2011 Audi R8 Review

If you want to know what it feels like to be a rock star, you have two choices. The first involves spandex, perms and lots of hip gyration.

I opted for the second. Drive a 2011 Audi R8 for a few days.

The journey started when my friend Dave and I drove to Audi public relations in Ajax Ontario to pick up the car for a weekend review.

On the way back we tested everything. The speed and acceleration were unlike almost any car I have driven. This car is a work of art, from design to engineering everything is flawless.

The Rock Star Factor
The reality is with this car you are not the rock star, the car is. Everywhere you go people want to chat you up, take pictures of the car and ask questions. I imagine it gets old FAST. Unless you like the attention

Chick magnet?
I say yes.

Performance?
The acceleration was unprecedented. The car has 2 modes automatic and manual shift with the option of both stick and paddle shifters. A quick experiment had me using auto shift in sport mode. The automatic shifting was so fast and gave you that traditional jerking feeling on each gear change that you expect in a fast car with pure manual shifts at high RPMs. It shifted gears better than I would have so I let it do it’s thing.

Corners have always been more fun than speeding for me because you can take a corner fast but not go over the speed limit. Speeding in Canada over 50KM carries a $10k fine AND the seizure of your vehicle. So I had more fun taking fast corners. It handled better than I even expected.

Looks?
Not many cars rival this in terms of beauty. Sure there are flashier cars but the Audi R8 has a subtlety that makes it extra cool in my book. You know it’s a kick ass car but it doesn’t have to have scissor doors or some crazy spoiler. In fact the spoiler on this car only makes itself visible at high speed.

The carbon fibre side blades look badass. No other way to explain it. And the engine compartment at the back is visible through a glass window that lights up at night with LED lights.

Interior
The Audi R8 interior is fairly simple, everything is limited to 2 main gauges and a small LED display between them. Everything I need to know is in front of me. Speed, RPM and whats on the radio

The steering wheel has controls for volume and channel/track switching on the audio system. Behind the nav screen is a DVD/CD player and slots for 2 SD memory cards that you can fill with MP3 music. Additionally an iPod dock was at the back of the car allowing easy sync with the on board control system.

Being a 6’5″ man, sports cars are often a bit of a joke for me. Even this one looks pretty small with me standing next to it but it surprisingly gave me enough leg room to be comfortable.

Conclusion
If you like German cars in this category you are fairly limited with your choices. I suppose the next car I would like to review is the Mercedes SLS AMG just to have a comparison. Can you hear me Mercedes?