Volkswagen Golf R review

The Golf R annoys a certain section of the petrolhead community, because it’s the four-wheeled equivalent of speedrunning a video game with all the cheat codes turned on. You simply can’t make a mistake: it never wastes a single horsepower. It’s almost always got torque: 310lb ft from 2,100rpm through to 5,500rpm. The DSG gearbox doesn’t blink through upshifts and if you decide to interfere with the longer (rather cheap-feeling) paddles, it’s mostly obedient.

Obviously Volkswagen was sensitive to this ‘it’s too foolproof’ attitude, because the Mk8 Golf R was treated to a Drift Mode, so long as you spec the R Performance pack which unlocks the right settings for the already-present torque-vectoring rear differential. It also heralds a ‘Special’ Nürburgring setting which teams an angrier powertrain map with more supple suspension characteristics. Handy for your average British back road, as well as The Green Hell.

What’s Drift Mode like?

An acquired taste, because to get the car sideways (when legal and appropriate of course) you need to do what the car wants, not the classic ‘turn in with no power on, jump on the gas and throw opposite lock at the mess you’ve made’ method.

To get the Golf R to misbehave, you need to keep the steering wheel as straight as possible – the skid is initiated from the diff pushing power to the outside rear wheel to kick the car’s backside out. If you steer into it exuberantly, it’ll kill the power as the ESP (which stays on by default) presumes you’re having an accident. You can turn the ESP off entirely which helps no end, but it’s still not what drifting aficionados would call ‘organic’. Eats tyres, too.

What’s it like the rest of the time?

We’ve only tested a Performance Pack-equipped car, which is less one-dimensional than VW AWD systems of yore. It’s great to feel the rear axle being worked mid corner to help pitch the car through a bend while clawing at the road, and when teamed with a bit of a lift-off turn in, the R hatch is properly agile and very, very fast cross-country.

What helps with the R’s ability to demolish a road in all weathers is its comfort. Spec the ‘DCC’ adaptive dampers and you’ll find plenty of adjustment between the firmer side and the plush end – we haven’t been able to test a car without this crucial box ticked. The AMG A35 hasn’t got the same bandwidth. Where it’s being deflected into the tree canopy, the Golf R stays relaxed and presses all 326bhp onto the road.

Ultimately, it’s nothing like as tactile or satisfying to drive as a Honda Civic Type R, which remains the benchmark hatchback-sized performance car (probably forevermore). But the Golf has a different brief; a more steely-eyed niche it’s got very good at fulfilling.

Anything else of note?

VW has added a ‘Sport +’ powertrain mode which you can save to your overall Individual collection of settings. This entrusts you to shift gear manually and will crash headlong into the rev-limiter instead of swapping cogs on your behalf. We approve, because there’s little more annoying than setting an automatic car to manual mode, then it second-guessing your shifts.

The brakes stand up well on track (in the hatch), but the noticeably lardier Estate (it weighs 73kg more) grilled its pads sooner and didn’t feel as biddable. Good news for the dog there, as we are contractually obligated by the car testing gods to point out in every fast estate car review.

And don’t expect great things from the designer-label Akrapovic exhaust. The thin-walled perforated pipes look menacing, but the noise of the EA888 engine these days is thoroughly muffled by particulate filters, and inside it’s heavily augmented by the speakers. So, save yourself £3,315 and keep the standard pipes.