At next week’s Los Angeles Auto Show 2015, Audi is set to celebrate the U.S debuts of the second-generation R8, the S8 Plus as well as the RS7 Performance revealed online just a few weeks ago.
The new R8 arrives in the United States as a 2017 model year in the middle of 2016. As with the rest of the world, it will be offered in V10 and V10 Plus guises with power from the 5.2-litre engine sitting at 533 hp and 602 hp respectively for the two existing variants. Although no announcement has been made, it seems like that the Audi R8 e-tron will also be available to U.S customers on a made-to-order basis like the rest of the world.
We recently had the opportunity to drive the 2016 Audi S8 Plus and as we expected, it is exceptionally addictive and well worthy of the ‘Plus’ badging. As a matter of fact, power from its twin-turbo 4.0-litre V8 sits at an extraordinary 605 hp, which is 85 hp more than the normal S8 and just 5 hp less than the R8 V10 Plus. When combined with a peak torque figure of 700 Nm, it’s of little surprise why the car sprints to 100 km/h in a measly 3.8 seconds.
As for the Audi RS7 Performance, it has the exact same engine as the S8 Plus but thanks to its lighter overall weight reaches 100 km/h in 3.7 seconds. While it makes do without a ‘Plus’ badge, it should prove popular in the U.S.
