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As if we needed another reason to salivate over the delicious little Audi A1. The Four Ring’d One has just announced that it will pull the sheets off of a new, hopped-up version of its tiniest hatch at this year’s Paris Motor Show. Here’s the important part: under the hood, there’s a 185-horsepower dual-charged 1.4-liter four-cylinder engine with 185 lb-ft of torque. That’s right, this machine makes use of both a supercharger and a turbocharger, and as a result, Audi says that its new A1 1.4 TFSI can scoot to 60 mph in a quick 6.9 seconds.

By way of salting the wound even further, Audi says that the meanest of the A1 breed returns around 40 mpg U.S., effectively making the Honda CR-Z look both lethargic and overtly wasteful. A seven-speed DSG gearbox handles shifting duties and likely helps with that massive fuel economy number. Quattro all-wheel drive is still not available, however.

European buyers can expect to see the brawny A1 by the end of this year, where it will carry a price tag of around $31,500 at current conversion rates (though the included EU taxes inflate that figure somewhat). As usual, we won’t see it on our shores.



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