Hot hatches in South Africa have a huge following. One only has to look at the front page of your favourite performance magazine or website (yeah, we know – thanks for your support) to find stories of ST’s, GTI’s, OPC’s, R26′s battling it out on dyno’s, the quarter mile, or for fastest lap times. SA’s production car championship also reflects this healthy rivalry, with nearly every hot hatch manufacturer present in the running for top honours on our local circuits. There is, however, another class of hatch, not quite as powerful, not quite as large and not quite as well known, but arguably no less fun to drive and one that shares in the hot hatch gene pool. We’re talking about hot supermini’s. Toyota has one in the form of their Yaris TS but the one we’re thinking of is the Renault Twingo RS.

Interior
Although half the size of the the Mégane RS, the Twingo RS is not lacking in focus (no pun intended). The RS badge brings with it a set of body hugging sports seats, which are some of the best we’ve sampled and could easily rival those fitted to more expensive sports saloons. A 3-spoke leather steering wheel, aluminium foot pedals, gear knob and handbrake contribute to the sporty feel of the baby RS. The gear knob fits reassuringly in your hand and the cold metal relays a sense of pure sports car. There’s no shift pattern printed on top either – it’s as though the Twingo RS is saying “I’m not providing you with a shift pattern, real drivers know what they’re doing.”

Apart from the sporty accents to these function elements, there’s not much going on inside the Twingo RS. The centre console is easy to reach, and the layout and function of the radio and climate controls is ergonomic and typically Renault. The Twingo RS also features electrically operated windows and adjustable side mirrors – which are heated – power assisted steering, satellite controls on the steering wheel for the Radio/CD/MP3 sound system and cruise control. The air-conditioning works well to keep you cool behind the wheel.

The somewhat sparse looking nature of the interior is not a bad thing though, because like all Renault Sport cars, the focus is on driving.

Where the Twingo RS does compromise however, is with its carrying capacity. With four adults onboard the Twingo offers a surprising amount of legroom even in the back, but at the same time offers hardly any luggage capacity with just 165 litres. If you’re travelling without company and need some extra luggage space, the rear seats slide forward independently, which increases cargo capacity to a more useful 285 litres.

It goes without saying that Renault would kit out their baby RS with all the safety gizmo’s at their disposal. As such, the list of safety features goes as follows: driver, passenger and front side airbags; anti-lock brakes (ABS) and electronic brakeforce distribution (EBD); electronic stability program (ESP) and traction control; brake assist; alarm and ISOFIX attachment points for child safety seats.

Exterior
The Twingo RS has been given muscle in the looks department and is even available with chequered flag tattoos if you opt for them. With all-new colour coded bumpers, flared front and rear fenders – that house the unique 16-inch alloy wheels – sculpted side skirts, tinted windows and new rear spoiler, the baby RS is not shy and maintains a purposeful stance. At the same time, it’s a car which can’t be taken too seriously, with its big bug-eyes, oversized front fog-light surrounds and chopped off rear end, the Twingo RS is like a killer Pokémon – cute and cuddly but with a dark side.

The Twingo RS is like a killer Pokémon - cute and cuddly but with a dark side.

The Drive
It’s in driving the Twingo RS that the ‘dark side’ comes out. Renault Sport have given as much attention to their Twingo as any other RS badged model. The flared arches are not simply an effort to ‘puff up’ the smallest RS – no – in fact they are necessary to accommodate the changes to the front and rear tracks, which have been widened by 60 mm and 59 mm respectively. Stiffer suspension – lowered by 10 mm over the standard model – and Continental Sport Contact 195/45/16 sized tyres, aid in providing improved stability and grip, with taut, direct response. Together with the recalibrated power steering, the Twingo RS handles twists and turns tenaciously, while providing accurate instruction to the front wheels that inspires confidence at all times. Ensuring that the stopping power matches the Twingo RS’s performance is an uprated braking system that links 280 mm vented disc brakes in front to 240 mm solid discs at the rear. The gearbox adds to the fun with a relatively short throw between gears and accurate gates. The clutch is well weighted and although not as light as one might expect, it provides a solid feel that compliments the sporty feel of the car. Around town the Twingo’s diminutive size makes it a cinch to park or manoeuvre through rush hour traffic. With the focussed suspension and steering mated to the Renault Sport tuned 1,6-litre engine, the Twingo RS is a joy to drive and makes you want to do a u-turn and have another go at the road you’ve just conquered. The aluminium pedals – with their pause, stop and play emblems – are ideally placed for heel-toe footwork, which rounds off an absorbing driving experience.

Performance
The engine that motivates the little RS with such intent is a 1,6-litre 16-valve DOHC unit, that produces 98 kW at 6 750 rpm. For its role in the Twingo RS, the engine gets a new throttle valve unit, revised camshafts to increase valve opening and lift, and a higher, 11,0:1 compression ratio. As you can imagine from the figures, it loves to rev and the sound from the naturally aspirated 16-valve is part of this car’s appeal. The engine revs freely all the way to the redline, building power as it goes and leaving a sweet exhaust note in its wake.

The down side to the rev happy nature though, is the relative lack of torque. With just 160 N.m available at 4 400 rpm, the Twingo RS needs to build revs before it gets a move on. Around town, and at slower speeds, you invariably find yourself reaching for the gear stick to drop a cog in order to catch a gap in the adjacent lane. But that doesn’t really matter because the Twingo RS demands to be driven hard and the engine sings in celebration.

If you want an unassuming car to fetch the kids from school, or meet your mates down at the pub, then buy the 1.2 Dynamique version. If, however, you want to be exiting the school car park before other mums have even finished parallel parking their SUV’s, or have your mates in their 1,6 Polo’s and Fiesta’s eating your dust on the way to the pub, then you want a Twingo RS.

In fact, forget all that because if you want a taste of the hot hatch experience, with driving dynamics to rival them, then for the money there’s really not much else.

What we like…

• Authentic Renault Sport driving dynamics and driving experience.
• Excellent sports seats.
• Free advanced driver training course with Renault Driving Academy

What we would like…

• About 20 N.m more torque from the already gutsy engine.
• A temperature gauge for the engine on the instrument panel – for the odd track day at least.
• A reach adjustable steering wheel.

More and more manufacturers are offering advanced driver training with the purchase of one or more of their performance models. A case in point is Renault’s new Clio Sport, which was launched in South Africa last month and whose new owners qualify for a complimentary ‘performance driving’ course. The new Clio RS is powered by a normally aspirated 2,0-litre 16-valve engine, producing 147,5 kW and 215 N.m of torque – enough to send the 2-door hatch from zero to 100 km/h in 6.9 seconds and on to a top speed of 225 km/h. In short, enough power to  get you into trouble if you’re not careful.

So, once you’ve collected your shiny new hot-hatch from your local dealer, and before you’ve binned it in your local parking lot trying to impress your mates, where do you go to learn how to drive ‘properly’? The answer, in Renault’s case, is the Renault Driving Academy. After attending the launch of the new Clio RS we were invited to Killarney race track in Cape Town, to join Renault and other motoring enthusiasts for a few lessons.

The full day’s tuition includes a lecture on car control, including cornering, braking and acceleration, as well as practical driving lessons in emergency braking, emergency lane change manoeuvres and time on the race circuit with an instructor. The final test of the day, and your nerve, is your ability to put all you’ve learned together in a lap of a gymkhana course with your fellow students watching on and your instructor recording your lap time and any penalties.

Although Cape Town offered up a rather wet and gloomy day for our training, the wet weather helped to highlight the imperfections in our driving style. Here are some of the key points we learned…

• Always look as far around a corner as possible – change lanes if it will help – because you never know what lies ahead.
• In relation to a pedestrian, you don’t realise how fast you are going and how much time you need to stop.
• A car itself is perfectly safe, it’s the person behind the wheel that creates the problem.
• Smooth control of brakes, throttle and steering make your driving faster and safer.
• ABS, EBD and ESP will save your bacon, but they can’t perform miracles.
• There is more grip in the wet than you think, but there is still less grip than in the dry.

In our opinion you can never stop learning and should aim to attend an advanced driving course atleast once a year – apart from improving your driving skills in terms of speed and safety, it’s also damn good fun and you’ll get to meet car fans like yourself.

Incidentally, you may be pleased to know that your SACarFan journo has some ‘street cred’ and posted the fastest time of the day in the gymkhana test – that is until instructor Deon Joubert had a go and went 2 seconds quicker!

Images courtesy of David Donde