28 Sep 06 08:59
Tom Kristensen drives his 2006 Le Mans-winning Audi R10 down the hill and onto the stage at the venue in Paris's equivalent of Canary Wharf, commanding a view of the night-time city below. It makes almost no noise but its exhaust smells strongly of diesel. It sets the scene for what's about to follow. But the new Audi R8 supercar isn't going to be a diesel as well, is it? Surely not...
Black and white footage of Audi's Le Mans win this year streaks across the giant screen. Even Ferdinand Porsche's grandson, Ferdinand Pïech, and his family are in the throng, come to witness the ultimate expression of his determination a decade ago to make Audi into a premium brand. The screen images become a drive from Le Mans to Paris, the car the new R8 recognisable as the production version of the Le Mans concept car of 2003. And then - what a surprise - the R8 appears at the top of the hill, LED headlights blazing.
Down the hill, revving and snarling as it drives past microphones whose signals make it rev and snarl all the louder. It stops, and out steps five-times Le Mans winner Jacky Ickx, more of a Porsche man really but the Piech family genes make enough of a connection. The eager compere rushes up: 'Well, Jacky, you have been racing sports cars for 20 years, how does it feel..?
Twenty years? Double that and more, if you don't mind, and don't forget the F1. But Ickx is too polite to say so, and instead heads off on a new-age homily about the success of a carmaker being all about the harmony between the people who make the cars. And so on.
Ickx then extracts four compact, carefully-shaped cases from the R8's front boot to demonstrate its practicality. It's going to be a usable supercar, then. Audi's chairman of the board, Professor Doktor Martin Winterkorn, has already talked - in English - of this key moment in the history of Audi, of how he started the R8 project (confusingly, R8 is also the name of Audi's earlier, petrol-fuelled Le Mans racer) in 2002 when he returned to Audi. But the unanswered question is: is this really a rebodied Lamborghini Gallardo with the direct-injection, 4.2-litre V8 from the Audi RS4?
There are elements of this, yes. But then the Gallardo's aluminium structure came from Audi in the first place. Also, the R8 will be rather cheaper, its estimated UK price being around £75,000 plus another £6K for the R-tronic sequential paddle-shift option. Other options include ceramic brakes and the terrific magneto-rheological adaptive dampers available on the TT and also used by Ferrari in the 599 GTB.
The R8 does look like a bigger, flatter, more aggressive TT in some ways, but with the visual (and actual) centre of gravity shifted rearwards. With its mid-mounted engine - 420bhp at 7800rpm, 187mph, 0-62mph in 4.6 seconds and equipped with a dry-sump lubrication system so it can sit low - the R8 is slightly tail-heavy with 56 per cent of the weight over the rear wheels. The gearbox is a six-speeder, drive is to all four wheels in proper Quattro fashion, suspension is by double aluminium wishbones front and rear. The standard wheel size is 18in with 235/40 tyres at the front and 285/35 at the back. You can specify 19in wheels if you must, but the R8 will almost certainly perform better on the 18s.
Horizontal stacks of black vanes guard the air intakes beneath the (optional) LED headlights and the wavy row of daytime running-light LEDs under them, and similar vanes mark the rear end's air exits. LEDs do duty at the tail, too, and there are both a retractable rear spoiler and an underside diffuser to manage the aerodynamics. On the flanks, air-channels formed in the doors lead to scoops in a contrasting colour: black on a silver R8, silver on a darker-coloured car.
The engine sits in a bed of glossy carbonfibre, all visible through the rear window. Soft white LED illumination is another option, perfect for any time the Chelsea Cruise might start up again. Inside, all is leather, Alcantara and aluminium and typically Audi-esque, with detailing in piano black or shiny carbonfibre and a flat-bottomed steering wheel. There are, of course, just two seats. Sounds emerge from a Bang & Olufsen stereo and there's a rear parking camera.
Audi is able to make up to 15 R8s a day in a newly built section of the Quattro GmbH facility in its Neckarsulm plant. Orders will be taken from the end of September, deliveries begin in 2007. Right-hand drive has not been confirmed but it's inconceivable that the UK, Audi's third-biggest market, will be denied a steering wheel on the right. At roughly Porsche 911 money, this mid-engined exotic with the big-name badge and the madly-revving V8 should be a cracker.
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