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| CLASSY COUPE: A classic interior and intuitive controls, coupled with 354 horses, makes the Audi S5 a winner. photography courtesy of Audi USA |
The thing I wasn’t prepared for was just how smooth the little Audi S5 coupe is. And when I say smooth, I mean it with a lot of extras ooo’s in there—like butter on leather—and I mean it in just about every aspect of this vehicle’s performance.
Take the suspension, steering, and handling. (I’m sure General Motors would love to.) With all three, there’s a sweet spot between high performance and comfort that’s as elusive as a sustained decline in oil prices. But in the 2008 S5, it’s like you’re gliding on one of those hovercars from the old Star Wars without sacrificing a truly road-gripping sense of control in the steering and the handling—and without the rougher ride you usually get with a sport suspension. Within a day the S5 felt like an extension of my will in how it responded without hesitation.
Those 354 horses in the V-8 were likewise unhesitating and smooth. The S5 could take off like a rocket without ever feeling like it was out of control or overpowered. And baby, it purred. This thing is far sportier than it looks.
The driver’s seat had a lot of adjustment angles, but not enough to compensate for an upward tilt in the forward seat base that got uncomfortable on longer drives. (Your mileage may vary.) It’s got a classic interior with intuitive controls and the kind of high-quality black leather seats that you lust for in the winter and that blister in the summer. The tilt-only sunroof seemed a little pointless, and like all coupes the rear seats are more an afterthought than something for anyone bigger than a pre-teen female Olympic gymnast.
While it seems unpretentious in design, the S5 still exudes a sense of quality and style that belies its very reasonable MSRP. Valets at the kind of venues where they’re used to parking cars with three times its price tag gushed. This is definitely the ride for the executive who wants to ride contrary to the herd, but ride in style nonetheless.
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| photography courtesy of Audi USA | |
