2:41 pm, August 22, 2011
FORD has given its strongest hints yet that an RS badge could grace the rear of a potent Fiesta again in the future.
In an interview with Car Dealer, Ford of Britain’s product marketing manager Steve Humbles refused to rule out a fire-breathing Fiesta to hark back to the RS Turbo of the early nineties.
He also revealed that the XR name, that graced legendary cars such as the Fiesta XR2 and Escort XR3i, isn’t dead – merely on sabbatical – and explained why it’s highly unlikely we’ll ever see another Cosworth-badged Ford.
‘Personally, I’d like to see a very sporty Fiesta,’ said Humbles. ‘We’re always looking at opportunities in the marketplace and there are competitors that have a sporty B segment car and we haven’t. There’s nothing I can tell you about at the moment, but that’s not to say there won’t be in the future.’
Humbles was referring to the Vauxhall Corsa VXR which has been left without a potent rival from the Blue Oval since it was introduced.
However, demand from America could see an RS model introduced here too. Ford now produces cars on a global basis and it’s hard to get sign off for models for specific countries as it did in the past.
But the fact rally star Ken Block drives a Fiesta WRC car will put pressure on the maker from the States to make a road-going version, albeit one that’s slightly less powerful. A slightly less powerful ST is likely to be first and depending on the success of that, an RS could follow.
‘One of challenges we have is that our cars are developed on a global platform,’ explained Humbles. ‘The British market is fairly unique in its demand for small sporty hatchbacks. You go to Germany or Italy and they don’t buy those cars so when you have to justify the product development budget across Europe it becomes a hard argument to win.
‘But, that said, we’re very aware that we have very strong heritage there and that means there are opportunities. It’s certainly a case of never say never – and more a case of watch this space!’
Humbles added that Ford still owns the XR brand, and although a return can’t be ruled out completely, he thought it would be unlikely.
‘It’s most certainly not dead,’ he said. ‘We still own the name, but to be honest the XR brand is a little bit in the past and perhaps not quite as sophisticated as the ST brand. Now we’ve put our eggs in the ST basket.
‘We don’t really want to dilute it, but saying that we do still have the XR2 and XR3 names should we need them again in the future.’
So what about Cosworth? Well, sadly a Focus or Mondeo Cosworth variant doesn’t look likely since the manufacturer no longer has ties with the legendary tuners.
Humbles said: ‘We don’t really have any link there now and we can only use the name if we use their engineering so I can’t see that being revived. Potentially it could if we got together with Cosworth again, but we don’t currently have a relationship with them.
‘Again, the Cosworth heritage is only really very strong in Britain, so it may be difficult to get it approved.’
But despite that sad news, fast Ford fans can still rejoice in the knowledge that the Blue Oval has its aim targeted on producing some thrilling sports models in the future.
