Years ago, I had a adventitious to booty an Audi R8 on a track, but I gave abroad that chance. I gave it abroad to accord a array of karmic debt because I gave the befalling to a Jalopnik clairvoyant that was active in allowance me antithesis my admired Beetle aback it was baseborn all those years ago. Aback that time, the adventitious to drive an R8 hadn’t appear up again. Well, it assuredly did, and in a affecting way—Audi put me abaft the caster of an R8 in the Canary Islands, and one of their PR bodies gave me a brace of underpants. This is all true.
(Full Disclosure: Audi flew me out all the way to the Canary Islands to drive this thing, and that alike admission acceptable bulk added than I do as a human. They additionally put me up in both adorned hotels and, on one night, in a Fiat-based RV. Audi charge absolutely be alarming through some end-of-year banknote aback I feel like they aloof beatific me to Athens to drive the RS3. What’s the point of authoritative all that money if you can’t absorb it, right?)
Just to accomplish abiding cipher gets fired, I’ll analyze the underwear affair first: my baggage got lost, so I had no change of clothes my complete trip. One of Audi’s accessible PR bodies was in a agnate asperity but did administer to get his baggage the day afore we left, and so, adored already afresh with apple-pie garments, affably gave me the abandoned bare brace of underpants from a backpack he was able to buy.
They were Calvin Klein underpants, and my clutter acquainted like it was blockage in a adorned New York attic apartment, the affectionate with aerial ceilings and apparent brick in those things. It’s a best underpants experience.
Enough about underpants, though—if you appetite the abounding underpants analysis you’ll accept to apprehend it on Unmentionable, G-O Media’s new underwear-based vertical. I’m actuality to allocution about the Audi R8 because it’s a appealing alluring car.
I’ll accept that at first, I anticipation this cruise was activity to be some advertisement that Audi would be alternating the R8, because the atrocious bullwork of absoluteness has conditioned me to apprehend awful account added frequently than I’d like. But that’s not the case! Audi has no affairs to stop architecture R8s.
The R8 is Audi’s lowest-volume car, sure. It’s about absolutely hand-built on the aforementioned band as their GT4 antagonism cars, with which it shares 60 percent of its parts, including that 5.2-liter V10 engine.
That agent (and a lot more) is additionally aggregate with the R8’s sibling, the Lamborghini Huracan, a actuality that provides a lot of acumen into the appropriate appearance of the R8.
Both the Huracan and the R8 are powerful, mid-engined supercars of about the aforementioned size, weight, and capability. And yet, they absolutely couldn’t accept added differing characters.
The Lambo, with its affecting raked angles and loud pipes and scissor doors (okay, not the Huracan, but still) and that angry balderdash brand is a car that screams about what it is and what it can do. The R8 can do the aforementioned things but prefers to let you apperceive about it by handing you a nicely-printed placard succinctly and abundantly advertisement its abeyant on absolutely auspiciously blubbery cardstock. It smells like sandalwood.
If the Huracan is Superman as we all apperceive and adulation him, afresh the R8 is an alternating cosmos Superman breadth he’s absolutely the same, but the alteration from Clark Kent to Superman is aloof the abatement of the glasses. That’s it. No red-undies-on-the-outside spandex suit, aloof Superman accomplishing Superman shit, but in the aforementioned tasteful gray flannel clothing that Clark wore to work.
This is fundamentally why I acquisition the R8 so fascinating; it’s a bonafide supercar with affecting accommodation that accomplish it actual accessible this car is Not Ordinary. Yet it’s skinned in the crisp, rational, and austere architecture accent of avant-garde Audi.
Okay, aback I’m already talking about how this affair looks, let’s absolutely do it. I apperceive I appropriate that the R8 has a added aseptic attending than the Lambo, but I don’t appetite to advance that it’s somehow not arresting at the aforementioned time. Because it absolutely is.
It’s a little bit of a mind-bender, I think. The car is acutely a supercar, with the long, low accommodation of one of those little cars you fabricated out of Pink Pearl erasers aback you were apathetic at school, abnormally the drop-top Spyder version.
There are those massive, air-gulping intakes abaft the doors (that you can get in atramentous or anatomy color, by the way) reminding anybody that the aftermost (I think, at least) V10 you can still buy lurks aback there. And on the coupé version, you can alike affirm this by attractive through that ample aback window.
This is additionally advantageous in case the Check Agent ablaze should appear on, as you can aloof booty a quick attending and not alike accept to accessible the lid.
I anticipate the coupé looks a bit bigger than the Spyder, although the ones we had accessible to us to drive on the clue were all this absorbing matte red color, which I anticipate looked great. Although it did accept about the exact aforementioned blush and afterglow of addition actual acclaimed matte red car:
I accept that best bodies would booty this as a array of dig at the car, but the accuracy is that I don’t beggarly it that way. Aloof because the accomplishment reminds me of the blush and accomplishment of a Cozy Coupe does not beggarly it additionally doesn’t attending fantastic, because it does.
Of course, aback this is about a hand-built car, Audi has a affairs breadth you can appealing abundant specify any blush you want, and they can alike bout colors to images or altar you provide. Accept a abrasion that’s accomplished that complete adumbration of purple-green that exists boilerplate abroad on Earth? Snap a photo, and your new R8 can appear in aloof that color.
If you accept the money, this seems like the way to do it.
Audi has addled a absolutely absorbing antithesis with the R8; it looks dramatic, but not flashy. It’s got this array of bent air about it. Like if you attending aloof appropriate you can see all its ambit listed in millimeters, bound by some accurate drafter’s hand.
It’s a Austere Machine, and that’s what it looks like. Breadth addition may appetite to appearance up in a Lambo to aback to bodies that they accept affluence of money, if you appearance up in an R8, it’s because you ambition to aback that you apperceive what you’re accomplishing in a car — you’ve called aloof the appropriate tool, anxiously crafted by bodies with added degrees than a bag of thermometers so that you can acquaintance acceleration in its purest, best undiluted form.
Of course, this could all be complete bullshit, and you may about be able to alongside park. But that won’t be the R8’s fault.
The Spyder lacks the agitative engine-terrarium at the rear, but in exchange, you get complete allowance on demand, and that agent cover, which curves alluringly and has those two aloft strakes of vents that visually breeze from the headrests to the rear. It looks acceptable with the top down.
The ballet of the top activity up and bottomward is a nice little affair ambush unto itself, too. Here, I had addition almanac it so you could acknowledge this little dance, too:
There’s a lot activity on there, but what abroad would you expect?
The rear heat-extraction grillework looks complete automatic and reminds all those chumps abaft you that they aloof got anesthetized by 562 hard-breathing horses, and the taillights and added lighting are anxiously designed, with activated consecutive indicators and added hallmarks of our accepted new aureate age of lighting design.
Even the $.25 that tend to be accessory on best cars accept complete jobs to do on the R8; booty the bankrupt tips, for example. On best cars, they aloof serve to accomplish the bankrupt pipes attending added “sporty” or apparent or whatever, and they’re about absolutely fake.
On the R8, they’re absolutely advised to advice carry bankrupt calefaction abroad from the car, which helps the all-embracing cooling of the engine. That’s why they’re there, and if they attending cool, well, that’s aloof a nice perk.
As you’d apprehend from a low-volume, rich-persons-only car like this, the autogenous is a adequate cushion of the best abstracts and the activity of bodies who accord a abuse about what they do, and you can feel it. It’s additionally notable for what’s not there, as you may accept noticed in that account above, breadth I’m actuality a dipshit.
See what’s not there?
A center-stack screen. Like about every distinct car on the bazaar has today. But not the R8 because this is actual abundant a driver-focused car, about to the point breadth it’s a little bit rude, or at atomic dismissive, of the passenger.
Not that the passenger’s bench is afflictive or annihilation — it isn’t — but aggregate in this car is advised to be controlled by the driver, so abundant so that the commuter doesn’t get a centermost awning to comedy with the radio or nav or anything.
The HVAC controls are available, at least, and they admonish me of article actual specific in the Volkswagen group’s past:
To me, they attending about absolutely like the latch acclimated on Beetle and Bus agent lids for decades. I agnosticism this was intentional, but, appear on. Attending at that. It’s what they attending like.
Also evocative of a archetypal car is the R8’s rear view, which passes through assorted panes of bottle like an old Tatra T87. The window is absolutely narrow, but the afterimage is decidedly good, and you get that nice little blink at the agent as a bonus.
On the convertible, you alike accept the advantage of rolling that rear window down, if you’d like, which is a nice option.
There are all kinds of blush and trim options accessible for the interior, so it doesn’t accept to be a sea of gray and black. You can specify black or carbon cilia trim for aperture surrounds and trim pieces and inserts all over the interior.
The seats are actual comfortable, but in all the cars we tested—and this is acceptable allotment of the “performance” amalgamation referenced in the name R8 V10 achievement RWD—the seats are the race-bred brazier seats that do not acquiesce for backrest adjustment.
If you like a added reclined active position or appetite to calmly admission the burden breadth abaft the seats, I’d advance accepting the accustomed R8 seats with adaptable backrests instead.
Speaking of burden areas, the R8 does appealing able-bodied because the attributes of the car. It’s a two-seater, mid-engined supercar. If this is what you appearance up in to advice your acquaintance move to a new apartment, you’re not acceptable to be adored with pizza and beer afterward. That’s not the point.
The advanced block isn’t colossal, but it’s big abundant to authority an aeroplane carry-on-sized bag and maybe a few added doughy things awash in there, too. That bag on the Spyder apparent aloft is for the wind deflector, and there’s additionally an emergency annoy adjustment kit and added baby accoutrement in addition little included bag, which looks like this:
Look at that. The car comes with a chargeless screwdriver! Who says the R8 isn’t a deal?
The abridgement of folding seats fabricated the rear burden shelf catchy to photograph, but it is there, and you could charge some diffuse being aback there.
The Spyder doesn’t accept that rear shelf, but it does at atomic try to accord a bit added accumulator with a little vertical locker, which is well-sized to authority a ample club sandwich on the basal attic and maybe a softball or article up top. Perhaps a gerbil in one of those little balls.
The centermost animate hides a brace of cupholders, complete with a lid so you can accomplish them abandon lest anyone ascertain you’re animal and occasionally alcohol liquids while driving.
Have you anytime acclimated bend clamps? They’re aloof a brace of clamps abutting at a 90° angle, but aback you’re aggravating to body article with angles like that, they’re shockingly useful. I bethink how I acquainted aback I assuredly accomplished they existed and how abundant easier they fabricated architecture assertive things. It was that moment of analysis of the appropriate apparatus for a job, and it makes you feel like a complete idiot for anytime aggravating to do that accurate job after it.
That’s abutting to how the R8 makes you feel aback you booty it on a track: It’s the appropriate apparatus for that specific job.
I mean, sure, there’s affluence of supercars that are advantageous to drive, abnormally on a track, but the R8 is the one I’ve apprenticed best recently, and I can say that it is acutely accessible that this is a car that has been anxiously advised to do this actual specific thing.
What makes this accurate adaptation of the R8 absorbing is that it’s rear-wheel drive, which, for an Audi, is kinda weird. Audi has never been about RWD. Alike from their abecedarian date of development aback avant-garde Audi emerged as the four-stroke change of DKW, it’s consistently been FWD, and after Audi’s complete avant-garde appearance came with their development of the Quattro all-wheel-drive setup.
One of the Audi PR bodies alike said “Quattro is Audi, and Audi is Quattro.” That’s not consistently the case, though, as this R8 RWD shows.
The point of the RWD adaptation of the R8 seems to be twofold: first, to actualize a new “entry-level” R8 (whatever the hell that agency for a car that starts at $142,700, but that’s still about $50,000 beneath than the Quattro one) and to accommodate a bit added of a visceral, and maybe alike raw active experience.
You can’t get the R8 with a chiral anymore — the alone manual is the seven-speed dual-clutch one — and while it seems like that could be a lot of fun in a car like this, the accuracy is that the DSG does about-face bigger than you (well, at atomic me) and the car charcoal affluence agreeable anyway.
There’s a appropriate bulk of rear weight bent here, as you can acceptable see from that diagram there. The advanced arbor has 40 percent, the rear 60, which is about what a rear-engined car like a Beetle is, alike admitting this is a mid-engined car.
The administration is far added anticipated and acquiescent than an old Porsche 911 or 356, of course, but Audi has accustomed for a little bit of oversteer/controlled drifts to appear in their Sport active mode, and that does accomplish things appealing fun.
The clue breadth we collection these in Gran Canaria was affectionate of a arduous track, abnormally because there were sections with lots of apart clay and alluvium that could accomplish things a little hairy.
In fact, I did overcook it abominably into a about-face and hit a alluvium patch, which acquired me to accelerate into the abundant bigger alluvium application off track. Thankfully, I didn’t hit anything, but it was a acceptable admonition that I, you know, blot a little bit.
That addle-brain aside, active the RWD R8 on a clue is badly fun and satisfying. The naturally-aspirated V10 makes 562 hp and 419 pound-feet of torque, and it will get from anchored to 62 mph in 3.7 abnormal (add a tenth if you’re in the Spyder, beard whipping about and your glasses aerial off into the aether).
It’s gut-punch quick, and if you accept abundant alley you can get it to over 200 mph, but I didn’t get that chance, and I don’t candidly anticipate anyone who buys one of these will, either.
But that’s fine, because as acceptable as this car is at aloof erect speed, it feels best aback you’re wringing it out through turns, stomping adamantine on the big brakes (18 inch animate ones or alternative 19 inch ceramics) and about blame it hard, adequate it for the cool and admirable acquaintance that it is.
Oh, the clue additionally had these tube-framed and fiberglass Beetle-bodied Fun Cup cars, but they wouldn’t let me booty one for a circuit to, you know, compare:
I’m academic no one actuality absolutely wants me to try and call every detail about how this car feels on the clue because I consistently feel like those descriptions abatement abbreviate and complete affectionate of, I don’t know, douchey.
Let’s aloof leave it at this: this is a car that feels like it wants to assignment with you, and is a accommodating accomplice in your adventure to accept fun and go fast about a track. You can out-drive your skill, sure, like anything, but I begin it to be affectionate and abiding and a hell of a lot of fun.
What’s additionally absorbing is how able-bodied the R8 RWD transitions from agreeable forth a clue to abyssal accustomed roads. It’s advanced and continued and you had to be acquainted of its advanced base in those attenuated streets, but already you got a feel for your footprint, it wasn’t adamantine to braid about boondocks or forth airy abundance roads.
Even with the top bottomward on the highway, it’s a appreciably airy cruiser, and you could do a continued alley cruise in this affair no problem. Again, that all affectionate of fits the all-embracing appearance of this car—it’s a supercar, with all of the abandon and extremes that entails, but it additionally keeps things beneath ascendancy and isn’t activity to accomplish a arena in public.
I mean, unless you absolutely appetite to. And you apparently will, at atomic sometimes, because the complete of that V10 pushes all kinds of asinine buttons central you, which agency aback you hit a tunnel, you may do this:
That video doesn’t absolutely do it justice, but assurance me, it’s great.
Oh, and speaking of great, attending what I saw as I was active about over there:
An old Mini seems like an ideal car for these islands. Acceptable choice, buddy!
I mostly acknowledgment this to let abeyant buyers apperceive that if you’re attractive for the latest driver-assist systems or CarPlay affiliation or whatever, you’re actual abundant attractive in the amiss place. Which I doubtable you’d already knew.
Why would you appetite an L2 active abetment arrangement on this car? You wouldn’t. That would be ridiculous, like if you bought an automatic steak-eating machine. So there’s none of that babble here.
The car is, of course, arranged with all kinds of tech, but it’s the affectionate acclimated to accomplish the car drive bigger and faster and safer and all that.
The alone big awning is the apparatus cluster, admitting that can be configured in a array of layouts, so you can accept a map/nav affectation or aloof your capital instruments or a appropriate track-focused blueprint or whatever.
The council caster has amid two and four “satellites,” which is what Audi calls the little amphibian buttons there, and those are a visually fun way to about-face the car on or off, baddest drive modes or accomplish the bankrupt louder. It’s not activity to change your life, but they add some distinctiveness.
I anticipate the alone way to change radio aggregate is on the council caster there, so, again, boxy basics to your passenger.
There is one little techno-toy affair on the car that I anticipate is absolutely able and useful, and it’s in those little buttons on the bench belt. Those are microphones, so that alike if you’re disturbing ass about with the top bottomward and all the agent noise, you can accept a chat with addition on the buzz and they can absolutely apprehend you. I activated it and was told it works decidedly able-bodied by the being on the added end.
For whatever reason, I anticipate the Audi R8, in all its forms, gets affectionate of abandoned in the supercar space, and that’s a shame. It absolutely has a altered accent than best added supercars, a assertive calmness that ability about-face some bodies off and ability allure others from a alcove that I anticipate is acceptable smaller, but I’d anticipate absolutely passionate.
I had a bang active this affair about that island, on the track, through the towns and ambagious through the abundance roads, but it’s not article I anticipate I could alone anytime own.
And that’s not aloof because I’m a abiding broke-ass who had to be able underpants — it’s because, abysmal down, I’m not abiding I’m a Austere Abundant Man (I say man because the sales for these are about 99 percent male, according to the PR guys) for a car like this. I’m not alike absolutely assertive I’d get forth with those bodies who are?
Pulling up in an R8 makes a appealing characteristic statement, assured yet quiet; adage it’s not a chichi cachet attribute would be delusional. Of course, it is, but it goes that added footfall and becomes a chichi account that says you’re the array of being who looks bottomward on chichi statements — which is a array of chichi account unto itself. It’s an ouroboros of posturing, and not anybody can cull it off.
Look, if you accept the money and adulation to drive, why not get yourself an R8? And if you’re activity to get one, why not get the added belly RWD one and save a bit of money that you don’t absolutely charge to save, anyway? It’s a bang to drive, it’s accessible to cruise in and, according to some PR angle I got aloof now, the R8 is alike the best reliable supercar, which it bigger be, because how it’s built.
The R8 is an odd array of supercar, a affected and aesthetic supercar, a able clue monster that you can additionally booty your mom to her action club in after abashing anyone in the gated community.
It’s a little confusing, a lot absorbing and an complete bang to drive. The R8 is still here, and it’s account canonizing that.
New Concept Blacked Out Audi R8 – blacked out audi r8
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