• Contrary to a report from earlier this week, Audi has no plans to market the RS 4 Avant in North America.
• The German automaker does offer another high-performance wagon here, the RS 6 Avant.
• In the A4 range, it's still possible to fall back on the Allroad wagon version.
A report by Motor Trend this week got fans of sporty driving, AWD and wagons all fired up. The claim was that Audi had decided to bring one of its iconic models, the RS 4 Avant, to the North American market.
This is the high-performance variant of the A4 sedan, but in a wagon version.
There was little reason to doubt the report, given that the sources was someone within Audi. Evidently, that looks like it wasn’t the case. Road & Track contacted a North American Audi representative of the company who confirmed that the information was incorrect.
The spokesperson told the publication, “There are no plans to bring the RS 4 Avant to the U.S. market. I love the car, but it's not coming.”
It’s hard to blame Motor Trend magazine for publishing the information it was given at the time. Moreover, it made sense, because Audi already offers the RS 6 Avant here, and has done well with it. What's more, the current A4 is at the end of its life cycle, so an RS 4 Avant version offered for only one year would probably have sold very well.
To wit, all RS 6 Avants destined for North America sold out. It’s very likely the same thing would have happened with an RS 4 Avant.
One note of caution: in the past, we've had “confirmations” from Audi regarding models not coming to North America, only to have the company change course and introduce them after all. Manufacturers often revise their decisions; it's part of their strategic process and the natural adjustments they make to their lineup.
Finally, a word about a rumour circulating about the name of the A4 sedan, which has it becoming the A5 when the new generation arrives. The idea being that models with an even number would first make the transition to electrification, so that a gasoline-powered A4 would become an A5, while the electric version would take on the name A4, with the mention e-tron. Ditto for the S performance variants.
We're at the rumour stage in this case, so stay tuned.