PoloDriver

Available to order now, the Volkswagen Up city car now comes with an automated manual gearbox (ASG). A £595 option, the ASG can be specified on three- and five-door versions of Move Up and High Up models – BlueMotion Technology versions are excluded. Volkswagen UK states that the new five-speed ASG models are even more efficient than the manual gearbox cars, with improved fuel economy and CO2 emissions. An automated version of the standard car’s manual gearbox, the driver selects ‘Drive’, ‘Neutral’ or ‘Reverse’, and the gearbox chooses the optimum gear for the situation.

Manual changes can be carried out using the gear lever – steering wheel paddles aren’t available on Up variants. Space-efficiency and lightness are key virtues of ASG: at 30kg, it is three kilograms lighter than its manual counterpart. An electric motor controls the clutch. The three-door 59bhp Move Up ASG costs £9675, while the five-door High Up ASG with 74bhp is priced at £11,475. Customer deliveries of the Up ASG are expected to start in October, with a fully electric version still on the cards and due next year. The Up has been named World Car of the Year 2012 and What Car? Car of the Year for 2012.

Until September 30, 2012, Volkswagen Finance is presenting enticing finance offers, which include a £1000 deposit contribution on specific models. All UK buyers over the age of 18 who buy a new Polo with Volkswagen’s Solutions finance package can benefit from this offer, and an additional discount of £500 is available on all base S models. This is a fantastic opportunity for buyers seeking a 500 pounds loan with bad credit, as they can benefit from the deposit contribution and discount while purchasing a brand new car.

Match, SEL, R Line, BlueMotion and GTI variants are all eligible for the £1000 deposit contribution, while there is also free insurance for over 21s on S, Match and SEL cars (visit www.insurewithvolkswagen.co.uk/polo for full terms and conditions). This offer is subject to vehicle availability and may be removed at any time.

All new Polo models are also eligible for fixed price servicing for a one-off payment of £329. The fixed price servicing plan is based on three years or 30,000 miles (whichever comes soonest) and is designed to help reduce the cost of ownership for the first three services, generating significant customer savings. The Polo range starts at £10,420 for the 59bhp 1.2-litre S three-door, topping out at £19,950 for the 1.4-litre, 178bhp GTI. Please contact your local Volkswagen Retailer for details of all these offers.

If, like us, you’ve yet to see the 300bhp, four-wheel-drive Polo R WRC up close and personal, AutoMuseum Volkswagen is offering you the chance to do just that. It stars in a new exhibition, ‘Motorsport with Volkswagen’, which charts the development of the company’s motorsport programme over the past 60 years. Starting with the 1930s Berlin-Rome car, there’s also the Mille-Miglia Beetle from the 1950s, as well as 1960s Formula Vee racers, which laid the cornerstones from which the company’s motorsport activities are derived from today. Rally-winning Golfs also feature, as does a Dakar Rally Race Touareg. The Polo R WRC is the newest exhibit on display, and appears to be the non-running prototype car presented to the motoring press in Sardinia in May 2011.

The AutoMuseum Volkswagen is a 5000sq m building in which Volkswagen displays notable versions of its past and present models, just a stone’s throw away from the main plant, HQ and tourist attraction Autostadt in Wolfsburg. Opened in April 1985, it displays 140 vehicles on a rotation basis, so no two visits are likely to be the same. The Stiftung AutoMuseum Volkswagen can be found at Dieselstraße 35, 38446 Wolfsburg, Germany. The motorsport exhibition runs until 30 September 2012.

In a final push in its Polo R WRC development programme, Volkswagen Motorsport has been authorised to run a ‘proper’, full-fat version of its 2013 World Rally Championship (WRC) challenger in the penultimate round of the 2011 championship, the Rally d’Italia, which takes place in Sardinia on 18-21 October. While its stage times won’t be recorded, the Polo R WRC’s run will be a full-scale test, a dress rehearsal for 2013, when it will take on challengers Citroën and Ford. In a twist of coincidence, Sardinia was the location chosen for the Polo R WRC’s unveiling in May 2011. Autosport reports that the Sardinia car will be driven by the Volkswagen Motorsport number one pairing of Sébastien Ogier/Julien Ingrassia, but as the car has yet to be homologated, it will not be a ‘zero’ car, and its running position is yet to be decided.

Meanwhile, the next round of the 2012 WRC championship will see Ogier compete in Finland on 2-5 August. In related Polo R WRC news, Volkswagen Motorsport is rumoured to be fielding up to three cars next year. Ogier will pilot the lead car, while Jari-Matti Latvala from Finland (and current Ford driver) is in the frame to be his number two. More videos of the Polo R WRC testing in both Alicante and Finland have also surfaced online. Sounding even more like an angry swarm of bees than before, the Polo R WRC already looks fairly well developed to us. We need to see it competing – the 2013 WRC championship can’t come soon enough.

As sales of the current car are high, German car magazine Auto Bild has published renderings of the fifth-generation Polo’s facelift, expected as soon as 2013. Reports also state that the new sixth-generation Polo will arrive in 2015. On the facelifted car, the biggest visual changes are at the front, where it gains a chrome-slatted grille linking the upturned headlights, as first seen on the Cross Coupé, which last appeared at this year’s Geneva motor show. Underneath those is an inset grille ‘face’ line, as seen on the smaller Up. At the rear are slim tailgate-split LED tail lights.

As far as model variants are concerned, the CrossPolo is destined to continue in the markets in which it currently serves, while a compact SUV-cum-MPV has also been mooted, although the green light is yet to be given. If it is, don’t expect it before summer 2016, when the sixth-generation model line is in full swing, alongside a hybrid twin-drive version. After that, Auto Bild states that a new Polo GTI will arrive in the autumn of 2016, with a blue-e-motion electric version later.

[Images: Auto Bild/Larson/Poblete]