At 250kph, I hit the limiter – there's no more to be had from the car I'm tearing across Germany inside. There would be, had the engineers at Volkswagen not deemed it necessary to fit an electronic limiter, so I will never really know what this car is capable of. But at these kinds of speeds there isn't time to ponder on such trivia. At 250kph on a public road, your senses are all absolutely alert, but in Germany, on derestricted autobahns such as this one – the A8 between Munich and Salzburg – people really do know how to drive properly. They use their mirrors, indicators and leave sufficient space between them and the vehicle in front.
Not that there’s much keeping up with my Golf GTI today. The fact that a diminutive VW can travel with such devastating rapidity for hours on end, flat out, is truly remarkable but it feels completely natural, despite the absurdity of the numbers involved and the extreme physics at work. These sorts of speeds used to be the preserve of supercars and now I’m reaching them in total comfort in a hot hatch. It’s madness.
Hatches don’t come hotter than a Golf GTI, and this, the new, limited-edition Clubsport, has very quickly become my favourite one of all. It’s an out-and-out sports car that distils everything that’s been great about the iconic GTI for four decades. It’s fun. Remember fun?
Forty years of fun. That’s how VW is celebrating the story of the Golf GTI. In 1976, a team of six enthusiasts developed the model in total secret. They planned to sell 5,000 examples, evidently unaware of how seminal those three little letters would become in the motoring canon. In those 40 years, more than two million have been sold, and the car is now in its seventh generation, better and hotter than ever.
I’m en route to the 35th annual Wörthersee Meet in Austria, which is the world’s biggest GTI festival. According to VW, “tens of thousands of GTI fans will be there in picturesque Reifnitz on the southern shore of Lake Wörthersee for a gigantic party”. While I normally give these kinds of festival events a wide birth, I’m particularly intrigued by the subculture that owning a GTI gives you complete access to. When it comes to diehard fans, none die harder than GTI fanatics.
The Clubsport is an exercise in visual restraint, and I know it will disappear into the shadows at Wörthersee, where there will be hundreds of outlandishly modified examples. But it isn’t lost on the occupants of a beautiful and mildly tuned version of the original model that I overtake. They appear to be father and son, and are no doubt heading to the same place as me. The Clubsport has them pointing, smiling and giving appreciate nods – quite right, too, because this car exists to celebrate the GTI’s 40 years at the top of the pile. It’s a fitting birthday present.
Some numbers: its 2.0L engine contains four cylinders and it produces 265hp. Maximum torque is 350Nm, but there’s a boost function that liberates another 25hp and 30Nm, when it operates on the fringes of what’s doable with a front-wheel drive chassis. It will hit 100kph from rest in 6.3 seconds, and as mentioned earlier, tops out at 250kph. VW says “up to 7,000” will be built – I don’t know how many we will get in the UAE, but it costs Dh140,000, and is worth every single bit of it.
It wasn’t love at first drive, however. On the contrary, I wondered why anyone would choose such a car for such a journey for about the first hour, before my companion fiddled with the central infotainment centre screen.
The problem had been its overt stiffness – fine when you’re on a billiard-table-smooth racetrack, but not so good when you’re carrying out high-speed voyages across European highways with their varying degrees of surface quality. When a car is stiffly sprung, at high speeds, the effect is one of the jitters – constant steering corrections are required to keep in a straight line, and it feels unstable, jumping about. It hardly inspires confidence to keep pressing on.
But this model’s adjustability, it turns out, is almost infinite. I soon settle on a preferential set-up, with the suspension set up in comfort mode, and the rest of the dynamics in sport. The transformation in the Clubsport’s handling is remarkable, with the suspension’s pliancy offering up greater levels of grip from the Michelins, and reassuring, dead-straight steering, all while the exhaust liberates more pleasing noises and the steering remains perfectly true. In this set-up, I could drive all day and night without getting fed up.
Part of the Clubsport's charm is its slick manual gearbox (a DSG with paddle shifters is available, too, if you must), which serves as a tangible connection between driver and car. Wiping off speed using the engine for braking by knocking down a gear or two is one of the things I miss most when it comes to driving in the UAE, where the automatic is king. I know that if it was my money being slapped on the showroom counter, I would be stipulating that it be supplied with three pedals and a gear shifter, the latter of which is formed like a golf ball, in a brilliant nod to the original.
After four hours of hard charging, I climb out of the Clubsport’s hugging seat, and hand the key back to VW’s people. I want one – it’s that simple. But I’m here to experience more than just the finest Golf GTI there has ever been – I’m here to soak up the vibes at Wörthersee. The following morning, I jump on a speedboat to the end of the lake to do just that.
When I talk about a subculture that surrounds the GTI, that’s an understatement – these people are absolutely fanatical about their cars. The event itself is independent, although VW does command a central presence with a large stage area where each generation of Golf GTI is on display. The auto giant’s highly corporate demeanour sharply juxtaposes with the thousands of fanatics milling around, many of whom have facial piercings and murals of tattoos inked onto every square centimetre of skin. It sounds scarier than it is – these are welcoming people, at least if you own a car built by VW.
The time, money and love that have been poured into these cars is breathtaking. Many of them look undriveable thanks to being “slammed” to the ground with trick suspension and outrageous wheel cambers – it’s not my thing at all, but I admire their determination and sense of individuality and nonconformism. But there are plenty of original Mk 1 GTIs here, too, which are greeted with exceptional enthusiasm by one and all. They’re so dainty compared to today’s examples, but their design was intrinsically right from the word go: add a hint of machismo to an already attractive car – just enough to get people interested, without showing off too much. That’s always been the GTI mantra.
On my return dash to Munich Airport I opt to drive a new Golf R, which is the most-powerful model of all. It sounds more gruff, and it goes like stink, but there’s something missing after my Clubsport extravaganza. The R feels more cumbersome, and despite that extra power, a bit slower. That all boils down to the fact that it’s carrying a lot more in the way of mechanicals than its daintier sibling, because it’s four-wheel drive. It’s still a stonking car, don’t get me wrong, but the Clubsport is undoubtedly more fun, and as we have come to know during the past 40 years, that’s what the Golf GTI is all about.
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