Volkswagen T-Roc

WE WERE ABOUT FOUR HOURS INTO FRANCE WHEN THE TEXTS started pinging. “Geneva motor show cancelled.” Rowan and I were unfazed by this development. It was Friday, we weren’t due in Switzerland until Monday and besides, we had plans for the weekend. Plans that involved two super-estates, a ski resort and a pair of roof boxes. You join us in a pizzeria a couple of nights later.

OM: Well this has been thoroughly pleasant. Mountains, fresh snow, beer and Netflix in the evenings, all to the accompaniment of 600bhp estates.

RH: As the ancient Chinese proverb states: one man’s cancelled motor show is another man’s scrambled group test. And these two aren’t a bad pairing – even though it’s not a level playing field. Yes, they’re both Germanic and similarly priced, but the RS6 annihilates the Porsche in the performance stakes. My 2.9-litre turbo V6 and e-motor pony up a total of 456bhp. You’ve got an eight-cylinder twin-turbo anvil pumping out 600!

OM: I know, and I did enjoy every hoof away from the tolls on the way down, watching your froggy headlights rewind in my mirrors. The right way to start life on the Garage fleet if you ask me. This is one of the Launch Edition models, although it does without radar cruise and keyless locking, and I hadn’t realised how much I’d come to rely on both. Excusez-moi Monsieur, deux grand bières s’il vous plait. Aside from that, no complaints. It looks awesome, rides gently and was very refined on the way down. How was yours?

RH: Easy. If not a little – er – whistly. The roof box is by no means a 6ft kazoo, but it does kick up a racket. Luckily, the £1,062 Bose sound system can shout louder. But the mpg… I’d used all the e-juice before I’d even crossed the Thames, let alone the Channel. So that V6 has been doing all the heavy lifting, and this is a hefty 2,265kg lump to lift.

OM: I surreptiously checked how many litres went in your car after the first 350 miles – 68.5, which gave you fuel economy of 21mpg! RH: Don’t have a pop at me – that was your second fuel stop! OM: There is that. And yeah, the best I’ve done from a tank is 335 miles. Roofbox on, I’m at 20mpg – about four below normal. It’s got this 48V mild hybrid tech that’s meant to shut the engine off for coasting, but I’m getting the same economy as I did from a last-gen RS6 six years ago. But still, only 1mpg behind a hybrid…

RH: But now we’re in Morzine and the clever technology knew our destination, so charged the battery on the way down and it left me enough to coast about town on electricity. You’re still going to be pumping hydrocarbons across the snow-covered slopes getting angry looks from the locals. Ah, merci monsieur. And cheers Ollie, it’s been a fun few days.

OM: Cheers Ro. And yes, point taken about silent running. Stop with the smug face. Stop. Because which one got all the attention? Mine. You saw how people engaged with it – they love it: the blistered bodywork, the angry face, the fact it goes blub-blub-blub. No one has bothered to bat an eyelid at yours. And have you looked up local chargers? Time to order isn’t it? Margherita for you – that’s about as bland as your car. RH: I’m guessing you’ll have the tartiflette… so you can clog your arteries just like the RS6 is doing to the planet’s. Now, which drives better? OM: Come on, that’s not even a question. The RS6 of course. RH: Wrong! The Sport Turismo is more positive, has real weight to the steering – do you not feel disconnected while driving the RS6 normally?

OM: Look, I like the way the Porsche turns into corners. It’s got good steering, you know what the front end’s up to and it gives you confidence. The Audi’s steering is way too light and flighty. But it’s so wide! Nice low centre of gravity, good grip, feels and drives like a sports car, but without the engine to make anything of it. The RS6 is more of a muscle car alright, and needs more detail in the steering and communication from the chassis when you ramp it up, but the rearwheel steering doesn’t half work well. It’s very nimble up here.

RH: Yeah, without the four-wheel-steer trickery, the Porsche does feel like a properly big car in the mountains. But what about the RS6’s seating position? It’s like being in a crossover. In the Porsche, you’re in the bowels of the chassis. But one thing that hasn’t changed with the RS6 is how rapid it is. Jeez. You just plant the throttle and it fires off into the direction of the next mountain. And with that quattro magic, the commitment you can apply in these conditions is astonishing. In

comparison, the Porsche just felt a bit asthmatic and weedy. Especially when we went for that blast up to Avoriaz.

OM: That was good, wasn’t it? I love the RS6 for that – it’s so hearty and good natured. It’s having a good time and wants you to have a good time too. Yes the engine noise is a bit synthetic in loud mode, but it storms off down tight twisty roads with such speed and composure. There might not be much feel, but it’s got an abundance of ability. I did also love that the air suspension on both can be raised 20mm – meant we weren’t dragging our bellies through slush. But, the Audi is much bigger in back and boot. More legroom and 565 litres of load space plays 425 litres. Plus my Thule Vector Alpine is way cooler than your Porsche roof box.

RH: Yes, it’s a bit plasticky and flimsy, but also only £350. How much was yours?

OM: It’s hard to put a price on internal lighting, locks that slot home properly, being able to open from either side and – most importantly of all – very little wind noise at speed.

RH: Well I’m sure Thule does put a price on it. Come on, how much? OM: £1,350.

RH: For 380 litres of air? That’s hilarious.

OM: Less hilarious than your mpg figure.

RH: Amen to that. Ah perfect timing, let’s get tucked in. Look at the state of yours – that’s a coronary in disc form.

OM: I’ve earned it. Encore deux bières, s’il vous plait. Bon appetit, mate.

GOODBYE £ 24,145 OTR/£28,978 as tested/£315pcm WHY IT ’S HERE

Would you have a faux-SUV over a decently specced Golf? DRIVER

AT THE START OF THIS PROCESS, WE ASKED OURSELVES IF WE’D rather have the T-Roc over a similarly specced Golf. At the time of writing, we’d be able to get into something like a new R-Line Golf MkVIII with a manual transmission, five doors and a 130bhp TSi – lightly aping the T-Roc’s functionality. That’s the very new Golf, with a slightly less powerful engine. And the answer? Probably not. Personally, I’d rather have a Golf. Why? Well, it’s not that the T-Roc is a bad car, far from it. Just that for the benefits apparent for having the Roc, the Golf would punch harder. Let me explain.

As far as I can tell, the Golf will do absolutely everything a T-Roc will do, except see over hedges and be slightly easier to get in and out of. These things, while appealing to some, have very little bearing on what I need from a car. The Golf would be more fuel efficient (lighter, more slippery), better to drive, feature the latest updates in terms of interior and generally be just as classless. Possibly more so. The T-Roc isn’t empirically bad, but it’s a fashion buy, rather than a practical purchase. It handles well for a tall car, rides acceptably, has a decent boot and looks nice. I’ve managed 43.5mpg on average throughout nearly 15k miles – which is great – and never felt that I’d been shortchanged in any aspect, other than the TSi EVO engine’s complete lack of torque/flexibility off-boost and general grumpiness on cold-start days. But it has never – and I say this with some surprise – come across as more than relentlessly competent. This obviously doesn’t matter to most, who want a reliable, easy-to-use, practical car, but because you’re reading TG, I assume that you might be looking for that special sauce that makes your choice of car more than just a head-over-heart purchase. And that’s where the T-Roc loses – if you’re being practical to the core, buy a Golf.

REPORT 7 £ 135,550 OTR/£146,625 as tested/£2,090pcm WHY IT ’S HERE

Because the TG Garage must have an AMG V8 at all times DRIVER

HAVING SPENT 46 YEARS DINING OUT ON ITS ABILITY TO

engineer cars that bonfire rear tyres, it’s amazing that in just seven, AMG has managed to do the exact opposite.

Merc’s go-faster arm first dabbled with 4WD back in 2013 with the A45. “Sacrilege!” enthusiasts shouted. And they had a point, it was far from a ground-breaking system. But, since then, the clever folks in Affalterbach have bashed their heads together and got the front and rear wheels talking to each other so fluently that now the traction light barely flashes. So much so, even in the recent torrential downpours the 4dr still had the ability to put down 631bhp and 627lb ft with crazy aplomb.

But that doesn’t mean you can’t turn the traction off and have some fun. And you should… it is an AMG after all.

GOODBYE £ 159,900 OTR/£200,345 as tested/£3,000pcm WHY I T ’S HERE

Is living with luxe all it’s cracked up to be? DRI V ER

THE CONTI GT’S TYRES HAD MORE GRIP THAN I EXPECTED. WELL, UP to the point they left the ground. I didn’t think I’d be able to carry enough speed around the corner that led into the Longcross jump, but once again the Conti GT surprised me.

That’s been the story of living with it – a time that has now come to an end. Every fibre of this car is built to tour grandly. And not just the headline stuff such as astonishingly low wind noise and a washing wave of whirring torque, but the small stuff: the dignified movement of the seatbelt arm, the weighted action of the column stalks, the Naim hi-fi. These are the things that engender long-term satisfaction. And they combine to affect the way you approach the car. End result? I drove it calmly, because that was how it wanted to be driven.

Not slowly, certainly, but smoothly, considerately. I built a relationship with it, acknowledged that on a B-road, it behaves like a burst dam: unstoppable momentum that takes up all available space. But the shudder and kickback when one of those huge wheels encountered a pothole made me squirm, and while all other mechanical moving parts were exemplary in their smoothness and sophistication, the gearbox wasn’t.

And then there’s the rear space. This should be the GT that can seat four comfortably, but it can’t. It would happily do 350 miles on a tank, and 26–28mpg on a gentle long haul, although this month’s 21.1mpg average was about par for the course. Its coasting tech worked brilliantly, while high gears and low revs were the best way to enjoy the W12’s 664lb ft. Pre-coronavirus, this was already my isolation tank. I loved the daily commute in it, because it was so impressive at putting up a protective shell. It was imperturbable. And more than that, it made travel joyous. And what’s the job of a car, if not to improve the way you travel?