And it appears that Volkswagen is rapidly approaching the same point with the Golf GTI. Ok, the interior of the new eighth generation Golf GTI revealed this week has been somewhat spruced, but if you look at its exterior or mechanical specification, you’d be forgiven for thinking Volkswagen has simply thought that the last one was as good as it needed to be, so why change it? Of course it is changed in many detail ways, and I look forward to see how this translates into the driving experience.
But for now, what about those other seven generations? Here’s my guide to which are the good, the great and the ghastly. And there’s not the space to go into convertibles, niche models and spin-offs, nor the many even higher performance Golfs that VW has produced over the years, so my comments apply to the standard GTI hatchback alone.