Classy Audi goes sassy with its R8 supercar.
No fewer than four Audi employees escorted the 2008 Audi R8 to the Los Angeles Times' garage a few weeks ago, a veritable task force of handlers to introduce me to the company's new six-figure, mid-engine supercar.
Once they arrived, there wasn't much for them to do but stand around and Armor-All their suit lapels.
Despite the R8's evident exoticism -- the car is low, wide and mirthless, its gimlet eyes fixing you with white-hot LEDs like it was brooding on ways to wreck your marriage -- the car required no special instructions.
There were no gear-shifting paddles attached to the flat-bottomed steering wheel (though they are an option), no hydraulics to raise the front end as there are in the nose-grinding Lamborghini Murcielago, no wing-setting launch sequence as in the BugattiVeyron.
The Cavalli-suited entourage underscores the fact that the R8 -- certainly one of the finest mid-engine sports cars ever built -- is not about posting quick lap times or eating into the Porsche 911's market share, though it will do both to a bloody fare-thee-well.
The R8 is a fistful of weaponized cool thrown in the face of the sports car status quo: seductively styled, comprehensively engineered, and flawlessly executed.
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