tridentnyc

Hey all,

So today I attended the Audi Driving Experience in Monticello, NY. Great day at the track where I was able to drive an S4, S5, TTS, TTRS, RS5, S8 and yes, the S7 of course! A great day at a great event! My only complaint was the instructors were WAY too tame in terms of speed on the track, hard to get a sense of what the vehicles could do fully. The Porsche event I did at the same location about six weeks ago was much less restrained.

Anyway, here are my thoughts on the S7 as compared to the A7. We were able to do both street runs and track runs with the S7 so my following comments refer to both driving scenarios. The S7 was always set to Sport and full Dynamic mode on all runs.

As soon as I got in the S7 I immediately liked the sport seats...way more comfortable than the A7 seats. The S7 seats have better thigh support and side support. I felt very secure in the seats and they felt slightly "cushier" believe it or not. Overall a much more comfortable and performing seat than the A7 without a doubt.

I was expecting the S7's ride to be much harsher than the A7's due to the performance oriented suspension. I was really tuned in to whether the ride would feel stiff and whether road imperfections would make it's way into the cabin. I was very pleasantly surprised that the ride was very sporty while still retaining a nice comfortable feel overall. The cabin remained quiet except under hard acceleration, where the S7's great exhaust note made just enough "noise" in the cabin. One thing I did notice about the suspension was the S7 felt like it still had about the same body roll as the A7. Now I was definitely driving the S7 more aggressively than my A7 but I still felt it had more body roll than I thought it would, not a lot of body roll but again about the same as the A7 surprisingly.

One aspect of the S7 that was a BIG surprise to me was it's off the line performance...it felt no better than the A7 to me. I know on paper the S7 is quicker 0-60 mph than the A7 but it just didn't feel that way to me. "Seat of the pants" feel is what matters to me, what puts a smile on my face etc. Now don't get me wrong, the S7 definitely puts a smile on my mug, it just didn't put a bigger one on me today and that surprised me.

One other thing I noticed was the seven speed dual clutch tranny felt much clunkier on deceleration than the eight speed on my A7. Now to be fair, from time to time I still get a slight "lurch" at about 10 or 15 mph with my A7 but it was much more pronounced with the S7. I drove two different S7's today and both exhibited the same downshift clunkiness. Maybe something Audi will have worked out in the near future.

I've read just about every article published on the S7 so far and was extremely close to ordering one and trading in my A7...not anymore. While the S7 is an extremely good vehicle, I just can't justify the premium over the A7 for the perceived performance gains.

Now that I've had a chance to thoroughly test drive the S7 I'm going to do the H&R springs on my A7 and do the engine software tune if and when that ever becomes available. With just those two mods I really feel that my A7 will get damn close to the S7 both in terms of performance on paper and the all important seat of the pants/**** eating grin "spec". Then all I need to do is figure out how to get either the S7 sport seats or the A8 comfort seats and I'll be set.

I've posted a tiny excerpt so you guys can hear the exhaust note in the cabin. There are just two small blips of the throttle due to the overly cautious track instructor. Sucks but check it out. One might ask how I got a good feel for the S7 if the track runs were so slow? The answer to that is we actually went faster and more aggressively on the street runs than the track with the S7 and the runs were much longer.

It could be argued that the extra hp, better seats and torque vectoring differential are worth the extra bucks and I think it's definitely a valid argument for sure...worth thinking about for someone who is considering either the A7 or S7. Just not worth the hit on a trade or sale and the price premium of the S7 for someone like me who already owns an A7.

Anyway, hope this adds to the conversation just a bit.

http://youtu.be/GLxbgVwHMKs

K91109

Thanks for the review. Did the S7 has 19 or 20 inch wheels?

Besides, how bad was the turbo lag? maybe that contributed to the car not feeling fast from a stop?

Kyn Prime

you dont need better seats... that is ridiculous... the most important thing when sitting is pelvis position ... you need a back joy... get one on amazon for 30 dollars... this is essentially an orthotic for sitting... even the performance seats do not come close to what this does for comfort and proper spine and pelvic alignment.

tridentnyc

Turbo lag was definitely noticeable. Another attendee of the event driving with me on the street mentioned it at the same exact moment I did. His words after the street run were "There is too much "talking" going on after I hit the pedal...engine just needs to get on with it". I thought that pretty much summed it up.

I thought with the V8 the rush of power and extra torque would have been immediate and very noticeable...it wasn't. The S7 pulls hard for sure but you don't start to feel that pull until maybe three seconds after punching it. Definitely disappointing to me in that regard.

All S7's were running the 19" wheels, didn't catch what brand/make tires were on them though.

tridentnyc

Ahh Kyn, Kyn, Kyn ...you do have such an elegant way with words don't you?

The reason my comment is not ridiculous, as you so eloquently put it, is that I wasn't referring to my lower back issue when commenting on the seats.

1. The S7 sport seats hold the driver in more snugly and supportively than the A7's, as one would expect.

2. The leather feels softer and not as stiff as the A7 making the seats feel more inviting.

3. The S7 seats aren't "park bench" hard like the A7, again, providing a cushier feel.

4. Thigh support is 100 times better in the S7 which will be very important, especially for taller drivers.

It is all these non-ridiculous things that make the S7 seats RIDICULOUSLY better than the A7's hands down!

Now, for the last month I've been waiting to thank you for the Back Joy recommend. Bought one over a month ago and my lower back pain while in the car has diminished considerably, so thanks for that Kyn. The Back Joy has made my back pain less but doesn't make the A7 seats any more comfortable, only different seats will do that.

aquarian

The S7 sure sounds nice, doesn't it? Did you also get to drive the RS5? On paper the S7 is as fast as the RS5, both being 4.5. Did you feel the same way?

raslam77

Great write-up...thanks! Helped me to pretty much confirm my suspicions/doubts about the S.

tridentnyc

Yeah, the great thing about the day is I was able to drive all the cars I listed in my original post. The RS5 was definitely one and was probably the one I was most excited to drive.

We only drove the RS5's on the track which you would think would be a good thing but as I mentioned earlier the instructors were very cautious on the track to the point of annoyance of many of us at the event. Apparently some guy crashed an S7 earlier in the day causing extensive damage so the rest of us were put on "nanny watch". I think the fastest we went in the the RS5's was a max of about 65-70 mph. By contrast, at the same track for Porsche six weeks ago we routinely were doing top speeds of 115-120 mph, Audi needs to get with it! These are performance vehicles so what's the use of doing track laps if you're going to go slower than many of us go on the highway?!!

With all of that said I can't tell you much about the cars performance for obvious reasons. Had a great growl, seats felt great but that's about it. Sad really, I think Audi wasted an opportunity to get some new customers or to "upgrade" current ones. It was a fun day but could have been much much more. Sorry I'm not more help on the RS5.

mwar99

Are you sure they weren't running the 20's? I know the S6's they used for the salemen on Thur/Fri were running the 20's with the Pirelli's on them (see my avatar).

tridentnyc

I never got up close to look so I referenced a pic from the event which according to Audi's online configurator is the 19's. But with closer inspection it seems the Audi S7 configurator has the thumbnails and the pics that shows the wheels on the S7 reversed...so I believe you are correct..it looks like it was 20's...Audi needs to get that fixed. Which is even more impressive considering how the ride was not harsh or nervous at all...must be attributed a lot to the air suspension I would think then.

Thanks for the correction.