SUPERESTATE GROUP TEST · GOLF GTI · YARIS
Who builds the biggest, baddest wolf in the superestate pack? And will your family agree? Audi RS6 takes on Merc E63 and Alpina B5
Merc E63 takes on AudiRS6 and Alpina B5 for the superestate crown. Also VW Golf GTI, Toyota Yaris and Bentley Bentayga
If you put a grunty great V8 at one end of a car, and an equally gargantuan boot at the other, what have you got? No, not a superestate. At least not straightaway. Because before that what you’ve actually got is A PROBLEM. Encapsulated in those two elements is the ultimate automotive dilemma – which comes first, practicality or performance?
A chasm lurks across that wheelbase between roaring motor at one end and cavernous boot at the other. I don’t think there’s a type of car with a clearer – or broader – separation of duties than a superestate. A hot hatch? No, because we’re prepared to suffer a slight comfort and refinement shortfall. A fast SUV? Pull the other one. Name me one that’s actually as good to drive as a fast estate. No, not the Urus. Or the DBX. Or a Cayenne. They’re all the wrong shape and that’s insurmountable.
So the fast family wagon is pulled in two very different directions. They need to do family things: holiday hauling, school runs, dog lugging. But equally, to justify their existence they need to deliver much more than the half price diesel version. If you’ve read our reports on the long-term Audi RS6 in our Garage section, you’ll know this has been occupying us for a few months. It’s a remarkably comfortable and capable cruiser, but... well, the car you see here isn’t the usual Navarra Blue one, but instead a Nardo Grey car equipped with the £1,300 RS Sport Suspension Plus with Dynamic Ride Control. Conventional coil springs instead of air suspension, with hydraulically crosslinked dampers like a McLaren 720S, no less.
In common with both rivals, it sports a V8 boosted by twin turbos to something in the
region of 600bhp. This is more than enough
– all these cars hit 60mph from rest in about 3.5 seconds. But by then they’ve barely hit their stride. It’s what they do from there deep into three figures that’s most impressive. Speed is a given, but don’t mistake speed for enjoyment, speed is just one facet of enjoyment – and the one that has the most potential to land you in trouble.
Lined up against the RS6 are the soon-tobe-facelifted Mercedes E63 S and Alpina’s B5 Touring. BMW hasn’t seen the need to do an M5 estate in the last decade. A travesty. But one that has allowed Alpina room to take BMW’s 4.4-litre M550i and fit it with a new intake system, intercooler, pistons, radiators and a pair of new, bigger twin-scroll turbos, and send it out in Touring guise with 592bhp, 590lb ft and no speed restrictor at all. Mercedes is currently in the process of giving the E-Class range a refresh after four years on sale. Mods to the E63 will follow, but aside from a redesigned cabin and new nose/lights, there won’t be much change to the mechanical package. So even if you wait for the facelifted one (likely along next spring), you might have to make do with no more than 604bhp and 626lb ft of torque. Don’t forget that Merc is the only firm that supplies different levels of AMG madness. This is maximus, while non-S minimus brings 563bhp and 553lb ft. The weakling.
We’ve come to Llandow in South Wales to give the Hyde-side of their characters a work out, but for the other six days we had them we Jekyll’d about. This is what you need to know about daily use with them. The Mercedes has the biggest boot (both in terms of floor area and litreage) and the lowest load height. Ageing Alsatians with dodgy hips will find it easiest to get into. The BMW has a separate opening tailgate glass. This is often overlooked but very useful – you can load stuff through it in tight spaces, or give your dog an easy breather in a lay-by without them making a concerted bid for freedom. All have electric boots, tie down hooks, underfloor space and so on.
Riding in the back? Alpina has the softest, comfiest seats, the Merc the most space, and
“AGEING ALSATIANS WITH DODGY HIPS WILL FIND THE MERCEDES THE EASIEST TO GET INTO”
Audi a balance of both. Most of us felt we’d prefer to bend our knees a bit more and cosset our buttocks in the Alpina. The Merc’s seats really aren’t very forgiving: afflicted with hard padding they’re bound to last for years, but you’ll be stopping every couple of hours to de-numb your buttocks. That’s what the overhead gantry guidelines say, isn’t it? So maybe it’s been done on purpose. The E63 rams home its sportiness not just via tough seats with deep side bolsters, but with a scatter of buttons across the console and steering wheel that insist you switch on the noisy pipes, select gears manually, increase the modes, decrease the traction control and so on. It demands most of you. Not just via its glaring buttons, but because the design is busy. It’s beautifully built from lovely, tactile materials, but there’s a lot going on. And a huge amount of screen configuration to do.
Both the Alpina and Audi are more instantly relaxing. You sink into softer seats (particularly the B5’s) and survey less frenetic dashboards. The Audi’s is especially clean, at least until you thumb the start button and the three main screens glow into life. Touchscreen-only has at least cleaned up the centre console, and Audi plays down the dynamic controls completely. One configurable RS button on the steering wheel, a selectable driving modes switch beneath the lower screen. It’s the most attractive cabin, the easiest to get on with, and in Vorsprung trim comes with an Alcantara steering wheel.
The Alpina’s, perhaps unsurprisingly, feels most like a conventional estate cockpit. Aside from badges, coloured stitching and screen graphics you could be in a 530d. Nothing wrong with that, it means the pace comes as even more of a surprise. Alpinas are stealthy, understated cars – I’d be tempted to tone down the exterior even more, remove the pin-striping and large-font badging. It’s the car for those that want to underplay their potential.
The others are chest-beaters. The black-onblack Merc looks plain sinister, and while the RS6 may not promote its potential inside, just look at the bodywork. The arches have been blown out 70mm more than the plain A6 Avant, a pair of flatulent pipes jut out from under this monobrow arrangement at the back, and then you get round the front and it’s all creases and angles and scowling and anger.
It’s mostly fakery. In the others, the visuals accurately reflect the driving character, but the Audi is different. It rides like an Alpina. No, it rides better than the Alpina. That needs some qualification. Yes, on air suspension, the ride is uncanny considering it sits on 22-inch wheels. Here, on the more hardcore suspension, it’s still very impressive. The Alpina is slightly softer, but doesn’t have the RS6’s body control, nor
“THE ALPINA AND AUDI ARE MORE INSTANTLY RELAXING. YOU SINK INTO SOFTER SEATS”
the bandwidth of its adaptive dampers.
I’d definitely have the DRC suspension – it makes the handling feel more natural, with sharper reflexes and purer steering. You’re never really aware of how much weight the RS6 is having to manage (it’s 2,075kg). Chiefly this is because of the standard fit fourwheel steering, which does a bang up job of increasing agility and reducing understeer.
It holds itself together better on a challenging road than the B5, which comes across as more of an autobahn express. The springing is a bit too soft and lazy for the chassis to feel crisp, and the engine is less urgent as well. The RS6 and E63 give you the full torque thump at 2,500rpm, but the B5 goes in for a gentler ramp up, saving the best response and real go for when you’re beyond 4,000rpm. It’s less instantly gratifying, but oh so satisfying. The engine is more muted, but gorgeously smooth, the steering is calmer in your hands and it gets out of corners beautifully.
While the Audi distributes power evenly between front and rear, which at Llandow inevitably meant eventual understeer, the
B5 – and the E63 – fed about 80 per cent to the back axle, and once that moved out of line, transferred the power smoothly forward, so you exited neutrally. Both felt delicious. But only one was what you’d call tenacious.
The E63 is a car you’d happily use to tow your Ariel Atom to a track day, but when you got there, take the tow car out instead. It makes the best noise, is the sharpest handling, the most aggressive and the most entertaining. It has real turn in bite, easily the best steering feel, mightiest brakes, angriest engine and was the fastest down the back straight. The other two coped with track work, the E63 lapped it up. Easily the most fun. And on the road, too. It is the most enthralling to drive, the one that engages with the driver and delivers something genuinely akin to a sports car experience. But...
Remember where we came in? You would be making a conscious decision to subject your family to this. Even in Comfort mode you’re jiggling along, the car regularly prodding you and demanding to be used hard. It’s tremendous for the driver, and actually noise levels are low inside, but the car always feels positive, vibrations and surface changes that the RS6 and B5 filter so well, are fed through in the E63. Your dog probably won’t mind, your family might well.
So here’s your dilemma, lucky person with a six figure sum and a completely admirable taste for a superestate. These are all cool cars. Far less crass than an X5M or Cayenne Turbo or GLE 63. If you want the one that’ll sweep across Europe without effort (and do so the most economically, averaging over 30mpg, when the best we got out of either rival was 26), have the Alpina.
But the others are better suited to conventional British fast estate use. They’re more readily entertaining on B-roads, with harder hitting engines, more striking visual impact, and sportier dynamics. Overall I think the Audi RS6 – with DRC suspension – strikes the best balance. It’s the one your family will forgive you for, because it doesn’t need much compromise. But it’s not the one I’d have. I’d have the E63 and tell my family every other superestate rode like this. As with so much in family life, it’s a question of what you can get away with.
“THE RS6 STRIKES THE BEST BALANCE. IT’S THE ONE YOUR FAMILY WILL FORGIVE YOU FOR”