Triumph of design

Logic tells us that if you want a truly beautiful car, you should choose a coupe, and if you want practicality you should choose a hatchback (or an SUV), but you can’t have both (the same logic tells us that truly beautiful people can’t be super-intelligent sherpas). 

Fortunately, Audi has told logic to go outside, have a good look at itself and try harder. 

While the recently released new A5 Coupe is undoubtedly a design of great elegance and sweeping, sculpted beauty, buyers lose next to nothing in the beauty stakes by buying its four-door Sportback sister.

Not only is she equally as pretty – particularly in this new guise with its wider stance, more rakish power-domed bonnet and carved cutlines along its flanks – but she manages to hide her significantly more useful booty in a coupe-like shape.

This new A5 Sportback looks like it was built to pull off this magical design flourish because it was. While the last version, launched in 2010, was a clever adaptation of the A5, this car was designed from day one to be something separate, and something special, a Sportback, with all of the extra load room (480 litres with the rear seats up, or a cavernous 1300 litres with them folded down) and ease of rear access that implies.

The new A5 Sportback doesn’t just look different, though, because it’s also lighter, longer, lower and roomier inside than before, which is most noticeable for rear passengers, who will enjoy more shoulder room and a significant 24mm increase in leg room. 

Sit behind a driver of even larger than average size and the back seat of this car is seriously comfy.

Sitting anywhere at all in the new A5 is enjoyable because, as usual, the cabin is class leading, with a new floating dash, striking horizontal elements, high-quality surfaces and a real focus not just on how things work, but how they feel. 

Audi has concentrated on haptic feedback through the use of touch-sensitive surfaces, so you need only swipe your hand lightly over the map lights, or the favourite buttons, to turn them on. Actually pushing buttons is so 2015.

While the packaging of the A5 Sportback is much improved by its all-new design, the engineering has been seriously honed as well, with up to 80kg shed through a determined process of weight minimisation.

Increased use of hot-pressed, super high-strength steel in the body helps with both weight and chassis rigidity, while a new aluminium tailgate saves 6kg and a redesigned braking system another 5kg.

Totally reimagined five-link suspension saves another 5kg at each end, and sits on stiffened suspension mounts, which give the car a core strength on which to build more dynamic handling. Taking the unsprung weight out of both suspension and brakes is a huge help with putting the sport in Sportback.  

Take one for a drive and it quickly becomes clear just how much of a focus there’s been on delivering that sportiness, with steering that feels sharper, a beautiful ride/handling balance that can now be adjusted through a greater range using the adaptive dampers (optional on A5 but standard on the superlative S5).

The engine department has also taken great strides forward, with the new $69,990 base model boasting a supremely economical 2.0-litre TFSI S tronic engine that makes 140kW and 320Nm and uses just 5.6 litres of fuel per 100km, which is down from 6.2L/100km on the previous model. 

That is a truly impressive improvement, but even more so when you consider the new car will hit 100km/h in 7.5 seconds, almost a full second faster than the previous A5 Sportback (8.4).

The diesel option, at $73,900, is a 2.0-litre TDI quattro S tronic with an even more incredible fuel figure of 4.8 litres per 100km, plus 140kW and 400Nm, and a 0 to 100 time of 7.4 seconds.

The car we drove at the range’s launch on a perfectly sun-soaked Great Ocean Road in Victoria was what Audi calls the sweet spot of the range, at $81,500; the 2.0 TFSI quattro S tronic, which boasts 185kW and 370Nm, a flat six-second 100km/h time and fuel economy of just 6.5L/100km. 

As its numbers suggest, this is a seriously sporty car, and it feels it on this terrific, twisting road, delivering the kind of spirited driving experience that makes you wonder how anyone could want for more from a four-door, family friendly car of this size.

Until you step into the S5. The range-topper really is temptation in vehicular form, with an all-new and supremely powerful 260kW, 500Nm 3.0-litre V6, which has switched from supercharging in the previous model to turbocharging, with the turbo nestled in the engine’s V for super-fast spooling. 

The result is a car that’s as fast as the previous generation RS4 Avant, a properly quick vehicle in anyone’s language, with a 0 to 100 sprint of 4.7 seconds (down from 5.1). Who needs a V8 when a six is this good?

The fact that all 500 of those Newtons are on tap from 1370rpm to 4500rpm means there’s always grunt on tap for effortless overtaking, or just for pure joy.

The new engine may be more powerful and quicker to react, but it’s also an impressive 14kg lighter, taking weight off the front end to provide even sharper turn-in. 

Throw in seats that make you feel like a racing driver from the moment you climb in, a slick, eight-speed tiptronic gearbox and a thrilling, whooshing engine note and you’ve got one very serious sports car. Or Sportback.

Clearly, Audi has decided to give its customers a lot more with this car – including $14,000 more standard equipment when compared like for like with the old one – which is why the price of this new S5 Sportback is such a surprise, coming to market at just $105,800, significantly under the previous model’s $135,900 launch price and with even greater equipment as standard. It’s a huge shift in the price positioning of this car, and one that makes it hugely competitive, and tantalisingly tempting.

Truly, the beauty of the A5/S5 Sportback range is more than skin deep.