time you get out. Smallness brings other advantages too: before the Stig does his stuff, I stick my neck out and predict it might well swerve through the tightest corner faster than anything else. So it turns out. The Abarth is such a willing terrier, the boosty motor puffing its lungs out for you, the steering wheel tugging in your hands and letting you know what's up at the tyres, even when, as often happens, what's up is pretty chaotic. It's inevitable that since you sit high above such a short wheelbase, you're pitched and tossed about, and the ride is in any case pretty turbulent, which affects traction and cornering accuracy. But the Abarth has an ebullient tuner-car feel we love. It doesn't try to be civilised or grown-up; it just tugs at your sleeve and drags you off for some naughty behind-the-bike-sheds fun.

MiTo Cloverleaf
We had a laugh with the other Italian car, the MiTo. The chassis is alive in your hands through tight corners, and you can slither it about on the throttle, even though the ESP can't be fully disconnected but always stays there as a backstop. This new MultiAir engine has torque to spare, and the equally new six-speed box is slick. Another change on the new Cloverleaf is the adaptive damping set-up, which copes a lot better with bucking and shivering surfaces. On the other hand, let's not get too carried away: the Golf GTI rides better and is more effectively damped using passive suspension. But driving across the Pennines on the sweeping A66, a problem familiar from our original Lifer MiTo surfaces once again. This car needs too much steering. On a long sweeping bend, you're always having to nibble at the wheel. There's elasticity in the system somewhere. I hop into the Megane on the same stretch of road, and in the Renault you can approach a corner, apply the lock and leave your hands still because the steering is proportional and predictable, whereas in the Alfa it needs constant fretting.

Scirocco R
You drop down into the Scirocco's cabin. It feels low and snug, like a competition car (though the equipment and plastics quality are streets ahead of any racer we've ever seen). And it goes like its backside is on fire. On the road, its star feature is the charismatic turbo 2.0-litre, which burbles through the mid-range and charges up towards 7,000, naughtily beyond its redline. Like the Golf R it came with a six-speed manual not the optional DSG, and we were happy about that, even though experience tells us the six-speed DSG works more fluently than the Polo's seven-speeder. But the Lake District roads are the Scirocco's undoing. The chassis doesn't have enough fluency on bumps, the wheels hopping and shuddering and making the whole car feel just a bit baggy and undeveloped. This despite the fact it has adaptive damping with three selectable programmes. The Golf R does without, and feels much less disturbed. Halfway through the second day up in Cumbria, my walkie-talkie cackles. "Paul, which car wins?" After all this driving, I'm still pondering that question. I'm sitting on a big rock, gazing out across this field of talent, and I'm a bit paralysed figuring out what to make of them. The Scirocco, MiTo, Polo, Bocanegra and Abarth have fallen -though not dishonourably. But that's fewer than half the cars gone. Six remain. They're separated on power by a factor of two, and on price by a factor of three. But on desirability it's ridiculously close.

Golf GTI v R v Scirocco R
The Mk 6 Golf GTI covers bases with admirable consistency; it's fast (0-62mph in just 6.9seconds with 21Obhp), practical, reasonably priced and utterly classless. It's also damn good fun to drive -one of the best front-wheel-drive platforms our there -and elastic in its remit; pottering is met with equal relish as thrashing down a backlane. VW thinks it's so good that it has spawned two notably different variants.
The Golf R is a 4WD uber-Golf equipped with 266bhp. All the good bits of the standard car, but woven with the stability of a next-generation Haldex drivetrain and a heap more grunt. Where the standard car weeps away power with no limited-slip diff, the R will claw its way round a greasy corner with psychotic determination. Where the standard car feels a tad loose during fast direction changes on track, the R will hold fast, bulletting our of tight corners. You do pay for the extra tech; where a standard GTI costs £23,440, a basic R will set you back nearer £30k. What we really want to find out is whether it's worth it. The Roc R sits somewhere in the middle at £27,520. A coupe version of the Golf it sports a wider track than the stock car, standard adaptive damping and more visual attitude. It has the same engine as the Golf R; but ditches the 4x4 system in favour of front-drive and an electronic simulation of a limited-slip diff. It's as fast as the Golf R, and yet somehow more exuberant, oversteering on lift-off and generally being more of a hooligan. So which car is the best? Well, VW has pulled a neat trick of providing three cars that maintain all the basic strengths of the GTI brand -quality, pace, image and reliable performance -yet have very different characters. Stig repeatedly returned to the Golf R, clearly impressed by its sheer performance. Many bystanders thought the Roc R was the best-looking car in the line-up bar none. But when it comes down to it, the car every vehicle here was trying to beat, the one we all owe a debt of gratitude to for continuously pushing the brand, is the Golf GTI. It's the best all-rounder among our hot hatches. But even so, it's not the overall winner.