Having now driven the Fabia 130 on UK roads, the good news is that the chassis is nicely judged. Again, don’t expect Renault Clio RS Cup levels of sharpness here, that was never the point. But even on the all-season tyres that the press office fitted for white reasons evident in the pictures, there’s a good amount of grip and turn-in bite.
Set the stability control to the new Sport setting and you can even tease the back out with a well-timed lift of the throttle. The systems can’t be turned off completely but will let you grab an armful of opposite lock before intervening.
The 130 is too mild to get a limited-slip differential, but in slippery conditions you can feel the traction control doing a fairly decent impression of one.
When we drove it on the international launch, we reported “strong levels of feedback”, but when we drove it in the UK, it was merely fine. There was a bit of feedback about grip levels and relatively natural weighting, but something like a Mini Cooper communicates better. This is one area where the all-season tyres might have been to blame.
The Fabia 130, then, is satisfying to drive quickly, though not exactly scintillating. For all that, it rides surprisingly well. It’s on simple passive dampers and torsion beam suspension at the rear, but the ride is taut without being excitable or brittle. It’s not excessively noisy on the motorway, either.
Like most recent Volkswagen Group cars, the various driver assistance systems usually work quite well and are easy to turn off when they don’t.
Cruise control is standard on the 130, with a smooth and responsive adaptive system as an option.