Do you know one guy who could tell us? The OP. He does have both!
Funny you should mention that, ive just back to back tested them down my 10 mile 'test route' :clown:
Took the clio 1st as it is my 'toy' afterall ... all the usual things that i love about the clio are there: epic brakes, quick once its on the boil, good feedback through the wheel, able to steer with the throttle/steering wheel/brakes - whatever you want really. Wonderful handing and brilliant fun when you're 'on it'. Flat as a f4rt if you're in the wrong gear, rattly, noisy, poor driving position, filthy dirty (although thats not necessarily the cars fault lol) and a bit of a shed. A loveable one though
Next up the golf. On the way to 'the route', im sat in a comfy leather armchair, car is changing gear for me, steering is light and the radio is pretty awesome. It has a level of clarity/bass that the clio could only dream of. Turn off the main road, wind the windows down, select 'manual' flappy paddle gear-changing and blip down a few gears, bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrppppp through the tunnel, wahoo time to have some more fun :star:
Thing is, in the golf, its an entirely more civilised type of fun, im not constantly pressing three pedals with two feet, rowing up & down the gearbox to keep it on the boil, or lifting off the throttle just at the right point to get the rear end swinging to play. Im literally just hoofing it up the gearbox, blipping it down on the steering wheel, braking a tiny bit, then hoofing it round the corner at maximum attack. The DSG is very good, although im not so bad at changing gear myself, so that element is missed, although the normal gearbox on a golf is fairly average, so i think if im driving something as refined as an R32, i might as well have the paddles.
On the road, in the dry, even on Semperit front tyres, understeer isnt really something that it seems to suffer from unless you are driving like a tool. On my 'testing roundabout' it did go eventually, but the speed was higher than in the Trophy, difference is that the clio allows you to lift, steer into the slide and carry on, the golf just understeers - although im obviously still learning its traits, & couldnt really experiment too much on a fairly busy roundabout in the middle of the day lol. For normal road driving, it has
alot of grip, something that has been reassuring in the torrential rain that we've had as of late i must admit, especially when travelling at motorway speeds.
Power wise, its noticeably easier to go fast than the T, you just leave it in gear and clog it, the power is there, very linear in fact, so when you change up it just carries on pulling. There isnt the nothing nothing nothing, bang of the clio/M3, which is one of the reasons you could consider it boring i suppose. Speed wise, it is pretty rapid though, plenty of times on my route where i was having to lift as my selp imposed speed limit had been reached quicker than in the T.
The brakes are considerably better than the Ed30 i had previously, no wilting/fading at all today, not as sharp as the Trophy understandably, & the standard compound would no doubt suffer on track with the car being soo heavy, but for road use they are more than adequate.
Overally, i wouldnt say that the golf is the most exciting way of getting from A to B quickly, the Trophy trounces it in that respect, purely as you feel so connected to the car! You think, it does, its a real oldskool hot hatch, that will bite you if you mess it up, chucking you backwards into the nearest hedge if you so choose.
But, anyone who doubts the R32 as a weapon to cover ground very quickly is imho quite mistaken. In a 'race' from A to B, whilst the driver of the clio would be giving it 110% and fighting to keep the car on the road & to stay ahead, the R32 driver would be listening to classic fm & having their bum being warmed by the heated leather seats, whilst the car did all the work.
So yeah, its not the most exciting car in the world, but if you need something that can pound the motorways all week, then go from A to B at the weekend, comfortably, easily
and at warp factor 10, its really rather good