2009 Audi A4 3.2

Last Fall Audi invited me and a few other Audi enthusiasts to drive the newest version of the A4 at Infineon raceway in Sonoma California. Of course I accepted and took the day off work to head north to wine country and check out the new ride. Normally I would not have bothered to test drive the standard version of a car like the A4 without being teased with the opportunity to drive a tuned version like an S4 or RS4. In this case it was one of the first times the car has been offered to the public to drive and would not be in the show rooms for a few months. Additionally it was at Infineon raceway... You can't go to a dealership and ask to test drive their marquee car at Infineon.
So how was the car? Very nice. I was suprised at how fast we were going because it felt absolutely stable through the bends. The car was quiet, but there was an underlying bellow at higher rpms that reassured me that I was indeed moving quickly. The only option for a transmission was a CVT and it was super smooth. Set in Dynamic mode, the throttle response, suspension dampening and steering all work together to tighten things up.
They had 4 groups of 4 cars each on the track at the same time. Everyone got their own car with a radio hooked up to the radio system so that you can hear the leader and follow instructions or warnings. Our group had to slow down twice to a crawl so that we could power through the esses to the hairpin. We were moving 30sec a lap faster than the group ahead. Once reason was the luck of the draw. We were all good drivers and could keep our lines tidy, enabling the leader to push us harder and faster. The other reason was that the car was very easy to drive fast.
The car I drove was red with a tan interior. The LED lights in front were a new thing a la the R8 and it worked. It made it look more sporty that I expected. All in all I could see myself buying one, but not as a first choice. I think I would wait until the new S4 came out or found a deal on an M3 Sedan or Merc C63 or something. I left the raceway in my R32 and found I would have missed the throaty sound of a sports car missing in the A4. It was a great drive home though.