Skoda Kodiaq VRS

The VRS goes supercar chasing

LAST MONTH THE KODIAQ VRS FINALLY got the chance to cover some serious miles, heading down to the Route Napoléon for issue 301’s cover story with the GT4 RS, Huracán STO, 458 Speciale and NSX-R.

John Barker and I chose to drive to the south of France because of the flight problems in the UK. The 15-hour journey seemed never-ending, but podcasts and caffeine kept us going while the cruise control held us at a steady 130kph.

The following day there was another early start to get to some of our favourite locations. The journalists and the owners of our test cars were obviously eager to have a proper drive, so not wanting to hold up the convoy I stayed at the back and did my best to keep in touch.

On twisty uphill roads, the Kodiaq quickly found itself out of its depth, lacking in both poise and power compared with other performance SUVS (its petrol four-cylinder has just 242bhp with which to haul 1776kg). Downhill it was even worse, brake fade setting in quickly and the steering making an unhappy whirring noise, maybe due to the strain or possibly just the hot weather.

I couldn’t help but think that our new F-pace SVR long-termer would have been a far more enjoyable SUV on those fabulous roads. It wouldn’t have been substantially less economical on the run down either, the Skoda having averaged 35mpg where the V8 Jag can achieve 30mpg on a similar run (see left). By the end of our first day on location, Barker found it highly amusing that the VRS was reporting an average of just 11mpg…

So with an inability to entertain on good roads and unexceptional fuel economy on boring ones, I’m starting to wonder exactly what advantage the VRS offers over a regular Kodiaq.

Date acquired February 2022 Total mileage 6120 Mileage this month 2311 Costs this month £0 mpg this month 33.1