Three Fresh Faces

The RS 3 is a staple of European hot hatch royalty. It finally deigns to step Stateside—at least in sedan form.

Powered by a contemporary version of Audi’s turbocharged inline five-cylinder engine, its iconic, warbling exhaust note echoes those that cascaded across rally stages for decades, as the original Audi quattro reset the bar for how fast a car could travel over gravel and dirt.

This latest one is a fizzing ball of energy, characterful and exuberant. Its frontal aspect is very aggressive, and its widened, boxed wheel-well flares mark it out. Inside, the design is current Audi—all sharp angles and bold shapes. The front seats lock one in place and the driving position is spot-on. Some cheap plastics remind one of the Audi’s humble origins, but everything works as it should and both the back seat and trunk are well sized for daily usefulness, making the RS 3 a practical proposition.

EPA RATINGS: 20/29/23mpg

0-60MPH: 3.3sec PRICE AS TESTED: $65,440

Obviously, that’s not what a weapon like the RS 3 is about, though. What it does well is pull in the horizon at a rapid rate, no matter the road conditions or weather. The test period coincided with a snowstorm, and since the Audi was rollin’ on winter tires, it would have seemed a serious breach of etiquette not to indulge its penchant for sideways antics.

Despite that 401hp “five pot” engine being situated ahead of the front wheels’ centerline, the RS3’s nose remained resolutely pinned the slick tarmac, never washing wide and instilling great confidence. The tail was as sedate or as mobile as one might want in any given moment, and such was the precision with which it sent its 369lb-ft of torque to the correct tire’s con tact patch, it could be bent into pretzel-like contortions and then pull straight, slingshotting down the road with complete confidence.

The iron-fisted body control that allows the RS 3 to do this has a downside, which is too much vertical body motion when the Audi is set to the softer of the damp er’s settings. Firming them up means the ride is never less than starchy. It isn’t exactly quiet, either. But the RS 3 offers a level of performance, fun and interaction that is rare in a modern sedan, and it brims with char acter. A modern day, almost-affordable classic.

Lucid has garnered lots of headlines; some for the trials and tribulations of their production ramp up, which has been hamstrung by parts shortages, and others for the way in which the company is financed. But most of the press has been about the car itself, which has reset the standard to which electric vehicles aspire. All Lucid models have EPA ranges that exceed 400 miles, and some can go over 500 miles on a charge. Simply put, nothing else is even close.

Getting seat time in a Lucid hasn’t been the work of a moment, but it was worth the wait and the effort. Simply put, the Air Grand Touring is the finest driving sedan your humble reporter has ever experienced. It rides more smoothly than a Mercedes S-Class, or even a Rolls Royce, in some ways, especially in how it avoids the crash and chop of traversing sharp-edged road blemishes.

EPA RATINGS:

516 miles (with 19in wheels); 469 miles (with 20or 21in wheels)

0-60MPH:

It also handles like a big Lotus sports car—no surprise, in that its chassis set up was guided by former execs of the storied British company. The Air’s “go pedal” has incredible calibration, allowing the 819 horsepower to be meted out precisely. Within minutes of sliding into its supple, support ive massage seats and grasping its precise helm, it was pos sible to toss the Lucid into the kind of blind, poorly surfaced and bizarrely radiused on- and offramps that are strewn all over the Los Angeles basin, with complete abandon. The Air stayed planted, putting its massive 885lb-ft of torque down without drama. And when all the electrons were unleashed, the scenery blurred through the glass canopy that extends, uninterrupt ed, behind the front seats, just like when the Millennium Falcon first made the jump into hyperspace.

0-60mph: 2.9sec

PRICE AS TESTED:

$145,725

The Lucid’s interior is a highlight too; stunningly rendered in midcen tury tones and materials—including the most sumptuous wool-like twill, and wood and metallic armrests that beg to be caressed. The tech is impressive for a new company, with stunning graph ics, fast responses and mostly intuitive menu structures. It was easy to do an over-the-air update that enabled wireless Apple CarPlay, but the highlight was streaming high resolution music files directly to its impeccably toned and superbly imaged Dolby Atmos audio system, straight from my own accounts.

The cockpit is very roomy in front and back; the only annoyance was air con that can’t move large volumes of cool air quietly. In the plus column, Lucid’s DreamDrive semi-autonomous system is on par with the best for how intuitively it deals with rush hour traffic, without being overly intrusive. The Air makes one feel special in a way few vehicles do, whether it’s the Close Encounters-esque light show it unleashes as the driver approaches, or the way car-jaded Angelenos want to talk about how groovy it looks when one emerges from its Jetson’s-like cockpit.

The Tesla Model S made people react the same way a decade ago and it’s exciting to bear witness to the next great leap forward in electrification.