Why pay $40,000 for a Focus? 350 horsepower, that's why.
TranscriptMIKE AUSTIN: Hey, guys, where are the keys to the focus?
[ENGINE ACCELERATING]
350 horsepower in a Focus! That's why you spend $40,000 on this car. And this, check it out-- (MIMICKING ENGINE ACCELERATION).
This is the 2016 Ford Focus RS, one of the most anticipated cars of the last year. It starts at $36,000. The one I'm driving is about $42,000. It has a torque vectoring all-wheel drive system. The engine is a 2.3 liter turbo-charged 4-cylinder. This is the same one you can get in the Mustang.
It pulls strong from 4,000 RPM all the way up to 6,700 RPM red line. There's not a ton of feedback on the steering wheel. But it's very precise. And it's very easy to manage where the car is going. It only comes in to manual transmission. It has Brembo brakes standard. It has very serious summer tires standard.
The coolest trick with the Focus RS is the torque-vectoring differential. There is a clutch pack at the rear. And that lets it proportion power side to side. Both under-power and under-engine braking. What it lets it do is overdrive the outside wheel to corner better, or under-drive the inside wheel. Both of those things help the car turn in faster and work against all of the problems that you would normally have with a high-horsepower front-drive car.
The focus RS is in the super-performance hatchback segment, along with the Volkswagen Golf R and the Subaru Impreza WRX STI. The focus is the best of those two worlds, probably a little closer to the Volkswagen in terms of that refinement and that sophistication. But it has that explosive power that you get from the Subaru.
So you can compare the Focus RS to the Golf R or the WRX STI. Or you can actually compare it to Ford's own Mustang. That's allegedly one of the reasons we didn't get the performance Focus in the US is that product planners were too scared it would either overshadow the Mustang or compete too much with it. Now they've come to their senses and realized that these are two different cars for two different customers.
Outside, there is no mistaking this is the Focus RS. You've got the giant, huge front grille. You've got the big, huge wing on the back. It's sort of like a sophisticated badassness to it. If you're familiar with the Focus ST, the inside of the Focus RS is about the same. It has the extra gauges on top. It has the 'Caro seats.
The main difference is our test car has blue stitching everywhere, including on the steering wheel. You've got your little Focus RS badges on all of the seats. And then you have Alcantara, or at least some sort of performance suede insert, in the middle of the seat.
This isn't just a track car either. It's meant to be a daily driver. So it's stiff, not harsh. It's the sort of thing you can put up with every day. The things that work well on the track, like the good brake feel and the great throttle response and the progressive clutch, those make it all easier to drive on the road. You are paying a price for all the performance parts and extra weight of the all-wheel drive. You only get 19 city, 25 highway, 22 combined miles per gallon.
In a lot of ways, the Focus RS shouldn't exist. It's an expensive hatchback built on an economy car platform. And it only comes in a manual transmission-- all things American drivers tend to avoid. But the fact that it does exist, and that it's so great to drive, is exactly why we love it. For "Autoblog," I'm Mike Austin.
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