Volkswagen Golf GTI

from Autocar Philippines May 2021

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TESTER’S NOTE I don’t tend to like too much configurability in a driving experience, but the GTI’s new DCC slider gives you really fine control over damping adjustment. Shame it’s buried in the back end of the Individual drive mode; I’d like a fixed control for it. MS

TESTED 25.9.20, SURREY ON SALE NOW VOLKSWAGEN GOLF GTI

Eighth-generation take on Volkswagen’s hot hatchback icon arrives in the UK

Wolfsburg has wasted little time introducing the eighth-generation Golf GTI into the wider Mk8 Golf family, which speaks volumes about how significantly the model now underpins the profitability of the Golf’s business case. Relatively restrained and judicious tuning has, as its four decades on sale have rolled on, given the GTI a broaderbased appeal than so many of its hot hatchback rivals.

But does it still? While Volkswagen assures us that everyday, real-world driver appeal, along with that just-so blend of desirability and bangfor-your-buck value, remains the heart and soul of the GTI’s mission statement, it has certainly taken a risk with its golden goose this time around. So while the mechanical make-up of this car looks familiar, very little of it has escaped overhaul.

The car’s engine may have the same headline outputs as the old GTI Performance, but it has a new, higher-pressure fuel injection system and revised combustion and emission controls. There may be the same choice of six-speed manual and seven-speed dual-clutch automatic gearboxes, but the latter is new to the GTI, offering shift-bywire technology for the first time. The XDS+ electronically controlled locking front differential you used to get as part of an option pack is now GTI standard, and it has been tuned to work even harder to augment the car’s handling.

You can now go as big as 19in alloy wheels on the GTI if you want to. This car rides 15mm lower than a regular Golf but, compared with the outgoing GTI, it has spring rates firmed up by 5% at the front axle and some 15% at the rear. Reworked rearaxle kinematics and mountings have been adopted to create better lateral wheel control and chassis response, while the car’s ‘progressive’ risingrate steering has been quickened by between 5% and 7%.

All this has been done, says VW, with a focus on creating keener handling response across the speed range, but specifically on better rotating the car’s chassis in tighter corners and in doing so producing a more poised, agile and – whisper it – slightly playful feel.

It’s left quite a striking impression. The GTI is now more vigorous and potent-feeling than before, with a greater appetite for mauling Tarmac and changing direction. But the trouble is, well, that doesn’t sound very GTI, does it? This car’s dynamic stature has not, thus far at least, been measured by how quickly or neatly it negotiates an 18-metre slalom test. Chassis revisions have made the GTI more agile and playful than before

The engine is strong – you get 242bhp and 273lb ft – but it lacks the audible character of some rivals

GTI touches adorn the cabin; seats are comfortable and nicely bolstered

What has made the very best modern fast Golfs stand out for as long as I’ve been reviewing them is that they dare to be pragmatic performance road cars. They are born out of a way of thinking that values the capacity to take apart a wet and uneven B-road as highly as shaving a few seconds off a handling track lap time – if not higher still.

The car’s GTI-ness remains recognisable from the driver’s seat. It is now one with an integrated headrest design but is still very comfortable, with good-sized bolsters to lean on. The plaid cloth upholstery is present and correct, and the controls are well located ahead, the slightly overly bulky gearlever and overly chubby steering wheel rim being only minor bugbears.

The revised EA888 2.0-litre turbo engine still seems a little cultured by today’s class standards. It doesn’t pop or bang on the overrun and is generally well able to fade down to a restrained background hum when you want it to. It’s torquey, though, with a pretty fierce, thrusty kind of responsiveness from about 2500rpm, although it doesn’t offer much beyond 5000rpm.

But the GTI certainly feels pretty potent and on song if you keep the tacho needle between those two crank speeds, and it gets up the road more than urgently enough to hold your attention. The new and slightly insistent firmness of the car’s ride, and damping that at times can feel just a little bit gristly and uncompromising, will keep you concentrating, too. There’s no need to exaggerate this; on most UK roads, the new GTI rides well enough – but there’s a lateral firmness to its set-up that makes it liable to some head-toss, and a grabbiness to the damping over bigger vertical inputs that can be tricky to iron out even with the car’s new 15-position ‘DCC slider’ adjuster driven all the way down.

What that means is that when you go looking for a road on which to throw at the car bumps, crags, gradients, camber, slipperiness, coarseness and corners of different kinds in testing combinations – to find out just how much punishment it can filter out and soak up, but still hunker down and crack on in that typically composed, fast Golf way – you might not quite recognise the car you find. Instead, the one you gradually unearth – compelling, fast, level and keen though it undoubtedly is – seemed to this tester to be much more akin to a generic modern hot hatchback than a 44-year-old performance icon that has earned the right to go its own way. MATT SAUNDERS

It’s torquey, with a fierce, thrusty kind of responsiveness from about 2500rpm ❞