Audi Sportscar Experience
Quattro put through its paces
Racing is what makes for high-powered, super quick road cars that constantly push the boundaries of speed and physics on track to offer thrills and excitement on your office commute. Audi has long been associated with racing and has tasted many successes in DTM touring car races and the gruelling 24 and 12 Hours of Le Mans, one of the toughest endurance races on the motorsport calendar. Audi also excels in transferring their on track performance and technology to their road-going cars and each year, customers
and a lucky bunch of journalists get a handson experience of testing the technology to its limits. This is the seventh edition of the Audi Sports Car Experience and it brings along the latest addition to Audi's fleet the gorgeous RS 5 Coupe.
The RS 5 is the A5 Sportback's quicker cousin, exuding the same classy visage albeit with subtle hints of sportiness revealed only through the 20-inch wheels and sporty front bumper. Out on the track, the differences become more prominent. The RS 5's 600Nm of torque pushes you back into the seat as it accelerates from 0 to 100kmph in just 3.9 seconds while the might of 450bhp from its 2.9-litre V6 turbo-petrol engine helps it go on to achieve a 250kmph top speed.
Audi's quattro all-wheel drive system keeps the traction in check as we set the car in dynamic mode to lap the fast Buddh Inter- national Circuit. Having driven the RS 5 and the R8 supercar on track, it was time to give the quattro system a harder challenge.
A handling course was set-up within the premises with a tight and narrow course that requires precision driving. A 180-degree skid pad sprayed with water makes it even harder for the car to hold traction. This is where the quattro all-wheel drive system displays its prowess. The system works on a complex
system of electronics, brakes and differentials to regulate power transmitted to the front and rear wheels. This helps achieve a near perfect balance of power and traction to the wheels.
We drove the Audi S5, the more powerful RS 6 Avant and the RS 7 sports cars around the course and came back mighty impressed with how well the cars held traction in demanding conditions. The test also included a fast slalom course which further demonstrated the quattro system's ability to offer optimum grip and a hard braking zone testing the ABS and braking efficiency.
With a day of driving Audi's delectable range of sports cars and pushing them to the limit, we had a blast of a time experiencing track-bred technology for the road.