Volkswagen Arteon R Shooting Brake review

List price is £52,435 for the Arteon Shooting Brake R, but you’ll need to factor in some cash to upgrade from the hideous standard Moonstone Grey paint, and maybe a £565 upgrade to 20-inch wheels (but the standard 19in ones do look nice). There are various options, but the standard fit spec list is already rather generous, so we would be tempted just to leave the Shooting Brake R as God intended. 

Unfortunately you’ll get spanked with a £1,345 bill for VED in the first year thanks to the car’s 211g/km of CO2 emissions and the BIK rate for getting the Shooting Brake R on your company car scheme is 37 per cent. But of course this is a car that you will approach knowing that the expenses are going to be higher than normal. If it means that you get to keep on the road in something spicy and still manage to fit in the family and their luggage, then it’s an investment worth making. Top Gear maths, we call it.

There aren’t very many lease deals to be had out there at the moment for the R, but if you went through Volkswagen’s own scheme you could bag yourself a Shooting Brake R for a smidge under £700 a month. A bargain, in many ways. Trying to work out who the car’s rivals might be is a bit of a crapshoot, depending on personal taste and requirements. Saying that, you could find an Alfa Giulia Quadrifoglio saloon for around £870 a month, or perhaps a Mercedes-AMG CLA 35 Shooting Brake for around £630 a month.