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| 2014 Audi RS Q3 |
What Audi did is take an ordinary Q3 on the nightclub, strip out most of its dignity like watching and paying for girls dancing, and then the result for all of those beer breath hangover is this; a crossover running from the law like what teenagers running away from the public with a bag snatched from a lady, some drugs hidden in his pants, and remain as anonymous as Guy Fawkes. This, ladies and gentlemen, is the brand new
Audi RS Q3.
The normal Q3 is made for the sort of people who realize that they are the sort of geek or nerd trying to think smart and act smart, like any dorky high-IQ morons in their skinny jeans, suspenders, polos, and dorky glasses. Whoever came here gets the bulls from the bullies and later on gets flushed down to the toilet. We're not talking about that but the Q3 really suits the description well because it's just one of the tall hatchbacks many people wanted to buy for no reason. This whole crossover trend, those fakey and phoney hatchbacks claim to be SUVs, it always here to stay and that really creeps me out. Anyway, what's this all about the RS version?
This is like when you turn a nerd into a ladies' man by giving him lots of adrenaline, not by steroids but taking him on a wild ride on a theme park like roller coasters, bumper cars, anything highriding that thrills him. That's true, it is an adrenaline-induced tall hatchback made by the skunk works lurking through the bowels of Quattro GmBH.
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| 2014 Audi RS Q3 interior |
Audi claims that this is the first ever SUV to get the RS treatment by quattro but to me this isn't an SUV indeed. The thing is though that the whole idea of having a high-performance SUV is by turning it from a family-friendly car into a car only selfies want to start some bar brawls by night. Think of it like Patrick Swayze's Road House in a mindless kind of way. Road House...
Under the bonnet, the RS Q3 is powered by the same sort of engine you'd expect from the old 2012 Audi RS3 Sportback. It develops 310PS of power and 420Nm of torque. 310PS of power...that's about 8PS less than the Lexus IS350 but still, the RS Q3 has a 0-100kph time of 5.5 seconds and top speed normally limited to 250kph. That sounds like a countdown to a disaster, much more like, well you know...
What about the way it handles? For a crossover like this, the RS Q3 really is worth a juvenile streak and because it's 4WD, handling never felt so...so...well, modest. It doesn't want to kill you like most high-powered sportscars do but still, it's worth a smile indeed to the driver's senses. Think of it like...salad preparation, the Brainiac way. You're making a salad with the use of pencil sharpener, a guillotine, and a paper shredder. Hmmm...convincing if you ran out of knives for chopping but it leaves out with some paper shreddings and pencil shavings. Ick!
If by ick, I mean of course, it's worth terrible to drive one of those if you were in the middle of a trip to groceries or to the mall because if you do, people might think you're just another one of people who spent the government's pork barrel for no reason at all and the authorities might get you noticed. There's another problem with the RS Q3 because hey, while it's worth exciting to drive, it's definitely not quite the weekend car for a treat and because Audi spent so much making it too sporty, being a weekend car is a bit of a contraband because it makes you upset more than your Photoshop teacher in class. Ouch...
But still, the biggest problem for the RS Q3 is of course, the price and since it starts at
54,600 Euros, twice as expensive as the regular Q3 but as a general rule, it's the most affordable RS model for now because when you look at the price list for Audi models, the RS Q3 costs less than the present Audi RS model. The most expensive so far was the very serious RS7 Sportback with the pricing of 113,000 Euros.
So yes, the new RS Q3, it maybe more of a value than any other Audi RS but what you get for what you pay for is a Q3 with too much power that doesn't make any sense. Too much power for a crossover? Hmmm... Where did I get that idea? Never mind about that, but if I want more fun out for the buck, it might be best not to have one of these but instead, I should be getting one of these...
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| 2014 Volkswagen cross up! |
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| 2014 Volkswagen cross up! interior |
Yep, just another tall hatchback but this time in the form of the
Volkswagen up! compact car, the small car worth enjoyable enough if you want to play a game of badminton out of it. It's called the
cross up! and this model starts at around
13,950 Euros and you don't need to have too much stuff that the Audi RS Q3 had. Sure, the RS Q3 maybe a crossover which has the strength of a crossbow but it's a bit too much and with the cross up!, you're not the sort of person who spends most of the pork barrel, you're just a busy man out with some casuals for casual Friday. Since it's not Friday, it's a bit of a casual everyday if I'm honest.
With the 1.0L engine from the normal up! compact, it develops about 75PS of power, extremely less than the RS Q3 but unlike the RS Q3, it's not very thirsty indeed because it has about 21.3km/L of fuel economy. Not bad though, not bad. Even though it's too small and it's too slow, the cross up won't definitely kill you more than the RS Q3.
So, in conclusion, the RS Q3 is worth the fun but if it's too much, better downgrade yourself to the cross up! instead because sometimes, the smallest can rest easily on the road like a baby carried by a stork. Quite a tearjerker to end this impression here...
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