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Here are the top 10 features you’ll love about i30 N:

1. Insane (track-spec) tyre and brake endurance

2. E-diff ( cuts wheelspin, boosts traction and cornering speed.)

3. Track-friendly warranty. Unlike most other brands, Hyundai extends the warranty on the i30 N to cover you for track days. As long as it’s not actual motorsport (like, a race) you’re covered.

4. Engine performance: 202kW/353Nm (378 on overboost).

5. Fastback styling: it’s not very often a carmaker tacks on a totally different design to the back half of an existing car and makes it dead sexy.

6. Bi-modal exhaust - just sounds awesome.

7. Nurburgring R&D: Rear strut brace. Actually there’s bespoke reinforcement all over this car - I whipped it up on a hoist and detailed that in my original i30 N Hatch review. It all just says: we went the extra mile, or in the case of this car: the extra 500 laps of the Nurburgring, in R&D.

8. Rev matching - brilliantly executed (read: superhuman).

9. N-custom mode (engine, dampers, steering weight, e-LSD, ESC, exhaust sound) 1944 permutations of settings. Good luck with that.

10. It's the anti-kudos hot hatch. Say you’re in a BMW M2, and you round up some halfwit in a Golf GTI. He can always go ‘well … it’s a superior car … the ultimate driving machine just got me…’

If you round up GTI wanker in a Fastback N … he’s got nothing. And you would, because after three laps, that shitbox GTI’s brakes will be going off … fading away … and yours won’t. And you’ve got Obi-Wan’s e-diff and the rev-matching, and more rubber on the road. And a better power-to-weight ratio.

The fastback is 11 kilos heavier than the hatch - and you’d have to be a pretty special driver for that to make a tangible difference on the track, but if you want to save 11 kilos, buy the hatch. It’s also cheaper.

There’s no perfect car, and the Fastback N is certainly imperfect. The interior’s a bit ‘plain’ - and I get it: the big bucks got spent on performance. But if you want a premium interior in a somewhat sporty car, this is not that car. Quite the opposite.

It’s manual only - that might get old in traffic, depending on your daily commute. Apparently a dual clutch transmission is in development. No word yet on availability timeline. It’s a sweet manual when you’re driving like you mean it. But it’s a pain in the arse in traffic, like every other manual transmission on earth.

Rear vision in the Fastback is a bit like looking through a porthole. When you look in the central rear vision mirror it’s mainly showing you the car’s interior, with a small window into what’s actually happening with the traffic behind.

It’s fine - you can see what’s going on. An inevitable compromise with the Fastback. But if you like bigger rear vision, buy the hatch.

Engine bay: not nearly enough bling. Just saying. It’s purely cosmetic - but they could have tried harder there, cosmetically.

What you will like, though, are the primary driver ergonomics - they’re excellent, right from the seat and wheel, the pedal placement - all the way to the shift light. Really good.

Cabin ambience - also excellent -engine note and bi-modal exhaust crackle. You could bottle that and sell it to performance nutjobs like me.

Bang for your buck - unbeatable. If you can drive, this is a sensational car. If you want to learn to drive - really drive - this car is ideal. It’ll adapt up with you, as your skillset improves. And it’s a turnkey solution - track ready out of the box: drive it there and earn your PhD in driving really fast and not crashing.

You can even have a proper spare tyre. I asked them specifically on this point. A space saver is standard. But a genuine wheel with TPMS sensor and proper performance tyre is a genuine accessory. It lifts the cargo bay floor about an inch - but that’s the only compromise.

That’s about it on this report: The Fastback is notionally $1500 more than the hatch. Luxury pack is $3000 - heated wheel and front seats, proximity key, rain sensing wipers, bit of dead cow, which may or may not be actual dead animal. Stuff like that.

If you tick every box it’s about $50k in traffic here in the Trailer of Arse. And that makes it cheaper than the Golf GTI it’s about to murder with extreme pre-meditation. So that’s nice.

Frankly, I’ve never seen a carmaker have a first crack at performance and get it this right.

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