Life with Top Gear's Audi R8 V10 Plus: part two

When I wrote the first one of these, I think I promised a second update would follow in a couple of weeks time. It’s now been over a month. Sorry about that. If you want to read the first story about life with an R8 V10 Plus, click here.

Now, I don’t know if you saw the magazine last month, but this was the cover - and one of the key reasons we choose a bright, stand out colour. If the R8 had been black or grey or blue we wouldn’t have put it in the front left corner, simple as that. Yellow stands out.

I know the bumblebee colour scheme is a brave choice, but personally I think it works as well in reality as on the cover of the mag: it’s striking from far away, but when you get up close you notice the detail in the carbon work on the mirrors, sideblades and wing.

This was one of the other shots that was taken on that day at Dunsfold. I wasn’t driving (that’s Paul Horrell doing the helmsmithery), but had to endure standing on another part of the runway, listening to my car being abused in the name of photography and videography.

It needed to be done, but at this stage the car had only done 800 miles, so was still in the thick of its running in period. Before I get on to that, I will say that I love this shot, because it encapsulates the R8’s driving behaviour so well. It’s exiting a corner with a smidge of oversteer, but has clearly got traction and momentum sorted. Smack on the line as well – nice work PH.

But until this day at Dunsfold, the R8 had followed its running in recommendations to the letter. No more than 5,000rpm on light throttle openings for the first 600 miles, and gradually build up from there until 1500 miles. After that you’re all good. Some would find that tedious, but as I do around 120 miles every day, I rack up a lot of distance quickly, so a couple of weeks of anticipation and we’re done. I can’t say I’ve noticed the engine running any more smoothly or revving more freely – it’s felt absolutely spot on from the word go.

From time to time I have to park the R8 to drive other stuff. I know, poor me. Anyway, stepping between the R8 and Porsche Cayman S was an eye-opener. I’d parked the R8 up, then driven off in the Cayman. The Cayman did not show up well in comparison. It showed the distance in drivetrain charisma and polish between having a naturally aspirated ten cylinder engine and a turbocharged four. Now, I know that’s not surprising, but both of these cars are aimed squarely at keen drivers, people like you and me who care about their car feeling good to drive all the time. The old flat six Cayman did, but after the response, noise and slickness of the R8, the Cayman (which you can read about here if you’re interested) felt flat and bland.

The drivetrain is the R8’s trump card. It’s mesmerisingly good. I’m sure Audi, aware that everyone else was moving to turbocharging, made special efforts to make this as crisp, sonorous and gorgeous to use as possible, but even so… It is something very special.

And so was this – a Lamborghini Diablo SVR. Now, I don’t know if this is a real one or not. The original SVRs were built for a one-make race series in 1996, and were very trick. They weighed almost 200kg less than a regular Diablo SV and the 5.7-litre V12 pumped out 533bhp and 441lb ft. Some were converted to road use, so this could be one of those, but Lambo only built 31 globally, so if it is it’s vanishingly rare.

Of course nowadays, it’s 3.9secs 0-62mph time isn’t much to write home about – the R8 claims 3.2secs. But all I will say is that while the Cayman couldn’t come close to rivaling the noise the R8 makes, the Diablo could. Proper, proper thing.

Last time round I bought you news that a set of kids golf clubs would fit behind the seats in the R8. This time the news is that you can use it for supermarket shops. Having said that, compared to other cars with load bays in the front, the R8’s isn’t particularly spacious. You get all excited because the front clam is so big, but when you open it up...

112 litres, where the Cayman has 150. I reckon a Ferrari 488’s is getting on for twice the size. Of course the difference is that the Audi has front driveshafts to package. So the weekly shop is a tight squeeze. Not too much heat soak on the way home – but then it is only five miles.

This wins it for me though. At the top of the R8’s load bay is this little pocket with an elasticated mesh net to hold things in place. It’s the egg pocket. I can’t think of anything else that will fit in it quite as neatly.

So, one of the things that intrigues me is how accurate those little colour swatch panels are. So I grabbed one when I picked the R8 up. Inside, where the car looks darker, the paint rich and thick, the match was very good. And outside – about spot on if you ask me.

Now, a bright yellow car doesn’t need much cleaning for it to stand out – regular road dirt doesn’t show up that much when worn by a sunshine, after all. And the same goes for the wheels – brake dust doesn’t show up on black wheels. So as far as that goes, this was a very good colour choice.

However, when you do clean it you notice that wheels you thought were just a bit dusky, and paintwork that wasn’t shining quite as brightly, were actually absolutely filthy. It’s quite satisfying to clean because the results ping through again. Not looking forward to winter, though – I have a feeling road grime is going to bake hard on to the warm back end.

We had an Audi convoy the other weekend, taking both the R8 and Audi UK’s superb, low mileage RS2 over to Shelsley Walsh to watch the racing and witness Hans-Joachim Stuck driving the fabulous V16 Auto Union up the hill (you can read about that here). I’ll tell you more about what we got up to in the RS2 in due course, but it’s fair to say that technology and comfort have moved on in the last twenty years.

The R8’s chassis is so stiff and damps vibration so well it feels like there’s a carbon tub at the centre of it, not an aluminium monocoque. Even road noise is distant, meaning its actually a quieter, calmer cruiser than not only the RS2, but also the BMW M3 I ran before it. There’s less tyre noise and it’s only if you switch the sports exhaust on that you get a significant amount of noise intrusion. But that’s very pleasant noise intrusion, so it doesn’t count.

The RS2? Surprising amount of chassis flex and creaking, eons of turbo lag, but so much fun. As I said, will write more on that soon.

This was the R8 at Shelsley, parked up alongside a last gen R8 V10. It was an interesting comparison. When I first drove the new R8 (for a group test we did in Portugal with the McLaren 570S and Porsche 911 Turbo, see here), I didn’t think it looked that great. It looked too stretched and the two-piece sideblade looks a bit apologetic. Compared with the purer original, it’s Audi trying to make lightning strike twice.

And I still think that’s the case to a certain extent. Audi has a tendency – more than most marques – to design a cracking original shape (think not just of the first R8, but the original TT, the A5 and so on) and then, when it comes to the second generation, following the original template too closely, just with newer headlights and a bit of massaging. As a result the replacement struggles to make as much of an impact as the original. And I really think that’s the case with the R8.

I’ve had my say on R8 new vs old, but I’d genuinely be very interested to hear what you think about these two – or about anything else to do with life with the R8 V10 Plus. Use the comments section to let me know.