WHAT IS SKODA vR5?

The brutal Fabia R5 is the most successful Rally2 car of all time

- Tom Jervis

COMPROMISE is often the name of the game when it comes to performance cars; you usually have to give up something - whether that be comfort, practicality or, most commonly, price - if you wish to transform an everyday motor into a hardcore driving machine.

This isn’t the case with Skoda vRS models, however, because thanks to the Czech manufacturer's focus on value and everyday performance, this speedy sub-brand has struck a chord with British buyers in particular.

Once little more than the butt of a bad joke, Skoda now outsells the likes of Renault, MG and even Tesla in the UK, and one in 10 new examples is registered wearing the vRS badge. So to find out what vRS is doing right for the Skoda brand, we headed deep into Welsh rallying territory to get behind the wheel of some iconic models from across the sub-brand's history, and speak to one of the key figures behind it all: Bjorn Kroll, Skoda’s head of product marketing.

WHAT DOES VRS MEAN?

FIRST and foremost, it’s worth acknowledging the history of vRS and what those three letters actually mean. Officially, vRS stands for ‘Victory Rally Sport’, although such an abbreviation was primarily chosen because Ford believed that it held the copyright to the ‘RS’ moniker in the UK - despite the American giant choosing to spell ‘Rallye’ with an ‘e’ suffix.

Nevertheless, to avoid any courtroom drama, Skoda instead opted to add a small ‘v’ at the front. This was also a nod to the caron typically positioned above the ‘S’ in ‘Škoda’, although in this instance it denoted ‘victory’. However, just to confuse things further, hot Skodas sold outside the UK still get the ‘RS’ designation, despite sharing the same logo derived from a racing livery worn by the successful Skoda Favorit rally car.