What is missing is any kind of external bling. Except for the spicy rims, four tailpipes and various S6 and V10 badges, there's little to differentiate the
S6 from a cooking A6 3.2. Even the daytime LED lights mounted beneath the headlights on the U.S. and European models are absent from Canadian models. Blame our government's bumper laws, not Audi Canada for their absence...
What's also missing--surprisingly, given the motor--is any kind of hair-raising excitement from behind the S6's driver's seat.
It's not like the new S6 is slow. Standstill to 100 kilometres per hour takes only 5.1 seconds, and the S6 tops out at an electronically limited 250 km/h. But the experience of achieving these numbers in the S6 is one of calm, composure and confidence.
The vee-ten, being tuned for high rpm power (435 h.p. at 6,800), and low rpm torque (over 90 percent of the torque is available from as low as 2,300 rpm), certainly sets the grand touring tone.
Whereas Lamborghini mates manual and sequential manual transmissions, Audi had to drop the rev limiter to save the torque converter in its Tiptronic tranny, losing the Gallardo's high-pitched shrill in the process. If anything, throttle response is too immediate at low speeds, but once you have your foot in it, the throaty rumble that only an engine with ten pots can create is one of the strong and silent variety. Aurally, the S6 vee-ten's not as racy and raucous as the smaller, more hyper RS4's 420 h.p., 317 lb.-ft. of torque 4.2-litre vee-eight, but the ten is definitely smoother and more refined than the eight.
The S6's steering and handling produces similarly sophisticated results.
Turning the S6 delivers linear and weighted responses, lacking only the feel that a true sports sedan like the RS4 would possess. Audi's new Torsen-equipped quattro all-wheel-drive system can send up to 85 % of its torque to the rear wheels, primarily to mitigate inherent understeer, as the vee-ten sits longitudinally in front of the front wheels like a surfer hanging ten (toes, not cylinders). Where the RS4 is blessed with Audi's new Dynamic Ride control system--reducing roll and pitch by diagonally linking opposed shocks, enabling the nose heavy Audi to be neutral at its relatively high limits--the more muted S6 doesn't.
After having been chauffeured around Mosport by Audi R10 pilot Allan McNish, flogging the car on the track during this year's AJAC COTY testing event, plus a week with this test car, it becomes apparent the S6 isn't a car
begging for a day at the track. It's just not that type of car. Beyond all the hype about "the S6 with that Lamborghini vee-ten", the Audi scores more points as a swift-but-stealthy Q-ship rather than a balls-to-the-wall sports sedan.
If you never drove a BMW M5 or Mercedes-Benz E 63 AMG, the Audi S6 would seem like a rocket.
But then, those cars will respectively run you an additional $11,400 and $17,900 more than the $101,900 Audi asks for their S6. In this company, it's a bit of a bargain.
 |
| (Photo: John LeBlanc, Auto123.com) |
What's also missing--surprisingly, given the motor--is any kind of hair-raising excitement from behind the S6's driver's seat.
It's not like the new S6 is slow. Standstill to 100 kilometres per hour takes only 5.1 seconds, and the S6 tops out at an electronically limited 250 km/h. But the experience of achieving these numbers in the S6 is one of calm, composure and confidence.
The vee-ten, being tuned for high rpm power (435 h.p. at 6,800), and low rpm torque (over 90 percent of the torque is available from as low as 2,300 rpm), certainly sets the grand touring tone.
 |
| (Photo: John LeBlanc, Auto123.com) |
The S6's steering and handling produces similarly sophisticated results.
 |
| (Photo: John LeBlanc, Auto123.com) |
After having been chauffeured around Mosport by Audi R10 pilot Allan McNish, flogging the car on the track during this year's AJAC COTY testing event, plus a week with this test car, it becomes apparent the S6 isn't a car
 |
| (Photo: John LeBlanc, Auto123.com) |
If you never drove a BMW M5 or Mercedes-Benz E 63 AMG, the Audi S6 would seem like a rocket.
But then, those cars will respectively run you an additional $11,400 and $17,900 more than the $101,900 Audi asks for their S6. In this company, it's a bit of a bargain.