Audi Admits Its Performance Stats Are Deliberately Conservative, Suggests 3.7sec 0-62 For RS5

Recently, we spent a week with the new Audi RS5. Our main takeaway from our extended test? It’s stupidly fast, and feels much quicker than the Mercedes-AMG C63 S, despite having an identical 0-62mph time.

Turns out there’s a good reason for that: it is actually quicker. Speaking to Car Advice, Audi’s Head of Technical Development Stephan Reil said:

“I’ve been in this job for nearly 20 years, and with all the cars I’ve worked on, the performance numbers we published were conservative. And it’s no different with the latest RS5.

“So, if we say 3.9 seconds, you will measure, maybe, 3.7 if the conditions are fine, probably 3.8, but even under the worst conditions, you’ll do it in 3.9 seconds. But you will not find a 4.0.”

This shouldn’t really be a surprise, as for years Audi’s hot RS models have been chucking out faster times acceleration times IRL than the on-paper figures. The reason? Audi would rather be called out for its cars being faster than they’re supposed to be, rather than slower.

“I simply don’t want to hear, when you guys write ‘well, they claim 3.9, but we got 4.0’,” Reil said, adding, “I don’t want to read that.”