Golf R -v- Golf GTI

[brad]

Here's a quote from two GTI owners:
"What's the point of tuning my GTI when I don't even have enough traction on dry roads in stock form?"

Enough said lol.

WOW! serendipity. Must be twins if they said the same thing.

All these folk that can't get the power down (not just GTIs - many reasonably powerful cars), is it that they drive around in 1st gear all the time or do they have no fine motor skills in their right foot & treat the accelerator pedal as an on/off switch?

[Maverick]

WOW! serendipity. Must be twins if they said the same thing.

All these folk that can't get the power down (not just GTIs - many reasonably powerful cars), is it that they drive around in 1st gear all the time or do they have no fine motor skills in their right foot & treat the accelerator pedal as an on/off switch?

They've 'upgraded' to the R because the GTI can't handle their awesome driving skills and now they tell everyone how the R is so much better!

[shakespeare]

Full stage 2 plus decent tyres and some suspension work; and traction is barely an issue. Only an issue when it comes to 60' times, for everything esle that amount of power doesn't overwhelme the chassis much at all.

That makes a lot of sense to me

You just have to modify your driving style between a high powered FWD and an AWD, particularly in the wet or on gravel. For me I prefer the AWD, but FWD is still fun

[Corey_R]

Lol yeah... I mean, the R vs GTI - when both upgraded, have very little in it. Around Eastern Creek last year during the MOTOR Hot Tuner Challenge in the torrential rain the Golf R did a 1:59.0, beating EVERYTHING. $120k WRX STI's and Lancer Evo X's, $200k+ Porsches and Lamborghinis.... but then so did the GTI with it's 2:00.7 - only 1.7 seconds slower than the Golf R, and several seconds quicker than any "full time" AWD STI or Evo (or any other car for that matter).

So that's on a track so wet you could go swimming...

In the dry you could only imagine that the time difference between the GTI and R would be even smaller... perhaps the GTI would even beat the R due to it's lower weight and less drive train losses...

So what about straight line speed?
Well, in 0 to 100 the R will always win. But on the 1/4 mile, well, thus far Sammy with his K04 GTI is showing up all of our "Stage 2+ R's".... and Sammy's in a manual vs the R's with DSGs (at least from who has posted times thus far)


So yeah - I echo the comments of Maverick and brad in that if people are whinging about not being able to put down power in the GTI, that it's more a case of lack of talent from the driver, than lack of potential in the car

[DoggieHowser]

The Mk V GTI is a remarkably great handling car and I expect if the XDS differential on the MkVI works like it's supposed to, it should extend the limits of the already impressive car. I doubt most of us will see the limits even if we are exuberant, on public roads.

But on the limits like on a track day, a good 4WD implementation should give the R that much more. Forget about mods and chip ups, just comparing stock with stock.

For what it's worth, I think the R is a real bargain. For 10 grand more, you get upgraded front calipers, bixenons, parking sensors, LED rear tail lights all as standard. You could easily spend much more trying to get those aftermarket on the GTI.

[dave_r]

<snip the facts>

Said it before and I'll say it again, GTI doesn't come in RB. The end.

That and a GTI isn't as cool to do LC's in the pouring rain. $10k worth right there!

[DoggieHowser]

Lol yeah... I mean, the R vs GTI - when both upgraded, have very little in it. Around Eastern Creek last year during the MOTOR Hot Tuner Challenge in the torrential rain the Golf R did a 1:59.0, beating EVERYTHING. $120k WRX STI's and Lancer Evo X's, $200k+ Porsches and Lamborghinis.... but then so did the GTI with it's 2:00.7 - only 1.7 seconds slower than the Golf R, and several seconds quicker than any "full time" AWD STI or Evo (or any other car for that matter).

I'm not sure that's enough information for a meaningful comparison. Most tuned STIs and Evos I know run on semi slicks which are notoriously bad tyres for the wet. Even the stock A046 tyres on my old Evo 8 MR was barely usable in the wet, much less my A048s

If the GTIs/Rs were on original PS2/CSC2, they'd have the edge in grip for wet conditions.

[Corey_R]

Both the Golf R and GTI were on semi-slicks too... Hankook Venti TD04's or something like that (sorry if the name/spelling of the tyres is wrong).

Said it before and I'll say it again, GTI doesn't come in RB. The end.

That and a GTI isn't as cool to do LC's in the pouring rain. $10k worth right there!

Lol... yeah dave_r, I must admit, the large majority of the reason I went for the R over the GTI was simply because of Rising Blue

[DoggieHowser]

Can't say I am familiar with the track but at the Sepang track in Malaysia (where the F1 races are held), the Evos and STIs have no problems outrunning GTIs, especially in the high speed chicanes (turns 5/6 and 12/13), where the GTIs usually ran out of grip or on the front/back straights (where the GTIs ran out of grunt).

But it's been a while since I went to the track in my Evo and there weren't any Rs then either.

[DoggieHowser]

Lol... yeah dave_r, I must admit, the large majority of the reason I went for the R over the GTI was simply because of Rising Blue

Hehe, I think I might be able to sell the R to the wife on that basis alone once she gets used to the 77TSI Shark Blue.

[robby_jai]

So yeah - I echo the comments of Maverick and brad in that if people are whinging about not being able to put down power in the GTI, that it's more a case of lack of talent from the driver, than lack of potential in the car

sorry i dont agree with this. my question to you is have you ever driven a high powered fwd car on the race tracks ???? Have you ever been on a race track ? it requires a completely different driving style to driving a RWD or AWD car.

the biggest issue is traction and understeer which are inherent to FWD car... and yes while lack of driving experience skills magnifies the issues of these cars... they do require significant amount of work around suspensions etc to make it driveable. those examples you gave to the Golf R and Golf GTi in the HTS ... had significant amount of suspension work done, had an LSD... sway bars put in ... and were running semi slicks and race brakes...the sum of ALL those parts equal a faster lap time. Not just a straight out power upgrade.

quite a significant amount of modification are required to handle the power upgrade that the FWD cars copped in the HTS.

most people here normally dont go for that extreme amount of upgrades when upping the power in their car... most leave the suspensions, wheels, tires alone and just up the power like crazy...because either they cant afford to ... or they cant be bothered

and quite frankly upping the power on the GTI like crazy and leaving everything else stock or almost stock will render the car quite difficult to drive on the track and is a lot less easier than you make it out to be.


Which goes back to the original statement... a golf r is much more capable of handling all the power upgrades with out significant modifications to other drive train components like suspensions wheels and tires etc.

[Guy_H]

I'm not sure that's enough information for a meaningful comparison. Most tuned STIs and Evos I know run on semi slicks which are notoriously bad tyres for the wet. Even the stock A046 tyres on my old Evo 8 MR was barely usable in the wet, much less my A048s

If the GTIs/Rs were on original PS2/CSC2, they'd have the edge in grip for wet conditions.

I've driven both the cars in question with the Hankook Ventus TD's - they are an awesome wet or dry tyre. Everywhere I have run them (Lakeside, Morgan Park & QLD Raceway), the R has only been just quicker (and these cars have near identical chassis setup), but an awful lot easier to drive closer to the limit.

The Golf R's forte is pulling out of tight, slow corners, the R rules that.

Honestly, the Golf GTI is so damn good (chassis balance), its taken some shine off the ever capable R. The Golf GTI is lighter, so gets away with less power as well.

[robby_jai]

Lol yeah... I mean, the R vs GTI - when both upgraded, have very little in it. Around Eastern Creek last year during the MOTOR Hot Tuner Challenge in the torrential rain the Golf R did a 1:59.0, beating EVERYTHING. $120k WRX STI's and Lancer Evo X's, $200k+ Porsches and Lamborghinis.... but then so did the GTI with it's 2:00.7 - only 1.7 seconds slower than the Golf R, and several seconds quicker than any "full time" AWD STI or Evo (or any other car for that matter).

So that's on a track so wet you could go swimming...

What YOU ALSO clearly failed to include in your above information is that the cars were all set up for DRY weather time attacks.. and all tuners were given specific instructions that they were NOT allowed to modify their suspension set ups other than reduce damping and adjusting tire temperatures.

All the cars were set up for aggressive dry time attack performance... with super aggresive cambers.... stiff suspension set ups etc... hardly condusive for fast time attacks on a very wet and slippery track

it just so happened that the APR cars... were set up quite well and suited the conditions on the day.

I can guarantee you with hindsight... a lot of the tuners.. if they chose a less aggressive set up on their suspensions... they probably would have topped the APR times with ease.

High powered cars with massive amount of gumbo on semi slicks makes for poor track traction.. which is why the porsche and co... suffered severely in the conditions that was last years HTS

[Corey_R]

Yeah - sorry about that... next time I'll write a ten page post listing in detail every single specification of all 100 cars and the results of all 20 tests for each of the 100 cars so that you can get all the information...

But it's not really relevant. The R and the GTI were setup for dry too, on semi-slicks, and most importantly for this thread (R vs GTI), they were both prepared by the same company and both had similar performance and handling upgrades (suspensions, sways, LSDs etc in addition to the power mods as you mentioned).

Of course one requires a different driving style to the other, that's a given, and yes, FWD or RWD reqiures more effort from the driver than AWD.

It still doesn't change the fact that the Golf GTI was within 1% of the R's time in conditions which many people would have written off a FWD car in favor of AWD cars...

[Guy_H]

What YOU ALSO clearly failed to include in your above information is that the cars were all set up for DRY weather time attacks.. and all tuners were given specific instructions that they were NOT allowed to modify their suspension set ups other than reduce damping and adjusting tire temperatures.

All the cars were set up for aggressive dry time attack performance... with super aggresive cambers.... stiff suspension set ups etc... hardly condusive for fast time attacks on a very wet and slippery track

it just so happened that the APR cars... were set up quite well and suited the conditions on the day.

I can guarantee you with hindsight... a lot of the tuners.. if they chose a less aggressive set up on their suspensions... they probably would have topped the APR times with ease.

High powered cars with massive amount of gumbo on semi slicks makes for poor track traction.. which is why the porsche and co... suffered severely in the conditions that was last years HTS

Cant bank on the weather

Robby, you need to go to a Porsche club trackday, try to stay with a well driven GT3 (or GT2) in the wet - you will be shocked how good they are in the wet.

I suppose we will never know, I know what our cars were capable of in the dry, and they have run Porsche club events (mainly because I'm a member & get good value track time) and I know how they perform against GT3's & the like - believe me, they never get embarrassed anywhere they go.

We can always have an excuse I suppose - fact is it rained. rains at Bathurst too, rains at Le Mans, Monaco etc - lucky Motorsport happens in all weather. Imagaine if we had driven 1000kms down from Brisbane with a wet setup & it turned out dry, how silly we would have looked

P.S. - This year there will be dry circuit (weather permitting) & "mandatory" wet skidpan, so that evens everything out for everybody. You have to make a choice on what will run best on the circuit & the best on the wet skidpan.

Our setup (Chassis & tyres) will be identical to what we ran last year - in fact, most of the parts off our old Golf R are on the new one!