Comfort like a luxury limousine and speed like lightning. We test drove the latest addition to the Audi RS family: the RS Q8.

The main European car manufacturers have been good at competing with each other for both the number of horsepower produced and who is the fastest around the Nürburgring. Now Audi has stolen the crown from Alfa Romeo in the fastest SUV category at the Ringen. Before the RS Q8, it was the Alfa Romeo Stelvio Quadrofoglio that had a time of 7.51:70. The new time set on an initially cold and rainy day on September 13 was 7.42:25. As one of two Swedish media, we had the exclusive opportunity to get a good feel for the RS Q8 at the international test drive in Tenerife. 

Getting to Tenerife takes time. After boarding early in the morning and a long flight, we arrived on the island in the afternoon. A bus ride to the hotel and a quick briefing, it was time to jump into the car. In order to get as much as possible out of the test drive, my colleague from Teknikens Värld and I invited Victor Underberg, who is Head of Vehicle Dynamics at Audi Sport. With Mr. Underberg in the back seat, we were able to get unique inside information about why the car behaved in a certain way and how they thought when they wanted to achieve the result that we could now feel on the challenging roads around the Teide volcano. 

At the heart of the RS Q8 is a muscular four-litre V8 with twin turbochargers. It's basically the same engine that's in the Lamborghini Urus, but with a slightly milder trim level. The Italian sibling is 50 horses and has 50 Newton metres more torque, but Audi has managed to make the RS Q8 an effective cornering beater on the race track. Engine power is distributed to all four wheels via an eight-speed automatic gearbox that does the job perfectly. As usual, Audi Drive Select allows you to set a number of parameters for the car's behaviour. These include engine mapping, gearbox, dampers, steering and engine sound. But what you can also set is the four-wheel drive on the RS Q8. You can then quickly access the various settings you have composed via two buttons on the steering wheel, RS1 and RS2. The RS Q8 is also equipped with four-wheel steering, which at low speeds can turn the rear wheels by five 5 degrees to reduce the turning circle. At higher speeds, the wheels turn up to 1.5 degrees to help stabilise the car. Something that is completely new for Audi but that we have seen for a long time at BMW with its M-buttons. To reach the hundred mark on the fully digital speedometer, only 3.8 seconds are needed. The top speed is electronically adjusted and depending on the optional package you choose, it can vary between 250, 280 and 305 kilometres per hour. 

The roads here in Tenerife are smoother than a freshly polished worktop, so it's hard to feel how the dampers work and deal with rough tarmac.
Before the test drive, a heavy rain has washed stones onto the road, and we're not talking about pebbles but razor-sharp volcanic stones. Despite my best efforts to avoid them, we end up getting a puncture on one of the tyres. They're massive donuts. The brand new rims are specially designed for the RS Q8 and are a whopping 23 inches, the largest rim diameter ever offered. I spot the puncture quickly because the tyre pressure warning immediately indicates that a tyre is losing pressure. Stopping the RS Q8 is no problem either as there are massive ceramic brakes hugged by red callipers. Audi's assistance team is quickly on site with a replacement car so that we can continue after a short break. As the road clears of sharp rocks, I start to push the car and see what it can handle. With a 600-horsepower engine and all the gadgets to make it dynamic, it's easy to forget you're in a big SUV weighing almost two and a half tonnes. It's really impressive how fast the RS Q8 is!

Whether people will really drive their RS Q8 as hard as I did in Tenerife is a difficult question. Probably not. There are probably even fewer who will really take it to the Nürburgring and hug it out. But the fact that Audi still continues to enter this game is incredibly fun. 

As icing on the cake, they had brought both the RS Q8 they broke the record with at the Nürburgring and Frank Stippler who was behind the wheel when the time was set. Frank has a past mainly in German motorsport and then almost exclusively as a factory driver for Audi. Among other things, he has been involved in winning the 24-hour race at the Nürburgring in an R8 LMS. For a while he also drove in the STCC series here in Sweden as a team mate with Thed Björk. "I had the pleasure of driving in the record car with Frank. The only thing that separates it from the normal cars is the mounted cage and racing seats. I consider myself a fully-fledged driver who dares to drive beyond the limits of a normal driver. But when you sit in the car next to a driver like Frank Stippler, you quickly realise what an amateur you are. His control and speed are out of this world. How he finds the grip in the corners and dares to trust it is incredibly fascinating. 

As I mentioned, few owners are likely to really push the car the way Frank Stippler can. But regardless, you get a car that you will soon tire of. Because even in normal driving, this is a car to enjoy. It has all the equipment you can dream of and the comfort is truly world class. And quite honestly, just knowing that you are sitting in the fastest car is often enough to feel like a king behind the wheel.

Audi RS Q8 

Base price: from SEK 1 319 500.  

Engine: 4-litre twin-turbo V8, 600 hp. Torque 800 Nm.

Transmission: Front engine, 8-speed automatic gearbox, four-wheel drive.

Acceleration: 0-100 in 3.8 sec. Top speed: 250/280/305 km/h (depending on options).

Petrol consumption for mixed driving according to the manufacturer: 1.21 l/mile.

Weight: 2 390 kg.

Warranty: New car 2 years, carriage damage 3 years, rust protection 12 years, paint 3 years.