Audi RS5 Hire Sydney: Review, Specs and Who It Is Really For

Most fast cars want you to know they are fast. The RS5 does not. It is a handsome Audi coupe, or a five-door Sportback, with a twin-turbo V6 and all-wheel drive that will match a Mustang to 100km/h without the Mustang's noise, and it will do it in the rain. This page is for the reader who wants the pace and none of the theatre. The car is confirmed by request, so send us your dates and we will tell you honestly whether we can source one.

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Specifications

Read the torque figure before the power. 600Nm from just above idle is what this car feels
like in daily use, and it arrives with so little fuss that the 3.9-second sprint seems to
belong to a different car until you check the speedometer.

What It Is Actually Like in Sydney

Speed without a soundtrack

The B9 RS5 is the car for the person who finds loud performance cars slightly
embarrassing. The twin-turbo V6, with its turbochargers packed inside the vee of the engine so
the exhaust path is short, responds almost instantly and makes a deep, even hum rather than a
crackle. Passengers do not brace. Neighbours do not look up. And yet a squeeze of the throttle
on the Warringah Freeway on-ramp puts the car at the limit before the lane has finished
merging. It is a strange and pleasant sensation to be in something this quick that behaves,
from the outside, like a well-mannered Audi coupe, and that is the entire appeal.

The previous RS5 had a naturally aspirated 4.2-litre V8 that revved past 8,000rpm and
sounded like a touring car. If that is the RS5 you remember, this is a different animal: more
torque, more speed, far less noise. Owners argued about the swap for years. As a hire car for
a weekend where you want to arrive relaxed rather than deafened, the V6 wins, and it is not
close.

A proper automatic, not a dual-clutch

Audi fitted the RS5 with a conventional eight-speed torque-converter automatic where the
smaller RS cars use a dual-clutch. In stop-start traffic on Victoria Road, or crawling through
the Harbour Tunnel at five in the evening, that is the better gearbox by a distance: it creeps
smoothly, it never shunts, and it changes down early and without drama when you ask for pace.
On a mountain road it is a fraction slower to shift than the dual-clutch in an RS3, and you
will not notice unless you have driven both back to back. For a car that will spend most of a
hire in traffic and on motorways, it is the right choice.

The paddles behind the wheel are there when you want them, and in the dynamic setting the
gearbox will hold a gear to the limiter rather than shifting up on your behalf. Left to
itself it reads the road well enough that most drivers stop touching the paddles by the end
of the first day. Launch control exists; the sensible place for it is nowhere on a public
road, and the car is quick enough without it that you will not miss it.

Quattro on a wet Sydney night

Sydney rain arrives in sheets and the roads go glassy in the first ten minutes as the oil
lifts. A rear-drive car with 600Nm asks for real care at that moment; the RS5 does not. The
quattro system splits torque front to rear and the car simply pulls out of the junction. That
is why this page recommends it to people who want pace but do not want to spend a weekend
managing it, and it is also why it is a sensible first booking on the Performance tier for
someone who has not driven a fast car before. The margin it gives you is real, and it is
there every time, not only in the right drive mode.

The roads that suit it

The RS5 is a long-legged car and the best days in it involve distance. The M1 north to the
Hunter with a run through the vineyards at the far end is the natural weekend. The Grand
Pacific Drive south over the Sea Cliff Bridge to Kiama, and back through the Southern
Highlands on the Hume, is a day that covers three kinds of road and the car is good on all of
them. Tight, bumpy second-gear roads are where a lighter car would be more fun; the RS5 is
quick on them, but it is happiest when the corners open out and the surface is smooth enough
to let the torque work.

Inside, the RS5 is the car in this trio that best suits three hours behind the wheel. The
seats are broad, the driving position is low without being awkward to climb out of, the
digital instruments can be set to show nothing but a map and a speed, and the frameless
doors on the coupe make it feel lighter than it is at a service station. Two adults, two
overnight bags and a run to the vineyards with a stop for lunch in Wollombi is exactly the
shape of a good RS5 weekend, and the car arrives at the far end feeling like it has done a
quarter of the distance.

Things You Should Know

Minimum age 20, and this is the sensible car to start with

The RS5 is a Performance-tier car, so the minimum driver age is 20 with a full, unrestricted
licence, checked physically at handover every time. Drivers under 25 carry Young Driver
Cover, added as its own line before payment. If you are choosing your first quick car to
hire, this is a better choice than the rear-drive V8s: it is forgiving, the all-wheel drive
removes the sharp edges, and nothing about it needs managing in the wet. Additional drivers
are named on the booking and meet the same requirements, or they are not covered at all.

The one thing to watch is that a quiet car hides its speed. In a Mustang the noise tells
you what the speedometer is about to say; in the RS5 the V6 hums along at a steady pitch
while the number climbs, and the smooth ride and the isolation from the road make an illegal
speed feel like a relaxed one. Glance at the dial more often than you think you need to,
especially on the long downhill sections of the M1 and on the Hume, where the cameras are
fixed and the demerit points are doubled on holiday weekends.

The coupe's rear seats are for short trips

The coupe has two rear seats and they are usable by adults across the city or by children
for longer. The roofline takes the headroom, and getting into the back means tipping the
front seat forward. If four people are travelling more than an hour, book the Sportback,
which has rear doors and a proper rear bench. The boot on the coupe is decent for a two-door
and takes two carry-on cases with a soft bag on top; the Sportback's hatch takes a great deal
more and the seats fold when it needs to.

Ride, tyres and fuel

On the standard sports suspension the RS5 is firm but well damped; on the optional adaptive
suspension it can be softened for the motorway and stiffened for a mountain road. It is the
most comfortable car in this group over the concrete of the M4. It runs 98-octane premium
and, driven the way the torque invites, uses more than the official figure by a comfortable
margin. Wide tyres on 20-inch wheels sit close to the kerb, and a scraped rim on a tight
reverse park is the likeliest damage on any weekend. Tell us on the day and it is a
straightforward conversation rather than a difficult one at return.

Choosing the Trim

Coupe

Two doors, the cleaner profile, the wide rear haunches that make the car look planted from
behind. Book it as a two-person car with occasional rear seats, for a couple's weekend or an
evening where the car is part of the plan. It is the shape people mean when they say RS5.

Sportback

Five doors, five seats, a hatch instead of a boot lid, and the same engine and drivetrain.
It gives up a fraction of the coupe's shape for a car that carries four adults and their
luggage without argument. Most families and most business bookings should take this one; the
drive is identical and the practical gain is large.

Who Books This Car

People who want to be fast without being noticed. A partner in a firm who has a client to
visit in Newcastle and would rather enjoy the drive. A couple heading to a wedding in the
Hunter who want to arrive in something elegant and get there quickly. Someone who has hired a
Mustang or an M3 and is curious what a quiet, all-wheel-drive approach to the same speed
feels like.

It is also the performance car that works as a business car. A Sportback in a dark colour
parks outside a client's office without comment, seats four for lunch, and covers a Sydney to
Canberra return in a day with the driver still fresh. Nobody who rides in it will ask what it
cost; everybody who drives it will notice what it does when the road clears. For a week that
mixes meetings with one good drive, that combination is hard to beat at the money.

It is priced from $550 a day, between the RS3 and the four-door AMG C63 S. The RS5 is
confirmed by request: tell us the dates and whether you want the coupe or the Sportback, we
find the car, and we give you a straight answer before anything is charged.