Audi's New 280bhp RS1 Will Be Stupid Fun
We’re massive fans of small cars with big power, and here’s another to drool over. Audi has given the green light to an RS-badged A1 with 280bhp, and it could hang on to a manual gearbox, too.
The four-wheel-drive RS1 is set to use the same 2.0-litre EA888 turbocharged petrol engine as the Golf GTI, Octavia vRS and a host of other performance-minded large VW Group cars, and it’s likely to be at least as fast as all of them.
Audi insiders see it as the spiritual successor to the slightly bonkers limited-production A1 quattro, which had four-wheel drive, 258bhp and the steering wheel on the left side only. Just 19 were sold in the UK, pretty much guaranteeing collector status.
It is being billed as a direct rival to the Mini John Cooper Works, which pushes out the same power and uses a similarly dinky platform.
No official images have yet been released by Audi, but the body styling of an RS1 will be more extreme than the current S1 (pictured), with its paltry 228bhp version of the EA888 four-pot.
As for performance we expect the extra 52bhp of the RS1 to knock a few tenths off the S1’s 5.8-second 0-62mph time, as well as smashing it into an electronic 155mph limiter. The car will arrive next year, but with a new A1 expected in 2018, the RS flagship is seen as a run-out experiment, testing the water for customer demand. With any luck it’ll catch on.
Comments
Imagining a RS1 with 5 cylinder engine…
With even more power…
I was thinking the same
Imagine it with a SIX cylinder
Imagining it with a detuned version of the RS3’s engine:
Imagine a RS1 with RS6 ABT’a V8 (I’m dreaming too high)
Yaaaaaaaaasss
280bhp in a car that size I thought the S1 was crazy
this is stupid and i mean really stupid…why 4cyl?…why not 5cyl?…i tell you whY?…becouse market gap…and for that reason i hate audi / volkswagen and all the manufacturers that do this…letting the accounts building a car instead of car guys…so a big NO >:(
The moment you forget to turn on your brain and remember we are talking about an A1 which doesn’t have room for a 5 cylinder engine with Quattro + the whole idea of the car is to keep it small and light. Finally, 360 hp in a car the size of a shoe seems a good idea ? What about no ? Please remember that the people who will be buying that don’t have a clue about how to drive fast and will likely kill themselves with that much power in a car that doesn’t have the chassis to cope with it. So a L5 in an A1 doesn’t make any sense at all. Who’s stupid here now ?
Slapping an EA888 into RS1 sounds a bit weird imo
Allright, Volkswagen, since you bring out an Rs1, i will demand something smaler and lighter. I demand to produce the UP! R.
Your in luck theyre making an UP! GTI if i remember correctly
like this edit i did a year ago? ;)
Let VW fix their emission scandal first before planning to do that xD
You mean the…SUP?
What? Still no five-pot? c’mon…
What a perfect daily!
Finally
400-bhp 2.5-litre 5-cyl, JUST DO IT!
MAKE EVERYONE’S DREAMS COME TRUE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
280bhp isn’t as much as I was expecting. Pretty sure you can get 315bhp with a remap on the s1 which renders this car pointless
Right, remap the ecu on rs1