Friday 19th September 2014

Polo GTI gains power - and a clutch pedal

Is this the genuine junior Golf GTI we've been waiting for?

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Back in January VW confirmed that the facelifted Polo GTI would feature a manual gearbox. Now more details have emerged about the baby GTI ahead of its launch at the Paris motor show, and the signs are promising.

A manual gearbox will now be standard (with the 7-speed DSG still an option), but more exciting is the arrival of a bigger engine with more power. The 1.4-litre Twincharger is replaced by a more conventional 1.8-litre turbo from VW's EA888 family of engines with 192hp, up from 180hp. The keen amongst you will know that matches the Mini Cooper S exactly. According to Autocar, torque will rise significantly in addition, from 184lb ft to 236lb ft. Which exactly matches a Fiesta ST Mountune's peak. Coincidence?

'Honey I shrunk the GTI' continues inside

Fastest Polo yet
With such parity against its rivals, performance is unsurprisingly right on the money. VW claims a 0-62mph sprint time of 6.7 seconds and a 146mph top speed. It didn't seem that long ago a Polo GTI had 125hp, but there we are. This must open a gap in the VW range for something smaller and less, well, fast; when's the Up GT coming?

For the first time on a Polo GTI, adaptive dampers will be offered as an option. Expect three settings as in the Golf and Scirocco. There is no mention of the VAQ 'diff' being offered at all.

The standard Polo was revised earlier this year and the GTI adds the same visual identifiers as before to the updated supermini. So there's the red surround to the grille, new bumpers, tartan seats and a couple of subtle spoilers. Nothing overt, but then that's not the GTI way.

VW will confirm full details including pricing and availability at Paris, and we look forward to finding out if it drives like a slightly smaller Golf GTI shortly afterwards. But that's not the only interesting hot hatch news around...

More good news on this little scamp too

Wait, there's more...
The Fiesta ST will of course be a significant rival to the Polo flagship and it can now be made even faster with Graham Goode Racing now offering an ST240 package. For £728.98 it takes the ST to 240hp and 253lb ft. It's the usual tweaks to the induction and mapping, but that output promises to make a very exciting hot hatch even more thrilling.

Then there's the 208 GTI 30th to look forward to, and we would wager a riposte from Renaultsport must be due soon. The hot hatch wars are on!

[Source: Autocar]

 

[GTEYE]

It looks pretty tidy in a typically German kind of way.

Whether that will be enough to appeal to the likely demographic is another matter.

Much less tacky to my eyes than the Clio, 208 and Fiesta (inside at least).