Opel and Volkswagen add more than just a little spice to see Golf and Astra off...

We've all seen images of the next Golf and Astra, read their first impressions and followed their introduction overseas in imported magazines and on the Internet. No we're not kidding anyone into believing that these two late-coming flagships are here for the long run, but what we have here are two splendid sporting machines with a most interesting story to tell.

For starters, they have quite a bit in common. They're both Huns - the Volksie coming from Wolfsburg - not all that far from Hamburg and the Opel from Russelsheim, just down the Rhine from Frankfurt. Locally they share the Eastern Cape as home - Opel's PE plant being just fifty kays from VW in Uitenhage.

So, to ignore that there's a healthy rivalry between Opel and Volkswagen is like expecting a Parisian waiter to give a Yank the service he expects. VW and Opel fight it out in the same segments of the market, too - Lite challenges Citi, Corsa vies with Polo, and Golf and Astra fight for bits of the same slice of market pie.

On track, who can forget those huge Group N racing local derbies at Aldo Scribante when the local teams slogged it out in front of the hometown crowd - the Golf GTI 16V and Kadett GSi bosses waging war there and everywhere else. You can bet that Opel keeps a beady eye on VW every day and Uitenhage never misses a trick they're up to in the Bay...

So, it shouldn't be too surprising then, that no sooner had Volkswagen unleashed the Golf GTI 132R than Opel let the Astra OPC loose on an unsuspecting local market...

But these two cars have two rather different backgrounds. The Golf is somewhat more of a homegrown solution, while the Astra comes in fully built up....

The Golf fills a niche that has been missing since the arrival of Golf 4 and the end of the line for the fine Golf 3 VR6 flagship. Yes, the initial 110kW GTI 4 was a very impressive car when it cropped up in 1999. Smooth, sophisticated and swift it was, but the market moved on.

Uitenhage was eyeing bringing in the V6 Golf R32, but the sums didn't add up as it calculated exactly how to counter ever more powerful class and other rivals. So it looked at another solution and opted for the 132kW version of the existing brilliant 5-valve per cylinder turbo lump already found in the existing GTI.

The 132kW mill had already made quite a name for itself in some quick Seats and Audis and the project never needed much more than a little re-fettling and re-speccing of a proven and popular package, so Golf GTi 132 was born...

What we were not expecting though, was the 132R, which VW sprang on us as a 25th birthday present to Golf as a brand in SA. R added everything the conventional spec 132 lacked - from chunkier wheels and fatter rubber to a fine body kit, trick seats and a cabin full of pleasant trim surprises...

The fist time I ever saw the OPC logo was earlier on that fateful September 11th at the Frankfurt show, where a delighted Peter Foster explained to me what it was all about. The ex BMW SA boss had just taken up the reins at Opel and OPC was one of the first signs of the return to glory Herr. Foster had planned for the marque...

And the Astra OPC was one of the prototypes on show - the muscular and more purposeful looking OPC boasted a 147kW 16-valve turbo lump that promised some rather excruciating results from the sportily clad and trimmed 3-door shell. It certainly looked impressive and Peter's enthusiasm really got me going...

OPC soon hit European showrooms and visited Auto Africa end 2002, quickly convincing Delta that the SA public had not forgotten what a good performance Opel was all about...

But it took until a coupe of weeks ago for the evolving Delta (into GM) to get to launch OPC as the basis of Opel's future performance and motorsports brand in South Africa. As much as the 132R's surprising arrival delighted us, the wait for OPC was certainly worth it...

So the Astra OPC and Golf GTI 132R followed a rather different route to coming together in Sandton to fight for the honor of Germany and the Eastern Cape, but finally getting them together set all of the test teams' hearts aflutter... It was something like the crescendo prior to a heavyweight title fight as the muscle-bound and powerful hometown rivals finally came chin to chin in the big city...

As explained above, they certainly looked the part and spurring them into action was about to reveal a couple of most appealing means of whetting the performance pundit's power appetite.

Both offer comfortable, sporty and functional driving positions in classy, if ageing cabins. Both don't sound like much when they fire up and even when running along slowly, although the Golf's free-flow exhaust offers a little extra excitement. And it makes us wonder whether this thing shouldn't be called something like 142R - as our figures do too...

At 7.1 seconds to 100km/h, the 132kW Golf runs pretty close to the 147kW Astra's 6.7, but the Astra also pips it at the quarter mile (15.33 seconds at 153km/h versus 15.69 at 150) and accelerating between 120 and 160km/h (7.45 vs.8.46) although the VW is stronger from 80 to 120 thanks probably to its 6-speed gearing. Interestingly, both of these hatches strongly challenge the iconic AWD Subaru Impreza WRX in pure pace...

Both OPC and 132R are great to drive, their re-fettled springs and dampers bringing that little extra to the willing pilot. They handle well and accommodate their additional grunt impressively and even as far as their limited availability, they are pretty well matched across the board. Well, almost across the board...

The Golf retains its five doors - a boon to the more pragmatic and the family guy who needs them. The Astra, however, will better suit the unattached and the more adventurous. But the Opel has one significant advantage, which sees it swinging this test its way. Price.

At R232 000, it undercuts the R250K and similarly long in the tooth, but also up-specced, VW quite significantly to bring a tiny bang for the buck advantage to this little run-out rocket skirmish.

In the end, not many of these cars will get around thanks to their limited availability (only 150 Astra OPCs - the last of the old model off the line - and 200 Golf Rs will be sold in SA), so owning either will be an individual privilege. Then they are both late life flagships to two vital model ranges for two rival carmakers that have so much in common. They're cars that will also further fire that traditional spat between them, their people and their faithful...

But both will be replaced in the not too distant future - likely toward the end of 2005 when the next Golf GTi and Astra OPC hit our roads, so they're going to have to slog it out until then. And slog it out, they certainly will...