► Taking our Audi TTS to the Isle of Man
► We head to its spiritual birthplace
► It’s a chance to stretch the Audi’s legs
I know that ride comfort is going to be a problem when photographer Alex turns green and declares himself seasick at 4am. We are tracing a rollercoaster route overnight to the Isle of Man TT course – a homecoming return to our Audi coupe’s spiritual birthplace, the motorcycling mecca famed for Tight, Twisting roads, epic views over the Irish Sea and unforgiving stone walls waiting to catch bikers whose ambition exceeds their ability to get a knee down.
It doesn’t help that Britain’s first named storm, Abigail, is blowing in from the Atlantic, battering our progress every which way with winds gusting past 70mph and beyond. We set off from CAR’s Peterborough HQ at 9pm in a stiff breeze but the anemometers are spinning ever more violently as we cross the Pennines, skirt Manchester and set the sat-nav for a blustery Heysham in Lancashire. The poor Audi doesn’t stand a chance in the small hours and nor do our stomachs, as we pitch and roll along in the dark, the metalwork around our heads groaning and creaking with every sudden movement.
In case you hadn’t guessed, it is the 12,700-tonne Steam Packet Company’s Ben-My-Chree ferry that is the subject of our night-time turbulence, not the ice-white coupe parked in the cargo hold below. We arrived at the docks in the small hours only to find our 2.15am crossing (don’t ask) had been delayed for more than an hour by the impending storm. So we bedded down in the TT, trying to grab some kip in the impossibly snug cabin, berating the closeness of the rear jump seats preventing ours up front from reclining fully.
There isn’t a great deal more sleep once we’re on board, the three-and-a-half-hour sailing to Douglas proving a corkscrewing affair in a heavy swell. Eventually we emerge from the ferry to a blustery dawn, the first grey shadows wrapping the island’s capital in a gloomy morning light. A classic English seaside scene, but the remarkably unfaded Victorian splendour hints at the prosperity of this remote British dependency.
We’ve come to the Isle of Man, home of the world’s most famous motorbike race. It seems a fitting destination for a car that has hogged the mainstream market for affordable sports coupes since launch in 1998 and cemented Audi’s modernist design aesthetic. The TT is named after the Tourist Trophy time trial first held here in 1905, as the Automobile Club of Great Britain sought a venue to host the implausibly named Gordon Bennett Cup – a globe-trotting race staged each year in a different country. Britain did not allow the closure of public roads, but the club secretary’s cousin was Manx Lieutenant Governor. Call it a pair of early petrolheads swapping favours.
Fittingly, the inaugural event was contested by ‘tourist’ – read roadgoing – cars before the axle count halved two years later when the bikers raced the clock. Although the exact TT route has evolved over the years, thanks to the courageous/crazy exploits of John McGuinness, Giacomo Agostini, Joey Dunlop and others, legendary status was subsequently assured and the two letters entered the motorsport lexicon, copied as far afield as Goodwood, Silverstone and Ingolstadt.
As well as an opportunity to explore the TT’s heritage, our road trip also promises to be a great test of KP15 HPO’s abilities – a mixture of long motorway schlepps, cross-country blasts and several laps of the 37¾-mile Mountain circuit, held on the public roads around the island. Ours is currently the most powerful TT on sale (before the near-400bhp RS rocks up later this year) and we’re about to find out if it will be all at sea or plain sailing on these fast, derestricted roads.
After loading up on caffeine, fuel and food, we seek the pit straight on the A2 opposite the capital’s cemetery. There’s something incongruous seeing pit walls bereft of their lap times on a cold winter morning, with just a steady stream of buses and commuters passing at a snail’s pace – we can only guess at the buzz during the summer season, as Fiestas make way for Fireblades.
The TT’s boot easily holds all of Alex’s photo-clobber and we sling our soft bags, sponges and grub behind us on the cherry red rear seats. As I’ve noted in earlier reports, it’s a surprisingly
practical car and after 48 hours of living, sleeping and eating in it we can report it’s surprisingly comfortable to sit – though not lie – in, with plenty of storage cubbies for the detritus of a road trip.
Hot seats set to roast rumps and widescreen sat-nav ordered on the crisp Virtual Cockpit display, we nudge into the rush hour. Even a small town like Douglas (population 28,000) grinds to a halt during the school run and so we crawl back into town, thankful for the Audi’s twin-clutch slushiness, before turning right on to Peel Road and what becomes the A1 westbound. There are constant reminders that the island is transformed each summer, as even town turns are festooned with striped kerbs and racing paraphernalia. Perfect for apex-clipping on the way to Ballakermeen High School, no doubt.
Gradually, the roads clear and we find our rhythm. The west coast describes a rambling ribbon that could double for a high-hedged B-road in Devon or Cornwall; there’s little chance to ape the exploits of McGuinness and co and so we settle back to a gentle cruise, wondering where the magical sections we’ve seen on YouTube will surface.
They come soon enough, signalled by the Ramsey hairpin – the start of the snaking A18 which climbs out of town towards Snaefell, the island’s tallest peak and the inspiration for the TT’s celebrated Mountain name. It’s classic highland territory and reminds us of our Welsh haunts around Snowdonia where so many CAR dogfights are played out. Tugging the TTS’s gearlever across the gate into Sport preps the transmission for faster responses, higher revs and fartier upshifts, while a prod of the Dynamic Select button on the dash wakes the Magnetic Ride dampers from their Comfort slumber and… well, ruins the ride, frankly. No, the Audi’s chassis is best left in Normal mode, unless you’re on a race track proper.
But by golly this car is quick. The turbo’d 2.0 is a cracker, its 306bhp slinging the stubby little coupe on to the next corner with impressive vim and a buzzing soundtrack that punches above its humble 1984cc. Nought to the mainland’s 60mph limit takes just 4.6sec and the S-tronic transmission chews through its gears with the immediacy of an Xbox driving game. Twin-clutch ’boxes have progressed so far since the TT first introduced the genre back in 2003’s V6 – it’s hard to see how much faster cog-swaps could become, although we still wish Audi would invest in properly tactile metal paddles like Mercedes instead of the flimsy plastic ears behind the wheel. A seventh cog wouldn’t go amiss, too.
Fog is closing in as we climb towards the 2000ft peak. The conditions play to the Audi’s strengths, quattro four-wheel drive keeping all the turbocharged grunt on the ground. On our first pass, we actually miss The Bungalow, the junction near Snaefell’s mountain railway with a tribute to TT legend Joey Dunlop and a shrine to bikers from all over the world. The full-sized bronze of the Irish three-time TT champ is a moving testament to this island race – capturing the informal bonhomie, team spirit and fearless balls-on-the-block courage of those who compete in it.
Dunlop, who died racing in Estonia in 2000, competed in 98 TT races and won 26, recording a fastest lap of 124mph around the Mountain course along the way. I’m stunned by the sheer madness of this feat: the proximity of dry stone walls lining much of the route; the bumps and lumps of typical British back roads that unsettle the Audi at 90mph, never mind twice that on two wheels; and the fact that the course zig-zags through 264 corners past Aunt Doris’s semi on the high street one moment and a moorside pub the next. The TT’s magic is how this motorcycling madness endures to this elf-and-safety-riddled day.
By contrast, the (Audi) TT is a polished act. It never puts a foot wrong, the clinically modern cabin nestling us in its aluminium and leather-bound bosom against the wind, rain and fog, heaters pumping out a welcoming glow, Matrix Beam LEDs lighting every dark nook but intelligently dodging oncoming traffic, and the unflappable chassis scything through every famous corner.
There’s no doubt the third generation of TT has evolved into a very capable coupe. Where the Mk1 was all design sparkle and little dynamic sizzle, the latest model is now as good to drive as it is to look at. There remains a nagging suspicion that Volkswagen Group hierarchy forces front/four-wheel drive Audi to deliver an Everyman Coupe – and of that more communicative rwd Porsche Cayman I lusted for on The Mountain course being reserved for real enthusiasts paying top dollar. Mind you, Audi did buy Ducati in 2012, so how long before we see more two-wheeled fizz injected into Audi’s sensible sports cars?
I might have to return to the Isle of Man in that forthcoming TT RS after all. Fingers crossed for a smoother ferry crossing.
Audi’s secret TT history
Perhaps it should come as no surprise that the Audi is so at home on the TT Mountain course. After all, the company did race on the Isle Of Man. On two wheels. Did you know that one of Ingolstadt’s rings denotes now-defunct bike maker DKW? TT historian Bill Snelling pulls out a picture of Ewald Kluge riding his DKW around aptly named Windy Corner in 1938. ‘It was so noisy you could hear it the whole way around the course thanks to the supercharged two-stroke three-cylinder engine,’ he says. ‘DKW stood for Das Kleine Wunder – the little marvel. They don’t make car names like that any more!’
From the driving seat
+ A proper chance to stretch TT’s legs
+ Lusty, thrusty 2.0 T
+ Marginal mpg gain to nearly 29mpg
– But that’s still 25% off official claims (ahem)
– Still finding the ride too hard on 20s
Logbook: Audi TTS Coupe
Engine: 1984cc 16v 4cyl turbo, 306bhp @ 5800rpm, 280lb ft @ 1800-5700rpm
Gearbox: Six-speed dual-clutch auto, all-wheel drive
Stats: 4.6sec 0-62mph, 155mph, 159g/km CO2
Price: £40,270
As tested: £46,565
Miles this month: 1422
Total: 7583
Our mpg: 28.5
Official mpg: 40.9
Fuel this month: £254.69
Extra costs: £133 (ferry crossing to Isle of Man)