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It might look like a coupe, but Audi A5 Sportback can shift the loads too: Audi A5 Sportback 2.0 TDI ultra S line S tronic 190PS long term review 2

Audi A5 Sportback long term review – it might look like a crisp coupe with its sportback styling but it’s also capable of carrying a load too. And then there’s the ride and handling too
Auid A5 Sportback load carrier
Audi A5 Sportback: crisp coupe appearance belies practical ability to carry people and loads

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15 January 2018

IT’S post match at Twickenham’s Stoop in west London on Saturday, January 13. Harlequins have just pulled off a major upset against rivals Wasps by managing to lose for 79 minutes, and then win it in the eightieth – and final – minute.

Cue euphoria.

It was also a cold night. So I offered to give a lift back to some of my friends who were there: including a former ex-GB rower and aspiring rugby youngster currently turning out for London Scottish A team.

So big blokes – I’m the lightweight of the bunch.

It was going to be nothing less than a squeeze getting six-sixers in the back but the Sportback did, despite the low roofline that gives the car such an appealing shape.

Admittedly the middle rear passenger was in something of a squeeze, but when I dropped off a couple of the boys and he popped off the middle rear perch he was surprised at how accommodating the rear seat was. Even for a six foot sixer.

Ride and handling so composed

Me? The thing that really impressed me was how exceptional and composed the ride remained. Speed humps and potholes were dispatched with little more than a shrug despite the combined weight of my rugby-going friends.

Tom Brennan head of Audi fleet
Tom Brennan: ride and handling under-appreciated

Indeed, when I was speaking to Tom Brennan recently, who is head of fleet for Audi, I asked him what was the most underrated feature of new Audi cars.

His answer?

The ride and handling.

I would agree 100%.

You almost take the brilliant build quality as a given; the exceptional quality of the interior; the intuitive haptic response from the buttons and controls you touch. But the ride and handling…this has always been an area that Audi has failed to fully grasp. Until now. Like the ride quality and tenacious handling on the Sportback’s saloon and estate A4 counterpart, it is quite unlike anything you have experienced on Audis before. It’s another tick in the premium brilliant box.

Anyway, back to the Audi A5 Sportback as a load carrier. This time without passengers. You can drop the rear seats and get a really usable space for lengthy objects – as my wife does often for her interior design business, or I do for taking no longer required items to the municipal dump.

It all adds up to making the Audi A5 Sportback rather more than a smart-looking coupe styled five-door with the sharpest of lines; it also makes it a thoroughly practical one too.

Boot of Audi A5 Sportback with seats down
Fold the rear seats down and the A5 Sportback becomes a practical business car

Audi A5 Sportback 2.0 TDI ultra S line S tronic 190PS

  • Power – 190PS
  • Torque – 400Nm
  • Transmission – seven speed dual clutch auto
  • Top speed – 146mph
  • 0-62mph – 7.9 seconds
  • CO2 emissions – 112g/lm
  • Company car tax band 2017/18 – 24%
  • Fuel consumption (official) – 65.7mpg
  • Fuel consumption (actual) – 48.3mpg

Read the previous long term review of the Audi A5 Sportback

Click here for Blue is the colour 

 

 

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Ralph Morton

Ralph Morton

Ralph Morton is an award-winning journalist and the founder of Business Car Manager (now renamed Business Motoring). Ralph writes extensively about the car and van leasing industry as well as wider fleet and company car issues. A former editor of What Car?, Ralph is a vastly experienced writer and editor and has been writing about the automotive sector for over 35 years.

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