Skoda Kodiaq RS 2021 review: The most expensive Skoda ever built? Not quite!

CarExpert

Skip Ahead: Intro: 00:00 Exterior: 01:13 Interior: 03:35 Infotainment: 05:15 Features: 10:44  Practicality: 12:53 On the Road: 19:50 Verdict: 25:07  Read the full review: https://www.carexpert.com.au/review/2020-skoda-kodiaq-rs-review/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=review&utm_term=&utm_content=&utm_campaign=single-car-review  Paul reviews the 2021 Skoda Kodiaq RS. The Kodiaq RS is currently the fastest seven-seat SUV around the Nurburgring and it's also the most expensive Skoda on sale. But, is it quick enough to earn the label of a fast SUV? Watch and find out!  We review every new car on the market, bust car myths, cover the latest car tech and answer your burning questions.  Whether you need new car advice, purchase validation or simply love learning more about new cars and technology, we are your car experts.  Subscribe to Car Expert: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7DvMhvy3H7ntEgn9n3xQcQ?sub_confirmation=1  You'll find us dropping new video content three times a week. If you'd like to ask a question about one of our videos, simply leave us a comment. If you'd like to give us any feedback on our content, feel free to email us, or alternatively, hit us up on social media.  Finally, we want this channel to grow with your support and feedback. If there's anything you don't like or would like to see us change, we'd love to hear from you! #skoda #review #kodiaqrs  Follow us on social media to see what we're up to and to ask any questions!  CarExpert: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CarExpertAus Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/CarExpertAus Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carexpert.com.au  Paul Maric: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PaulMaric Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/PaulMaric Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/PaulMaric  @skoda@SkodaAustralia

Transcript

00:00 G'day, I'm Paul. That behind me is the most expensive Skoda currently on sale.

00:04 But did you know it isn't the most expensive Skoda ever built? The most expensive Skoda ever built was this. It's a cake.

00:11 It cost about half a million pounds to build and it was for a commercial.

00:15 So, very interesting. And the birds find it funny as well.

00:18 But this one over here, the most expensive Skoda currently on sale, is the Kodiaq RS. It is the performance

00:25 SUV for Skoda and fun fact, it holds the world record for the fastest seven-seat SUV, the Nürburgring.

00:31 Not bad, right? Just under 10 minutes and pretty impressive for a diesel. It's gonna set you back just under

00:37 66,000 Australian bucks and you can see the rest of the Kodiaq pricing down in the comments below.

00:42 But you still have some options you can get. There's another four grand worth of stuff

00:46 you can put onto this car, which makes it like a $70,000 proposition.

00:50 And it is about $14,500 more than the nearest Kodiaq, which is at the Sportline beneath it.

00:55 Now, if you do want to skip ahead to other parts of this review,

00:57 you can see time codes just up there or you can scroll down to the description and then just press one of those buttons to

01:03 jump ahead. And I would love for you guys to subscribe to our YouTube channel.

01:06 Just hit the subscribe button, then the bell icon and it's going to tell you every single time we jump behind the wheel of something different.

01:12 Let's talk styling.

01:14 So this color is called Race Blue.

01:16 Quite fitting for the RS because they want you to go racing in it. There is seven other colors available and they're all going to cost you

01:23 $550 extra, except the base grey color. You can also spend 1500 bucks on Velvet Red.

01:30 Now, let's have a look at this front end. This looks really impressive. So this is one of our slimline Victorian number plates.

01:36 So it's kind of discreet there, but you can imagine this with a broader Euro style plate on it taking up that front end.

01:41 You've got this awesome looking black grille.

01:43 And of course, you guys know that this is the module for the radar.

01:47 So this is what helps you follow other cars at a set distance. It also interacts in part with the autonomous emergency braking system.

01:54 So this is a very important component of the car. And then nestled in under here, this little sort of nipple looking thing is the

02:02 360 degree camera. This is the front end camera.

02:04 It's an ultra wide angle camera and then it stitches all the images together around the car to give you a bird's eye view.

02:10 Have a look at these headlights. Full LED headlights. Round to the side here, you have 20 inch alloy wheels, red brake calipers.

02:17 This is a really sweet design and this is what's going to set this car apart from other Kodiaqs.

02:22 The RS is based on the Sportline, so you do get visual enhancements.

02:26 And this is one of the things you're going to notice as the difference there.

02:29 I love the side profile with the black highlights here. It is just a really cool looking package.

02:34 Now come around to the back. You've got black badges all around the car. So Skoda up there,

02:39 Kodiaq down the side and then RS with 4x4.

02:42 This is a fake exhaust. I don't know why they bother with those things.

02:48 This one on the other hand is a real exhaust, so you can see in there, but it has a special feature. It's called

02:53 Dynamic Sound Boost. It's the first Skoda to come fitted with this and you may have found a similar feature on something like an Audi

03:00 SQ5. Just under here, there's a little speaker. So it's a dynamic sound enhancer. This is of course a diesel.

03:06 They generally don't sound very good.

03:08 So this makes it sound good on the outside and then it uses the speakers inside the cabin to beef up the sound as well.

03:14 Before I show you guys the interior styling, I've got a question here from LucasTBH.

03:18 Does it still have those cool door protectors? So let's answer that. Yes, it does. Have a look at this.

03:23 Might pop out there as you open the door. That's on all the doors and the other cool thing,

03:29 umbrellas. How cool are they?

03:32 Come standard on the Kodiaq.

03:35 Okay, interior styling. Wow, this looks sensational.

03:39 I really wasn't expecting Skoda to come up with something that looks as luxe as this. You've got to remember that Skodas are,

03:45 I don't know, some people kind of think that they're old

03:47 Volkswagen's because Volkswagen Group owns Skoda and

03:51 the theme used to be that they would get all the Volkswagen's old parts and then you'd kind of have a car that was reliable

03:56 and just a little bit boring. Now, the tables have turned because the Kodiaq not only looks good,

04:01 but the interior is beautifully presented.

04:03 There is a fair bit of black in here and there's piano black as well, which I'm not a huge fan of, but outside of that,

04:09 it looks fantastic. But check these seats out. I mean, I would expect to see a seat like this in a Ferrari.

04:14 That is an awesome looking seat. It has these sort of carbon fiber weave inlays and I don't think it's real carbon fiber,

04:21 but it looks awesome. You've got Alcantara on the seats. You've got Alcantara in the doors.

04:26 It really is just a fantastic looking interior with lots of tech sort of dotted around the place.

04:31 And I'll go through that in a bit more detail in a second, but it's time to use our hardness tester.

04:36 This is what we use on our tests to see how soft the dashboard is.

04:41 Something that motoring journalists always talk about but no one else cares about, so I thought we'd include this. Zero is soft,

04:47 100 is hard. Let's try this on the dashboard and see what this looks like. Pushing it down.

04:52 So you got maxes out at about 58.

04:55 What about this center console lid? That feels nice and soft. Push that down.

05:01 High 30s there. So this is a premium interior if our durometer has anything to say about it.

05:07 But let me know what you think. Do you think it looks premium? What do you reckon about these seats?

05:12 I think they look absolutely sensational. Let me know in the comments below. Let's talk about the infotainment system.

05:17 Skoda's Columbus infotainment system borrows most of its components from Volkswagen,

05:22 but it is slightly unique with some of the things that it can do.

05:25 So I'm going to give you a detailed review here of the system. It's actually really impressive to use.

05:30 So this is your home screen. You access that by hitting the home button.

05:33 It shows you navigation,

05:35 telephone, where you can add your favorites, and then also radio. And then you can basically go through each of these menus.

05:40 What you'll notice is that as you approach with your finger,

05:43 you can see the additional context menus pop up and that's because of this little strip down here.

05:49 There's some gesture functions that I'll run you through in just one moment, but let's start here with navigation.

05:54 This is the main navigation screen. You can scroll around, zoom in, zoom out. There's automatic zoom,

06:00 shortcuts to find the car again.

06:01 You can also change whether you want to go from automatic or fix a rate of zoom.

06:06 And as you approach with your finger there, you see the extra context menus appear.

06:09 You can use voice recognition or if you do want to manually enter addresses,

06:14 you simply go through and type them in here either as points of interest or full addresses. Generally, it works pretty well.

06:20 Let's try typing in

06:22 Melbourne Airport.

06:24 There you go. So that that's immediately starting to find everything that we need.

06:28 It's really nice and fast as well, quite responsive. So the navigation menu is good. You also get traffic built into that as well.

06:34 So let's jump over to the menu where we have radio. In here you have FM, AM, DAB plus digital radio.

06:42 So there's a full raft of stations there, but like Ford's sync system, it basically makes you go through bands.

06:49 So here you can see one band and then for me to get to the next one,

06:52 I've got to select it and then wait for it to pop up.

06:54 I don't understand why they can't all just be displayed in one screen.

06:58 It's kind of weird that it has to then break them up and you need to go looking through different sections.

07:03 It'd be easier if they were all just alphabetical order.

07:05 Telephones, same story. Once you're connected with Bluetooth, it all works as it will. In addition to phone connectivity,

07:12 you have smartphone mirroring with Apple CarPlay, Android Auto and MirrorLink.

07:16 That's all controlled with a cable you plug in and then your phone is mirrored onto there.

07:20 It's all widescreen functionality too.

07:22 So the screen actually looks really nice and crisp when you have your phone mirroring onto the car.

07:27 And the advantage of that is that you can use your phone's voice recognition system,

07:31 which uses the cloud and third parties for extra functionality and also things like sending messages. So that's a really great feature.

07:37 If we jump back over to the menu, media. You have media storage built into the car,

07:43 so you can copy music to the car's internal hard drive. But most of the time these days people are simply using

07:50 things like Spotify or third-party streaming services that they access through their smartphone mirroring.

07:54 Now the gesture controls. Check this out. If I want to swipe to the next menu,

07:58 it even gives you a sound effect,

08:01 which is pretty cool.

08:03 Vehicle. This is what I love about the Skoda. So in front of me, I have another digital display.

08:10 I can configure everything that's on that display here. So if I click on virtual cockpit,

08:14 instantly I can flick through these menus and change the things that are appearing in front of me.

08:19 And then I can simply auto classic. There's a number of different views I can select and they automatically update ahead of the driver.

08:26 So you have all of that information ahead of you all of the time. The other cool thing, because this is a four-wheel drive,

08:32 I have four-wheel drive information. So you have a compass, you have the inclination,

08:37 so how far up, down or sideways you are. And also your altitude, how far above sea level are you. And these can all then be

08:43 changed around to display different parts there.

08:45 So that's a handy feature to have. Driving data is also useful when it comes to cars like this. This is a diesel,

08:51 it's a fuel-efficient car. This keeps tabs of how much fuel you're using and also how green you're being.

08:57 So you can see here we have a rating of 84.

09:00 That means we've been very friendly with the throttle there.

09:02 And then you even have a secondary screen that tells you how you're going since you refueled and how much energy you've recouped with

09:10 the stop/start system as well. You've also got a lap timer in here.

09:14 So if we go to the Sport menu, you can time your laps if you're at the Nurburgring going for a blad.

09:18 Then you've got other sport displays as well. Same story, you can just swipe up and down to have those displayed here.

09:24 I love the G-meter too. That's pretty awesome. Back to the menu, we have the rest of the functions.

09:28 So SmartLink is our connectivity with smartphones. We also have Media Command.

09:33 Now this is a fascinating menu because this allows us to configure our wireless LAN and our mobile hotspot.

09:39 So that's useful if you have kids, they have iPads and that kind of thing.

09:42 They can connect to the single hotspot and that's shared throughout the car.

09:45 So you have one data connection and then multiple users.

09:49 So that is a really, really cool feature to have and it uses the car's internal antenna to allow you to connect.

09:54 Which means if you've got the phone over here, it doesn't matter if the kids are in the third row.

09:57 They're still able to connect reliably. Finally, if we go over to the air conditioning menu,

10:02 I find this quite fascinating because you have a number of different options to set climate zones throughout the cabin.

10:07 But you've also got a menu called Air Care and Air Care Climatronic is a certain type of filter that's fitted to this car

10:15 and it's able to optimize its function to filter pollen and also increase the quality of air that you have in your cabin.

10:21 So it's not like the bio-security mode you have with a HEPA filter in a Tesla,

10:25 but it still is an improved air quality inside the cabin. So that is a pretty handy feature to have.

10:31 This is a fantastic system. 9.2 inches in size.

10:35 Skoda has absolutely nailed functionality here.

10:38 It's very easy to use, presented beautifully and it also means that you have to spend less time with your eyes off the road.

10:44 Enough about infotainment. Let's have a look at the rest of the features you're getting in this car.

10:47 It is almost $66,000 plus on-road cost. So it's a lot of money, but you're getting a lot of standard equipment.

10:53 There isn't a heads-up display, which is a little bit disappointing,

10:56 but outside of that you're getting all of the bells and whistles. You get radar cruise control, this fantastic steering wheel with perforations,

11:02 ahead of the driver a big screen that is fully customizable.

11:05 I love all the different views you get in that screen as well. You can cycle through them.

11:10 There's also like a relaxed view as well. So that is a really cool fully featured system. Down here

11:16 we have tri-zone climate control.

11:17 So two zones for the front and one for your second row and then a raft of extra buttons plus some blank buttons as well.

11:24 This one here is the automatic parking feature. So that is parallel and perpendicular.

11:28 That's a really handy feature if you're not confident with parking. This one here is a 360 camera.

11:33 Not amazing. The camera itself is okay, but when you start playing with some of the 3D modes and spinning the car around,

11:39 it's impossible to see what's around you. It's so grainy and washed out.

11:43 I keep saying this, but surely you can go and buy a high-definition camera.

11:48 I don't really understand why we're still stuck in this day and age where a 360 camera looks like that.

11:52 It's kind of not very nice at all. But anyway, wireless phone charging. So grabbing your phone,

11:58 let's see if my big phone fits down there.

12:00 Voila, there we go. It fits perfectly. You've got USB connectivity, 12-volt outlet as well.

12:05 Keep in mind that that USB slot is going to be for your car play. A little further down you have the off-road mode.

12:11 So this is a tailored off-road mode. When you are driving,

12:14 it's able to adjust stability, controlling the amount of torque it sends to the wheels and it makes it a little easier to climb things

12:20 and climb over sort of little bits and pieces.

12:22 It's not a hardcore off-road car, but it'll get you to a camping ground somewhere. Mode button.

12:27 This will get you through all the different driving modes. We'll go through those shortly and then an auto hold function as well.

12:32 You've got those excellent Alcantara seats. They are heated. So they're nice and warm in winter.

12:37 There's also heated seats in the second row and a cracking Canton 10-speaker sound system.

12:43 I'll show you what the key looks like too.

12:45 So it's pretty straightforward. Lock, boot, unlock and then on the back you have the Skoda logo.

12:49 And of course you have a pop-out key just in case it goes flat. Now, what about

12:54 locality and storage? If your kids are hoarders,

12:58 you're going to love the Kodiaq because there are places to store things everywhere throughout the cabin. So let's start over here.

13:04 There's two buttons, which is a little bit weird. Push one of these and you get the glove box open.

13:08 That's not the world's biggest space, but it is somewhere to tuck things away.

13:12 There's also a CD player in here, SD card slots and also a SIM card slot as well.

13:17 But push this other button and you get this cubby in the dashboard here, which is a really cool little space.

13:23 It's not air-conditioned, but it is a nice place to to put bits and pieces

13:27 so they can't be seen from outside the car from those prying eyes. You've got your phone storage down there. Cup holders here.

13:33 Let's see how they work.

13:35 They work beautifully. Crack this open too and there's even more storage there.

13:39 It's not the world's deepest storage pocket, but it is lined at the bottom with rubber.

13:43 So nothing that you put in there is going to move around. But my favorite feature is inside the doors, little bins, including little bin bags.

13:50 So that's a really clever feature. And then inside the doors as well,

13:52 you have a really big bin pocket there so you can just throw all your things in. It's also padded with carpet.

13:58 Just next to the driver's knee is another storage area for coins and other bits and pieces.

14:03 Again, that is padded with carpet as well.

14:05 It adds to that premium feel to this cabin.

14:08 It makes it feel like it's a much more expensive car than it actually is. Sometimes with sports seats though,

14:13 they look cool, but they're not very comfortable.

14:15 These seats are heaven. They are so nice.

14:20 There's electric adjustment on the side, bolster adjustment as well. And just the driving position is fantastic.

14:26 The steering wheel is a perfect size and I just feel super comfortable here.

14:30 I feel like if I was going for a drive of 500, 1000 kilometers, that this is the exact seat

14:37 I'd want to be in, especially if there were some corners to carve up along the way.

14:40 Forget the kids. Let's talk packaging in the second row. This car is sensational.

14:46 Skoda has done such a good job accommodating not only kids, but adults back here.

14:50 Even with sports seats, generally the second you put a sports seat into a first row, it eliminates all of your legroom.

14:57 I have absolute acres of it here. I mean most SUVs you find a little bit cramped,

15:02 especially if it's in my regular driving position, but even here with a sports seat, I've got plenty of knee room.

15:07 Loads of toe room as well. In fact, I could fit another set of feet under there if I wanted to.

15:12 I love the design of these seats as well. So that carries on from the front to the back.

15:16 So the kids are going to find it just as fun back here.

15:19 You have heated seats for the two outside seats. The two outside seats also get ISOFIX anchorage points.

15:26 You have a third zone of climate control so you can manage the temperature back here. A 12-volt outlet as well.

15:31 A center armrest which has two cup holders plus a little baby cup holder. So you could have like a piccolo or something here.

15:37 See if that works with our cup. No dramas at all. And a bottle holder in the door pocket. Loads of headroom too.

15:43 And I have grab handles, mat pockets and my favorite feature of all,

15:47 privacy blinds so you can go through and no one will see you in the back seat.

15:52 Oh, yeah, and if you love road trips, you're gonna love these.

15:54 So because this is a Kodiaq, there is a third row, but there's a slight issue.

16:02 Most things in this car and their tagline is simply clever are clever, except this bit.

16:07 So because we're in Australia, we're right-hand drive.

16:09 The passenger side is on this side of the car, except on this side of the car

16:13 you have two sets of seats as opposed to a single one on the other side,

16:17 which is where you'd be if this was left-hand drive.

16:19 So where I'm getting at is that you're going to displace

16:21 two of your passengers potentially when you try and get into the third row. Is it an adult-friendly third row?

16:27 Only one way to find out. So this folds in two ways. If you pull this little thing,

16:31 the seat drops so that you have a flat load floor.

16:35 But if you do want to climb into the back, you pull this lever up the top, the seat folds to this section,

16:40 slides forward with a little bit of arm power, and so you're gonna see my bum here for a second.

16:45 Climb in there. I'll pull this back as well.

16:50 Oh, yeah.

16:53 This is pretty much just gonna be for kids. My knees are well and truly wedged into there.

16:58 It's not overly comfortable, but back here you do have cup holders,

17:02 you have a little storage tray as well, and a 12-volt outlet.

17:05 These are pretty cramped.

17:07 So this is obviously going to be a kids-only zone.

17:09 But one of the advantages is you can fold just the center down,

17:14 so your knee gets a little bit of reprieve if you do have to stick an adult back here.

17:18 Before I show you how much luggage you can fit into the boot of the Kodiaq,

17:23 Skoda's tagline is "Simply Clever", and I've got to run you through some of the amazing features that come standard with this car.

17:28 And let's start with the virtual pedal. Normally this stuff never works, and I've done it about a thousand times now,

17:34 and it works every single time. There you go.

17:36 So it's like a virtual pedal under the car that opens the boot. So in here you have

17:40 230 litres of cargo space available with the third row sitting up. If we drop the third row and the second row, that expands to a

17:48 little over 1900 litres, which is good.

17:50 But there is a slight issue here, and that is with this folding mechanism. With the seats in their standard position,

17:56 you'll see here that they just sit up against them, and you have to kind of

18:00 really push them down quite hard.

18:02 And you can imagine that if you've got a

18:04 screaming horde of kids there and shopping and stuff like that, you don't want to have to be thinking about

18:08 jamming the third row in, so you can get everything into the car and get out of there.

18:12 Now, under the floor here is where all the clever equipment starts. So we pull this up.

18:17 First up is our cargo blind. You access that by moving these side pieces out of the way,

18:23 and that quite easily comes out. And we'll attach that here, just so I can show you

18:27 what that process looks like. It's one of the systems where you just basically push it into position there.

18:33 That is your cargo blind ready to go. Now under here, what else have you got? Well, you have the most random thing

18:39 I've ever seen. I

18:41 spotted these and I thought, "What the hell do these do?" and we came up with a few theories and none of them were right.

18:46 They actually act as a foot elevator, so you can use those in the third row or the second row. Under here as well,

18:51 you have a picnic pack. How sweet is this?

18:55 So if you ever need to sleep in the car, your car comes with a blanket.

18:58 So you can throw that down and have a relax in the back seat. So that's all pretty cool.

19:03 Pop that away.

19:05 Under here is the car's battery, but I love this system here.

19:09 This is a way to adjust the load and where it sits in the back of your car.

19:14 So if you do have something big that you need to place in there,

19:17 you're not restricted to just the racking system that sometimes comes with these SUVs.

19:21 So you can simply set these up wherever you want and then the Velcro system holds everything into place.

19:27 So whatever you put in there doesn't move while the car's moving. So that is a really genius way of doing things.

19:33 How does our luggage actually fit into here? Let's get our big bag first.

19:37 Slide that in.

19:41 So that fits in fairly easily and then the laptop bag as well.

19:45 So this is an incredibly versatile space that doubles as a seven-seater when you need it.

19:50 (Car engine)

19:52 So we're driving here in comfort mode and it says what it does on the box. It is comfortable.

19:58 The steering's nice and light. It is cruising along nicely. There is a bit of engine rumble coming through.

20:02 It's that typical diesel noise. The thing I am noticing though is there's a fair bit of tyre roar.

20:07 So we are on 20-inch alloy wheels, but it seems to be transmitting a fair bit of that through to the cabin.

20:13 So it is getting a little bit droney here at about 70 kilometres an hour on a country road.

20:17 It is a really comfortable cruiser. The ride itself is actually really good despite the fact it is on those 20-inch alloy wheels.

20:22 The adaptive suspension is soaking up everything really nicely.

20:26 Even as you hit some of these sharper bumps and ruts on poor country roads,

20:31 it actually just communicates it nicely through the cabin. It doesn't crash or break over anything.

20:36 So it is a very compliant ride from that sense and very comfortable,

20:40 which is exactly what you need it to be if this is seven up with all the family.

20:44 Despite the fact this is classed as a large SUV, it's actually not that big compared to things like the Pathfinder and CX-9.

20:51 With that in mind, visibility is excellent out the front, out the back and out the sides.

20:55 The wing mirrors are massive, so you can see all around the car and you never feel like it's too big to be out on the road here.

21:02 Under the bonnet is a 2-litre turbocharged diesel engine.

21:07 It produces 176 kilowatts of power and a thumping 500 newton metres of torque.

21:12 It uses two turbochargers, a low pressure one and a high pressure one.

21:16 The low pressure one is used to spool up the engine until the high pressure one takes over.

21:21 So it's quite a clever system and they're used in series,

21:24 which means you're extracting as much potential as you can out of this 2-litre diesel engine.

21:29 One of the big benefits of driving a performance-oriented diesel is the fuel economy.

21:35 It has a combined official fuel economy of 6.4 litres per 100 kilometres.

21:40 We've been testing this car for a little while now, giving it a bit of a fang,

21:44 so we're up more close to the 8 litres per 100 mark,

21:46 but that is a reasonable fuel economy if you are going to be using this as a daily commuting to work,

21:51 driving on the highway and the regular type of thing that most people are going to do with it.

21:55 So this car is permanent all-wheel drive and it uses an electro-hydraulic clutch

22:01 to send torque between the front and rear axles,

22:04 and that's where you're getting the dynamic nature in it.

22:06 It's not like a front-wheel drive car that just sends torque to the rear when it needs it.

22:10 It is a more permanent all-wheel drive system,

22:12 so you're getting a lot more traction as you power out of corners.

22:15 OK, so you've dropped the kids off with your cousins or someone,

22:20 they're out of your hair.

22:21 So you press the mode button here, we're going to select Sport,

22:24 you immediately hear that exhaust.

22:27 The dynamic sound boost come on.

22:32 Sport mode is engaged down here, your paddle shifter's allowed you to shift manually.

22:36 We've found ourselves a nice set of corners.

22:39 Oh, that sounds tough, as.

22:41 It's got like a little whistle sound as well as you roll onto the throttle.

22:44 It's got a fair bit of go as well.

22:50 It's actually pretty impressive.

22:55 OK, so seven-speed dual-clutch auto, which means you're getting fast gear shifts.

22:59 It sticks to the road beautifully, that permanent all-wheel drive system is working a charm.

23:04 OK, look, it's quick, but it's not really blowing me away.

23:09 500 Newton-metres of torque is, you know, it's not a ground-swelling amount.

23:13 As I sort of play with the throttle here.

23:16 Yeah, look, it's not too bad.

23:18 I mean, it is quick for a diesel, but I am surprised it's not faster.

23:23 I was expecting it to be a whole lot quicker and in your face.

23:26 It sort of seems to be quite gradual and relaxed, if I'm honest.

23:29 When you are driving aggressively in Sport mode,

23:33 the ride actually is still pretty good.

23:35 So the adaptive dampers go a little bit harder and it does firm up a little bit,

23:39 but it's still really compliant.

23:40 It's not overly firm. It's not going to break your teeth.

23:43 It is still a really manageable and easy car to drive.

23:45 So we have an Instagram question from @matthay100.

23:50 Does it have launch control? Yes, it does.

23:52 So all you do is come to a stop in Sport mode, foot on the brake, foot on the throttle,

23:56 launch control active, you hear it dial up and let go.

24:02 Away we go. So official 0-100 is in about seven seconds.

24:05 We're into the speed limit. Not too bad.

24:07 So Skoda Kodiaq RS. I'm going to be 100% honest with you.

24:11 I love everything about it. It has heaps of room inside, loads of tech,

24:15 simply clever. It's their tagline and they literally deliver on that.

24:18 There is so much clever stuff in here that you don't see in any other cars on the market.

24:21 But there's a problem and it's that badge.

24:24 It says RS. Whenever I drive an Octavia RS, I have a smile from ear to ear.

24:29 It's such a fun car to drive.

24:30 This, I just feel it's a tiny, tiny bit underdone.

24:33 Like it's, I don't know, it's got plenty of performance,

24:35 but it kind of just doesn't deliver that punch in the back that you assume it's going to.

24:39 It almost feels like if they could do with a petrol engine or to get more torque out of this diesel engine,

24:45 it just doesn't give you that emotive experience.

24:47 Sure, it sounds good, but it just fails at that last little bit.

24:50 So the ultimate question is, is it worth buying?

24:53 Hmm. That's one I'm going to leave up to you.

24:55 I think it is worth the money when you look at all the features that you're getting.

24:57 But if you are strictly after a performance car, and I think a lot of people that buy an RS are,

25:02 I don't think it delivers that sort of performance bang that you're after.

25:06 So keep that in mind.

25:07 If you want a really good cruiser that doesn't use much fuel, but has a bit of pep every now and then, this is good.

25:12 But if you want a bit of a ball-tearer, I think you're going to have to look elsewhere.

25:16 So if you have liked this review, I would love it if you could hit like and then subscribe to our channel as well.

25:21 And also don't forget to hit the bell icon.

25:22 That's going to tell you every single time we jump into a new car.

25:26 I'm keen to get your feedback as well. Have you taken this for a test drive?

25:29 Did you come away feeling the same thing I did, or am I expecting a bit too much from it?

25:33 Let us know in the comments below.

25:35 And until next time, take it easy.

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