2016 Ford Focus RS – Autocar Award for best Performance

Tijdens Autocar Awards 2016 kon het bijna niet anders dat Ford daar een rol in zou kunnen spelen en zagen wij een kans liggen voor de alom geprezen 2016 Focus RS, maar kwam dit ook uit?

Jazeker, ze hadden volgens eigen zeggen, maar 6 genomineerden die ze 5 sterren gunden en daar zit de 2016 Focus RS, zouden bijna zeggen ‘uiteraard bij’, maar laten we bescheiden blijven.

Tyrone Johnson die dit hoogstandje de wereld in heeft geholpen, valt met zijn Ford Performance Team in de prijzen en ging naar huis met ‘The award for best performance’.

Focusmania.com test 2016 Focus RS

Focusmania.com test 2016 Focus RS

Reactie van Ford:

The award for best performance goes to…

Our Focus RS is one of the most acclaimed cars in recent years, with awards including Top Gear’s Car of the Year 2016. Now the engineer who led the project has achieved a top award too.

It is three years since Tyrone Johnson was first tasked with creating a ground-breaking, all-wheel drive hot-hatch – and now he has been named Engineer of the Year 2016, by Autocar.

“I’m energised by the team I lead. This award is for them all,” said Johnson whose team helped the 2.3-litre EcoBoost engine-powered Focus RS to generate 350 PS, achieve 0-62 mph in 4.7 seconds, and hit a top speed of 165 mph.

“Tyrone was asked to reinvent an icon, and he and his team have achieved it in the most spectacular fashion, creating old-school thrills in a totally modern package”, said Autocar’s editorial director Jim Holder. “The new Focus RS heads our league table for delivering ‘on-the-edge’ thrills when you really want to push”.

Well done, Tyrone and team.

Source | Ford Social

Tyrone Johnson, vehicle engineering manager, Ford Performance

Tyrone Johnson, vehicle engineering manager, Ford Performance

Autocar.co.uk:

Five Star Cars

Only half a dozen cars have been awarded a coveted maximum rating by Autocar’s road test team during the past 12 months.

We have honoured each of them with an award

PORSCHE 911 GT3 RS
McLAREN 570S
PORSCHE CAYMAN GT4
ARIEL NOMAD
FORD FOCUS RS
FERRARI 488 GTB

Ford has perfected a way of making a new RS’s arrival seem as momentous as any supercar’s. That wouldn’t work if the model didn’t measure up, but this one does – and how. As a gauntlet to its rivals, the RS impact is crater deep.

Engineering Hero – Tyrone Johnson – Vehicle engineering manager, Ford Performance

Tyrone Johnson, vehicle engineering manager, Ford Performance

Tyrone Johnson, vehicle engineering manager, Ford Performance

The car industry can’t have enough straight-taking, enthusiastic, driven engineers like Tyrone Johnson. There is a glint in this man’s eye as he talks about the outstanding new mega-hatch that he and his Ford Performance engineering team have produced: the Mk3 Focus RS. He doesn’t gush; he knows he doesn’t need to.

There’s devilry in his smile as he lists the shortcomings of the Focus’s rivals (“overpriced, onedimensional, boring”). He has had, in short, exactly the same thoughts as you or I after a drive in a typical modern hot hatchback: “It’s fast, sure, but I wish it was more fun.” And then he had the commitment, the skill and the backing to turn that gap into a realised opportunity. If you were Tyrone Johnson, you’d be smiling, too.

2016 Ford Focus RS - Autocar Award for best Performance

2016 Ford Focus RS – Autocar Award for best Performance

A Ford lifer of more than 30 years’ experience, Johnson spent his early career working on Ford’s first ‘Special Vehicle Team’ Mustang, as well as on the landmark Mk1 Mondeo. Involvement at the highest levels of motorsport came with Stewart Ford and Jaguar Racing, as well as in the World Rally Championship with Ford’s M-Sport team, during the late 1990s and 2000s.

Coming back to Ford’s Team RS, which became part of Ford Performance in 2014, he’s had a guiding influence on the development and dynamic tuning of cars such as the current Focus ST, Fiesta ST and the new Mustang. And with those, plus the new RS, on his CV, he’s a man whose services will be in high demand for years to come.

Source | Autocar.co.uk

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