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That sounds amazing.

I once ran at Goodwood in my 172 Cup with some very very old track tyres I'd bought secondhand and stored for a few years. Halfway through session one I had to apply a small amount of lock to stay straight and by the end of the session I had a thump thump thump vibration from the front...

Almost but not quite...VED on the RS is £140 a year...although the base insurance quote before I bolted the basic essential 'extras' to it would have been £142 a year. That's good going! I was paying £370 per year but that did include cheap trackday cover as well.

So this morning I thought I ought to sort out some insurance as the Ford driveaway cover expires in a couple of days. Aviva, me and Sarah (who are both accident prone), Topcashback rebate included, £210 a year. That'll do. That's over £150 a year cheaper than my ST!

As said by many before the interior is old and pretty low rent. It's a little up on the ST but not much...and the firm damper setting does really shake sh*t about! All in good time :up: White ST was a complete coincedence. He went and bought it before he knew about my RS, but did so because...

Very likely. I've never been in anything powerful and AWD either so the traction I'm feeling is mad. It's more than that though I think, the way it really properly and noticeably pulls the nose in when you give it power while loaded up which eventually transistions very progressively in to...

Nope. Nothing. 1974 Triumph Toledo (RWD and with zero rear damping and remoulds, only 27bhp but still sideways everywhere) 1990 1.1L Fiesta 1997 Pug 306 1.9TD (Van Aaken optimised giving it a stonking 105bhp) 2001 Mondeo Zetec S V6 Then came the 172 Cup.

I'm hoping to get out at Goodwood before the summer is out. Knowing what I know about it and what it does it's going to me a very good thing around there. Yep. All this wait for the corner to open up, feed throttle in while unwinding steering, malarky is not required. At all. The bottom line...

...and breathe. 853 miles so far, that's 28 hours spent on b roads between the south coast and Farnborough. I'm knackered! Given the roads I was on and how I focused on driving it I considered it run in at 750 so to celebrate I found a private road and launched it. Twice. Nice. Very nice...

Here's as much of an update as I can right now chaps

In spite of it's weight it genuinely goes into corners just like the Fiesta did but with more overall grip, then, just when a squirt in the ST would push you wide a bootful in this brings the nose in and you get fired out driven firmly from behind with the fronts scrabbling away. It's epic...

Break time. 150 miles done. The rain came just in time, on small quiet tight 2nd gear roundabouts it's like a puppy on a polished wood floor with a little rear end wag on the way out. Only required a quarter turn dab of oppo so far. Note to self; must try harder.

It'll be a day or two before I stop to doing anything at least.

30 miles in so far and it has happened once in normal as I blipped it to rev match a downshift, it caught me completley by surprise! In other news...o, m, f***ing, g. This car a) feels right in every single way imaginable and b) how does it do what it does when exiting roundabouts? Much more...

Oh, and...

I shall work gloves in at some point don't worry.

On the train still. Almost there!

They actually phoned me up and asked if I was happy with them putting a couple of miles on to put the fuel in or would I prefer to fill it up myself. As a dealership they couldn't have been any better.

Bingo. I said do not fit the centre caps, I'll do it myself. It turns out the PDI chap didn't, but left them in the car and then the valeter thought they'd been forgotten so did. I'm not that fussed about it myself but the RS community deems misaligned badges heresy so I thought for 10 seconds...

Never! This is staying exactly as it comes. Ah right, OK. I thought that happened in normal but only with FPM375. I'll find out tomorrow for sure. I'm sure standard is fine. I stuck with the ST's book pressures 36/26 all its life and that rocked. I'm surprised no one has spotted what they...

I'll be finding out for sure tomorrow as will be the first thing I check once I get home to fit my dash cams (I can't bring myself to do it on the forecourt before I drive off!). I believe they're something like 41/39 though so quite high but not that surprising I guess with 35 profile tyres.

It seems to be mostly very early builds so far (a high proportion of reported failures are June '16 built)...some casting inconsistencies leading to weakness and/or warping as the head cools, both of which can give a tiny coolant leak into the cylinders. For me it's nothing at all to worry...

Oh yes. And Friday. And I've told the wife she can expect to see me late evening only over the weekend. Four days of quality bonding/running in time ahead. 5,000 rpm and max 75% throttle for 1,000 miles. My target is to get that complete before Monday. I may even datalog the entire running in...

Right, the money's been transferred, they've confirmed receipt, return of the hire car is booked, RS collection is at 0830 tomorrow. I'm a just like a kid at Christmas today. A few stills from yesterday...

There was a reason this time. A genuine not even slightly made up one. Planned, yes, but it was a genuine reason LOL.

Oooooh

Beast! We'll have to go out and get some footage of you destroying me in my RS LOL

With the low down torque build it's not far off that level of instant shove... The standard torque curve isn't really a curve, it's a rectangle.

This is the main thing. 350 torques available from 1 rpm, 350 powaz, all-wheel-drive with an oversped rear axle to actively encourage rear end playfulness on the throttle, 5 doors, decent enough mpg, and £270 a year fully comp with no excess. At what point would I need or want to change any of...

Currently the answer to that is no. That is going to be tough to resist! Standard it only pops and bangs in 'sport' mode. With FPM375 people report cars doing it in 'normal' mode as well plus a load more snorting and hissing from beneath the bonnet...none of that appeals.