I BELIEVE it was originally called the just Club Edition. But two years since Volkswagen produced this special edition car it has become the Lavida 1.4 TSI DSG Club Edition+.
When it was first launched it had black decals on both sides that expressed further its “sleeper” tendencies. I had read articles and watched videos that attested to its sporty performance. But having the chance to slip into and push this 1.4-liter VW Lavida into S7 (Sports Mode, 7th gear) was awesome and borderline, illegal.
Experience from the Honda Civic Type R, with its manual transmission, will not compare with the Lavida Club edition but ride height and stance will. If the Type R shouted performance, like a tight-fitting shirt on a tri-athlete, the Lavida Club edition is more like a corporate type, the six-pack cloaked in a herringbone Brunello Cucinelli suit. All pressed, and simple.
The shoes give it away though. Shod in aftermarket 18-inch Rota wheels and thinly soled with proper low-profile tires, the Lavida CE gets a lower, sportier stance, and the not-so-glossy, yet not-so-matte finish gives it a decidedly, personal, non-assembly line look. The well-pressed collars of a suit come out nicely in the FRP front chin, and side skirts and the appropriately tiny, almost insignificant ducktail spoiler on the rear bonnet give it a sporty look rivaling the Honda Civic RS Turbo.
Turbo now becomes a point of comparison and a trajectory. With the well-synchronized power management of the excellent DSG automatic gearbox, the 1.4-liter turbocharged gasoline mill which churns out 128hp and pumps a maximum 225 Nm of torque gets one getting to illegal highway speeds quickly. It requires the refinement of a corporate type to ease off the throttle when on the verge of exceeding the speed limits, like overspending on a business venture, it isn’t wise. However, this white pocket rocket has more to give.
Thus, on a long, not yet opened stretch of road somewhere in the construction of the SLEX extension, getting to 180 kph in less than 4 minutes was very possible. If there were more road, there was more chances to maximize S7 on the DSG. But one could get penalized for writing about it so, while its power and speed figures may seem a tad lower than other cars, the turbocharger and the DSG synchronize very well to get the sane highway speeds and beyond in rapid succession. Note that Waze will always tell you where the speed cameras are. Listen when on board the Lavida Club Edition.
The DGS transmission can pretend to be a manual gearbox. Flick the gearshift lever to the right side at “D” position and the dashboard indicator changes from D to S. Doing so allows for quick, crisp but moderated shifts (it won’t go down or up like a real manual transmission, needing to match engine revs with transmission speed. But throttle it properly and it a straight-line trajectory is confident, speedy but well behaved and not at all jerky. These good manners are straightforward as a target setting in the boardroom, with the engine response being an upward chart.
Now, despite its ability to rocket itself, it can also be very frugal. Think of it as a board meeting with targets met at about 11 kilometers per liter on the drive from inside Quezon City to Makati all the way to Novaliches four times during the week but an amazing and 20.8 kilometers per liter on the Laguna to Katipunan Avenue with the same frequency. That only required one fill-up at Cleanfuel in Calamba which could be considered a corporate KPI in terms of maximizing resources.
On the drive, the Lavida Club Edition is precise on its steering due possibly to the aftermarket tires. In cornering, there is a tad of understeer but not reflective of its true performance because on the hilly roads of Lipa to Balete it proved it’s worth taking the long sweeps in style. I think the understeer is mostly tire choice than anything else (or tire age as the tires were near their wear marks). It is a hefty machine in terms of weight but that does not take away its agility and compliance. The suspension does help to eke out what can be from the turbocharged engine.
Since this test unit I took hold of was nearly a year and 34,000 kilometers old, the leather seats were well-used and started to develop that patina most people look for. It also indicated that it was a semi-synthetic leather material. Everything was “German” meaning arranged in blocks, the ergonomics were definitely fit and snug with my only complaint being the weird knob adjustment to lower the seatback. If you know that YouTube video of escaping an attacker inside a car by dropping the seat, well, that won’t work with the Lavida.
What does work are the overall clean and simple look, the subdued blacks with textures all over and the analog gauges, and knobs for climate controls are a welcome blessing.
The 2-DIN format infotainment system is small, and understandably not from the school of full color and high-resolution screens, but the accessibility and functionality are perfect. It is made by Blaupunkt–a German audio maker known well for its audio reproduction quality and not colorful interfaces. It is not bad, really, especially at night when the screen is absolutely not distracting. It runs on Android which to me is really good. I don’t know about Apple users but I did manage to connect my iPad to get the system to mulch WiFi.
When you gear down to reverse, the screen shifts to a monochrome icon of the car with ripples on the side to visualize the intensity of the beeping that comes from the reversing sensors. Let’s not kid ourselves though. In a world where the mobile device reigns supreme, the Lavida’s screen is like a Nokia feature phone. In the future maybe, a better option might be available, but for now this one is perfectly, German. It is the corporate, “if it works, keep it.”
The Blaupunkt system outputs the audio very well. Very important since the low-profile tires and lower-to-the-ground stance means higher NVH levels at almost any speed. Note that it isn’t bothersome, just something noticeable when compared to the Santana GTI or the T-Cross. It is a price for performance, like walking in Ferragamos or Ballys. The noise of success.
The lack of a large infotainment screen isn’t really so painful as is the need for USB plugs. But because there is a lot of space and power jacks for an adaptor, the design team can be forgiven for this.
Here is one thing to point out. Though the Lavida can fit 5 people, the recommended number is only four–because the middle seat is restricted by a transmission tunnel and the design of the second row seems to favor an even rather than an odd number of passengers on that side. To reiterate though, the leather seats anywhere in the car are well bolstered, finished nicely and firm but not hard, and cushioned but not saggy.
It lists safety features as ABS with EBD, traction control, cruise control, a tire pressure monitoring system, 4 airbags, and ISOFIX tethers. On the panel just above the shift lever is a series of switches for hill hold control, electronic stability control, auto start/stop and that detection system, which should include one for ride height relative to the low front chin spoiler.
The Volkswagen Lavida 1.4 TSI DSG Club Edition+ is priced at P1.350M which is about P100K more than the regular variant. This gives this corporate-suited sporty performer excellent marks in terms of performance and looks. It is truly a great, reliable, and superbly comfortable tourer. — with Raymond B. Tribdino
