Racing around an abandoned airstrip at 100 mph plus is not the normal imagery one associates with a Volvo Estate, writes Michael McAleer.
From the firm that brought us the seatbelt and the land where people obey speed limits with religious fervour, one would normally not associate a family car that offers 300 bhp and 0-62 mph in less than six seconds. Certainly not something aimed at taking on the likes of the BMW M3, the Audi S4 or the Mercedes C32 AMG.
Yet Volvo is out to sauce up its image and transform its super-safe if slightly dull reputation into something a little racier. And it's not that far-fetched for a firm that previously brought us the glorious T5-R.
It also came as a super discreet Estate that left boy-racers scratching their heads and sent many a wealthy executive racing back to their dealer demanding a refund after their new high-powered motor was put to shame by, of all things, a Volvo estate. These latest performance variants of the S60 and V70 models don't feature any significant body or styling characteristics. Yet be aware, when you see the discreet tell-tale R-lettering, that deep beneath the ice-cool exterior beats the heart of a racer.
While we should expect only a handful of sales here, it's enough to make motorists take a second look the next time we offhandedly dismiss that overloaded Volvo estate crawling up the inside lane of the M1.
Both cars are powered by Volvo's 2.5-litre five cylinder turbocharged engines offering 300 bhp and top speeds limited to 155 mph.
It's the smallest engine in the category, compared with the M3's 3.2-litre 343 bhp engine, the C32 AMG's 3.2-litre 354 bhp unit and the enormous 4.2-litre V8 339 bhp Audi S4.
Yet Volvo is confident that while it doesn't win out in the bhp stakes, it does hold its own in the corners, thanks to its impressive all-wheel-drive system and an ingenious chassis system. It's this, as much as the engine power, which offers the R-models real performance potential. The new chassis system features 20 individual sensors measuring movement of the car and actions of the driver 500 times a second.
All this data is collected by a central control unit which then adapts the damping on each corner of the car individually. The result is a car that doesn't tilt to the back too much when starting out - thereby losing front traction from the all-wheel-drive system - nor does it get ahead of itself in corners and during braking, when all the weight is normally to the front, and the rear braking and gripping effort is normally compromised. All very technical, it's true. Thankfully it's all summarised into three buttons on the inside, each representing a different chassis setting. More than just a gimmick, these represent significantly different driving characteristics.
First there's comfort, which offers a soft pliant ride quality - a little bouncy in parts, but well able to take on the worst excesses of Irish back roads. Next there's Sport, a far firmer chassis setting yet compliant enough to take the rough and tumble without too much ill effect and our personal choice for everyday use.
Finally, there's advanced, a race setting that's so hard it should only be used in the company of a licensed chiropractor and certainly not on Irish roads. It's for the race track and even on the Prodrive track we were on, most of the professional racing drivers said they would err towards Sports on all but the smoothest of track areas.
All these settings are accompanied by significantly different handling characteristics, with comfort contributing to some body roll while advanced offered pin-point accuracy, though spine-shuddering reverberation.
There's another button that's relevant to handling: the dynamic stability and traction control. The benefits of this system were demonstrated to us as we drove on watered tiles, similar to a shower-soaked bathroom floor. With the system switched off we spun and swung from side to side, eventually skidding with a jolt onto the drier tarmac on the side.
However, with the system on, our wild excesses with the steering wheel and the accelerator buried to the floor failed to cast us off the tiles. Even with the brake pedal fully depressed we were able to manage controlled steering. All very impressive, but of what practical use in the real world? Simply replace bathroom tiles with black ice and think about the benefits.
On the roads and back in the confines of the national speed limits, the advanced chassis setting is only to be used to severely injure your passengers. Yet it's on a par with some of the competing performance cars. So what's nice about these performance variants is the ability to call up alternative settings for everyday motoring.
For all the investment in this segment, and the attention it gets in the English language motoring press, these performance cars represent a minute fraction of overall car sales, with BMW's M3 and M5 taking the lion's share. Volvo now hopes to at least compete with the M models. The line from Volvo is that the R-models offer "performance without the usual compromise". This may be just the trait that will win over fans of performance cars with families to worry about.