![]() ![]() The R8 is still a sports car, the seating position is low, and getting in and out is more of a heave and a tumble than a red-carpet arrival, but the seats are soft and adjustable while still looking sporty. With the top down and the heat up-is there any better combination than a convertible with heated seats on a cool morning?-we set the modes to their loudest and stiffest and blurred the hillsides all the way to the ocean. Its deep red interior got approving nods, and it was easy to find a willing passenger for the post-race Malibu cruise. Even so, it's a bargain compared to its Ferrari 488 neighbor, or even its Huracán cousin. Our car carried a heavy price tag for an R8: $189,690, larded with a premium stereo, sport exhaust, and diamond-stitched leather. My last day in the R8 started at a Formula 1 viewing party, where the Audi looked right at home door-handle-to-door-handle with Ferraris, Lambos, and Porsches. Then again, it also doesn’t have a jutting front spoiler or a giant rear wing. Parking is easy, too, which is surprising because the R8 doesn’t have a nose-lift or a big center screen to show multiple camera angles. The Audi mirrors reflect a little chunk of rear hip and two lanes on either side, all steady and ready for your blinker. There are side mirrors, but they tend to vibrate so vigorously that one can’t tell if the reflection is an SUV or a distant mountain skipping like a biblical ram. ![]() Changing lanes in a Huracán is an exercise in faith. Later, on the freeway, I thought about how different the R8 is from its Lamborghini sibling. The R8 doesn’t terrify with initial acceleration like a McLaren, and it isn’t small and saucy like a Lotus, it pulls forward with the big-engine confidence of a draft horse. The return was broader and faster, with tight turns to get just a touch of wiggle-the blessings of rear-wheel-drive-and big sweepers to stick and stay in it. ![]() It started on Little Tujunga, a road too small for the R8 to stretch its legs, but one with plenty of canyon walls to bounce the bass drum of the exhaust out over California’s San Fernando Valley. Point is, the R8 has been an important part of Car and Driver’s collective consciousness, so as we prepare for what may be our last year of R8 drives, we want to do each one justice. We’re going to ignore that part about Miller seeing Iron Man in 2008 as a kid because it brings up an uncomfortable awareness of the passage of time. But it also felt semi-attainable, in that I would see one every so often.” It looked so low and sleek, and I think the association with the badass, tech-king Tony Stark made it seem even more futuristic. “I was obsessed with Iron Man, and by association, the R8 became one of my favorite supercars. As a relative newbie in the C/D office, he has yet to get behind the wheel of an R8, but he’s loved them ever since he saw Iron Man as a kid. I spent a couple of weeks driving multiple R8s before the automotive journalists even laid eyes on them.”Īssociate news editor Caleb Miller is going to be jealous reading this. “The cars would often arrive straight from the port so we would have to unwrap them and put the first 500 break-in miles on them. Road test editor, Becca Hackett, was working in automotive fleet management when the first R8s came to the States and had the unenviable job of keeping her foot off the floor. When asked which of those was the bigger thrill, he wisely didn’t answer. His other R8 recollection was of a road trip through Napa with his wife. When I asked our current team for Audi memories, testing director Dave VanderWerp mentioned it was the first car he ever set a sub-three-minute lap time in at our annual Lightning Lap testing, and highlighted the R8's dual nature. #Displaycal vs spyder plusCsaba Csere described a 2008 V-8 model as “roomy,” “racy,” and “useful.” Ten years and a generation later, Eric Tingwall pronounced the 2017 V-10 Plus “graceful and sophisticated … compliant and comfortable." From the get-go, the R8 struck us as more functional than your run-of-the-mill mid-engine machine. Over more than a decade of R8-ing, there have been some reoccurring thoughts. #Displaycal vs spyder driverNow, Car and Driver as a team has been in just about every R8, from the Le Mans prototype, before the road-legal sports car existed, back when the racer was only a three-time winner (it would go on to gather two more) to the early models of the first generation production car. ![]()
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