Can you imagine doing a Ballet on Ice with the Audi S4 Avant Quattro, which produces 333 PS of power and 440 Nm of torque?
Sometimes in life your wishes do come true. The first time I was in Arjeplog was in February 2008 and had a great time driving on the ice test tracks and snow-laden roads. The car I was driving at that time was a 1.6-litre, front-wheel-drive car and I was really envious of all the Audi Quattros parked outside my room with Audi Driving Experience written on their doors. At that time I was telling myself what I would not do to get behind the wheel of one of them.
Two years later I was back in Sweden to drive the A4 and now, five years later, I am back again. I got a call from Audi India, saying that they would be taking a few journalists for an ice driving experience to Sweden and was I interested in going? It was an instant ‘Yes’ without even batting an eyelid.
Whenever you visit a place for the second or the third time, you always feel at home and are in a comfort zone. For instance, like the sign at the Arvidsjaur airport, which says, ‘Pick up guns and ammunition from this counter’. I bet you will not see this sign at any other airport!
The Audi ice driving experience outfit is now based in Arvidsjaur, 140 kilometres shy of the Polar Circle in northern Sweden, and the temperature is anything from –6 degrees to –30 degrees Celsius, depending upon the day.
The driving course has especially been designed by experts from Audi to explore the limits of their cars. There were four different test tracks for the winter testing programme and these are laid out on frozen lakes and the snow is compressed in the shape of the circuit. It is like driving the car on an ice skating rink with a lot of corners.
The S4 Avant Quattro was equipped with special Swedish Lappi metal-studded winter tyres. Our instructor for the two days was Markus Winkelhock, the very gentleman who took me around the Misano circuit last October in the R8. He made it look so easy while going around corners sideways.
The first instruction from Markus was that before you get into the car you have to remember that this is a four-wheel drive car and the driving technique is totally different compared to a rear-wheel drive car. In a rear-wheel drive car you can turn the steering slightly and feed the power and the tail will hang out. In the Quattro, however, you have to use the dynamic weight transfer to do this.
To achieve the dynamic weight transfer you have to brake and as you brake, the front wheels get loaded with the weight of the car and get more bite and traction and the nose of the car turns in and, at the same time, the rear wheels get light with the dynamic weight transfer and you can hang the tail out and gently feed the power, with the car going sideways in a controlled manner with a little bit of opposite steering input. The one thing that Markus kept insisting on was very little steering input and control the car with power and brakes. Once the steering is at full lock then there is no coming back.
If there is under-steer, then apply the brakes gently and bring the car back in line and feed the power. When you have over-steer, use opposite lock and feed the power and you will have the car sideways back in control.
The one thing that stood me in good stead was my smooth driving style and my lines round the corners. You have to be extremely smooth as you can imagine that the driving surface is like an ice skating rink and even walking on this surface is not easy.
The S4 was extremely well poised under normal driving conditions with the ESP switched on even on this surface, but if you wanted to have fun, then all you needed to do was switch off all the driving aids such as ESP and traction control and, boy, you can get her sideways and have all the fun you want to have in a nice and safe environment. The most important lesson that I learned from this drive is that how much extra grip and traction you can get from a four-wheel drive car compared to a two-wheel drive one. Greater traction and more grip means a safer car for you and your family.
This driving experience emphasised that the four-wheel drive Quattro system allows you to use the 333 PS of power from the S4 even on the ice. The driving exercise was conducted by Audi to prove that their Quattro system is so much superior to the normal car and, boy, they did prove it!
