*Apologies about the late post! This review may be a bit disjointed, as it was written over multiple different days due to how time has worked out this week. Hopefully, it’s still an enjoyable read!*
Different types of cars have to conform to different types of personalities. For example, a big Mercedes or Audi tends to be a solemn affair, wearing shades of black or grey with perhaps a dash of chrome. These are serious cars for serious people, and must behave as such. Hot hatches on the other hand, are more like a t-shirt, adorning themselves with splashes if colour and design, not afraid to try new things just because it might look cool. And the undisputed kings of the hot hatches have always been the French. Ever since the Peugeot 205 GTI, France has held up a reputation of excellence when it comes to small, practical, and extremely quick hot hatches.
The Citroen DS3 Racing very much fits into the mold of a French hot Hatch. It’s small, FWD, turbocharged, affordable, and downright funky to look at. Seriously, this car is just cool. No matter where you go, the black with orange highlights will turn heads. It’s not just grabbing too, keep looking at it and you realize just how handsome a car the DS3 is. From the floating roof to the orange wheels, it dares to be different and it looks all the better for it.
However, to be a proper French hot hatch, it needs to do more than just look good, it needs to drive good as well. And thankfully, Citroen has done an excellent job here. While it’s not a hot hatch on the same level as the Megane, it’s a decently quick car in its own class.
First, let’s start with the engine. It’s a relatively small turbocharged engine, producing a punchy 203hp. It makes decent power throughout the rev range thanks to that turbo, but you need to really rev it to get the most out of this motor. This is where GT Sport actually misleads the driver a bit. The shift timer on the hud display will start to flash, but you actually have another few hundred rpm before the cars true redline, which is bang on 7000RPM. If you want to be fast with this car, you need to ignore the hud and focus closely on the cars actual rev counter, then shift the second it hits 7000. Other than this minor issue, the engine proves to be powerful enough to give the car some speed, but not powerful enough to make it hard to drive. The transmission, while having fairly tall gearing, is well suited to the engine, meaning you’re very rarely left dead in the powerband. Tall gearing is sort of what one would expect in a car like this, helping it achieve decent fuel mileage in normal driving conditions. Acceleration wise, the car likes to spin it’s power away in 1st, so careful throttle control is needed to get the best out of it, then 2nd, 3rd, and 4th all pull quite nicely to redline. The car hits a wall at 130mph in the top of 4th, and you won’t see much past 135 in 5th. Again, not unexpected or uncommon, and more than competitive in its field. I suspect this is one of those cars where the extra fine control a steering wheel brings over a controller would be very useful.
Handling wise, the little Citroen DS3 Racing is a treat. Approach a corner, and the car rotates lovely on brakes, allowing the driver to point the car towards the apex. Mid corner, you want to gently ease into the power, to roughly half throttle, and the car pulls itself exactly where it’s pointed. Then when approaching corner exit, gradually apply more throttle as the car straightens out. It’s very easy to spin an inside wheel when cornering due to the Citroen’s open differential. If there’s one thing I had to complain about on this car, it’s the open diff, it really limits the amount of power you can use in the corners. Planting the gas at the wrong time results in fairly strong, though recoverable, understeer. Other than that, the car rotates nicely off power, the brakes are exceptional, and the car is very good at communicating with the driver what’s happening.
Initially, the car was tested at Brands Hatch, but after a few laps there I decided to see how it would handle the Nurburgring. Surprisingly, it was great fun to throw around the Green Hell, plenty of traction and power, and of course the excellent brakes, and after a couple laps it set a time of 8:42.8. Not bad for a small affordable French hatchback. Out of curiosity, I then lapped the king of modern hot hatches, the Volkswagen Golf GTi Mk.7. Immediately the Golf felt much quicker. While the VW is heavier, it also has more power and an electronically controlled differential, meaning it’s not losing time with wheelspin and somehow managing to not understeer wide at full throttle mid corner. In addition to this, it managed 140mph down the straight, 5mph more than the DS3 could muster, so how much faster did the VW lap the ring? 8 tenths of a second. Undoubtedly, getting an 8:42.0 out of the VW was easier than getting the 8:42.8 out of the DS3, but it’s still extremely impressive that the little French hot hatch could keep pace with the Golf. In fact, I suspect the Citroen was actually making up time in the corners because the VW was faster down the back straight, which is quite amazing considering how high tech the Golf is.
Sadly, after this, I got a little carried away. I thought that the Golf would make mincemeat out of the Citroen, so after seeing how close the two were, I decided to try a couple more hatchbacks. Specifically, The Lancia Delta HF Integrale, and my personal favourite, the Ford Focus ST. The Lancia, despite its AWD grip, struggled around the Nurburgring, mainly due to the fact it weighs so much more than the Citroen, but only has 6 more horses to pull itself around. The Ford was a different story however. Despite being the heaviest of the bunch, it boasts exceptional corner balance for a FWD car, allowing the driver to chuck it around corners at speeds far higher than you could with most other cars in its class, and having an extra 50hp didn’t hurt either. But the simple fact that I had to go to a car with 50 more horsepower and a fancy electronic differential to gain ground on the DS3 is telling of how good the little Citroen is.
The takeaway from this car for me was that it’s a great car to drive, and while it’s not quite the fastest in its class, it’s not far off. So if you’re racing some hot hatches, and you want to race something different without getting left behind, then the Citroen DS3 Racing might be for you!
I used that term just for fun, no need to get angry 
