It’s a curious thing with hot hatches – they’re much lusted after when they’re the cars of the moment and the best of their breed.
But when that moment has gone and the next superheated hot hatch arrives, they fade as fast as a tropical sun. They get used up until suddenly, there are hardly any left. And fewer still that you’d give drive-space to.
The X85 generation RenaultSport Clio has yet to reach the decimation phase, but its X65 predecessor has despite this car being the hot hatch to have in its day. You’ll occasionally find a crisp Clio 182 with low-ish miles. But these are the exception - most have been thrashed, trashed or crashed.
But there signs that its successor may not quite go the same way. A tempting trip through the classifieds reveals several that have clearly been pampered, come with all the right bits and have a heap of life left in them. So perhaps the X85 Clio RenaultSport is going to buck the hot hatch trend, allowing a decent number of coveted and cared-for examples to survive. High prices potentially make it too expensive to track-day these machines to oblivion.
That said, a track is where you best experience the superb handling of this car, especially if it’s equipped with the coveted Cup option. Though if you’re shopping for an X85, you need to know that there were two ways to acquire this confection. In its most extreme form, the Cup option was not only about recalibrating the springs and dampers for still greater agility, but also about paring weight, specifically 20kgs-worth.
To make that gain, Renault deleted the air conditioning, keyless entry and curtain airbags, and installed the lower-rent dashboard of the most basic Renault Clio, complete with steering column adjustable for rake only. You could order the air conditioning and curtain airbags as options, but not the higher-grade dash, reach adjustment or keyless entry.
You paid £1000 less for this version – a refreshing contrast to Porsche, which will charge you (loads) more for an RS with less, but better still was that the Cup chassis could be ordered with standard car. In this form the Clio weighed only 1.6% more, making this the optimal choice. But if you’re shopping, you need to be sure of what you’re getting.
And what was so special about the Cup suspension? It wasn’t as if the standard car shortchanged in the gripping, turning, swerving and stopping departments. But those reworked dampers and springs tightened the Renault’s body control, deepened its athleticism and sharpened your impression of the tyres’ intimacies with the road below. And all without ruining the ride. The steering could still have weighted up more informatively when you got some boldness on in a bend, but the Clio Renaultsport Cup was unquestionably top of the pile, not least because of the lift-off, tuck-in liberties you could take with this wonderfully game chassis, and a revvy engine to goad you on.
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