[Auto] Hot hatch twin test: Volkswagen Golf GTI vs Ford Focus ST

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Hot hatch twin test: Volkswagen Golf GTI vs Ford Focus ST

 

It’s possible I missed it after 40 years of the Audi Quattro and 30 years of the Honda NSX, but amid all the automotive anniversaries that have been celebrated in 2020, I don’t recall too much bunting strewing the streets in celebration of the fact that this is the year in which the Ford Escort XR3 hit its fifth decade.

Perhaps that’s not terribly surprising, but we should pause even just for a moment to consider that it has now been four decades since Ford’s fast family hatchback has been running up against what is now eight successive generations of Volkswagen Golf GTI. I wonder how many of those encounters it has actually won? Few if any of the early skirmishes, I would warrant, and probably fewer still after the Golf GTI rediscovered its mojo for its fifth generation in 2004.

 

So why is this contest between the brand-new Golf GTI and the still fresh Focus ST going to be any different? It all looks very familiar on paper. As ever, the Ford has the statistical lead, although we know from experience that, in the real world, that might not count for much at all. There’s a chunk more power and torque for the Focus (34bhp and 35lb ft respectively) for not much additional weight, leading to a 0.6sec gap opening up from rest to 62mph, despite these cars’ traction-limited front-drive configurations.

The Focus is cheaper, too, although by less than a grand in the showroom, so not as much as in the past. Then again, it comes positively groaning under the weight of all its standard equipment. Put 19in rims, adaptive damping, electrically adjustable and heated front seats, a heated steering wheel and a reversing camera on the Golf and the gap widens considerably.

 

The first surprise once you’re on board is that the interior of this Golf has lost some of the class of its predecessor. Of course, it’s now all ultra-high-definition screens, in line with the modern vogue, and it’s full of clever stuff like ventilation controls labelled ‘cool my feet’ and a pulsating engine start/stop button, while you can choose for your interior to be lit in any of 30 different colours. I would trade it all for some better-quality plastics and simple ergonomics that don’t require you to dive through menus to find what you need.

If, for instance, you want to suppress or switch off the electronic stability control, you have to go into vehicle settings, then swipe through until you find ‘brakes’ (which isn’t where I would first think of looking), ask it to turn off the systems and then be patronised by Volkswagen telling you that it doesn’t recommend you do so before it forces you to confirm your ill-advised choice with another stab of the screen. I would rather just press a button.

 

Not that the Focus offers a more palatable alternative, and you only have to park it next to a Fiesta costing half the money to see that Ford is stretching the art of parts-bin commonality a decent distance further than it cares to go. Actually, the Focus’s systems are less complicated and more easily understood than the Golf’s (surely a first?), and if their blue-lit graphics weren’t quite so nasty, that might be a sizeable blow landed against its rival. But despite my reservations about the Golf, the Focus’s cockpit feels even cheaper and lacking in occasion. For a car costing the uncomfortable side of £30,000, it could and should be better than this.

However, I know this car and know that, on the right road, I won’t be overly troubled by the inelegance of its displays. Exmoor lies before us, so grab a gear and go. In the very first instant, the Focus is slightly disappointing. The steering feels slightly artificial in the way that electrically assisted racks often do when coming off centre and the gearchange is reasonable but no more. But as soon as you start to work the engine and suspension, it begins to make sense. A great deal of sense.

It’s startlingly good on these roads. The engine brims with more character than you would attribute to a turbo four, while the clever front suspension and electronically controlled limited-slip differential inject all that torque straight to the street surface without dither or delay. It’s annoying that you can’t separate the engine and damper maps in Sport driving mode, but it’s so lively even in standard settings that it’s usually best to leave the button unpressed.

 

But where it elevates impressive point-to-point pace into a genuinely special experience is when you push harder and discover that, instead of starting to struggle, it goes on getting better and better. It never wilts, at least at public-road effort levels, and never suggests that you’ve had all the fun that you can handle. Grip is superstrong, its poise into the apex beyond question. You always know where the nose is going and, even with the stability merely in Dynamic mode, it’s so throttle-adjustable that you can place the back wherever you like.

It may not be quite so rapid as the previous-generation Focus RS, but it’s sharper, more communicative and more predictable. With this ST at your disposal, you find yourself wondering whether Ford’s decision not to replace the RS is that great of a loss after all. Or at least I do.