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By Jonathan Crouch

No one else in your street is likely to have a CUPRA Ateca. But should you, could you, want one? Jonathan Crouch drives it.

Ten Second Reviewword count: 60

CUPRA is a name you might be familiar with, but not as a brand in its own right. It used to be merely a badge adorning fast SEATs. Now it's been launched as a stand-alone marque and its first product is this mid-sized SUV, the CUPRA Ateca. With 300PS from a 2.0-litre turbo petrol engine, it packs a decent punch.

Backgroundword count: 179

For years, we've been told that Spanish maker SEAT is a kind of 'Iberian Alfa Romeo'. In the CUPRA though, it has an automotive brand with a much more credible claim to that description. You'll probably know the name, but only as a sporty trim designation that goes back to 1996, since when it's been used on a whole string of Ibiza and Leon hot hatches. Today though, SEAT wants CUPRA to mean more, creating, in its words, 'a range of unique, sophisticated performance models designed to captivate car enthusiasts.' This CUPRA Ateca, introduced back in 2019, was the first of them. As you might have already noted, this particular model isn't particularly 'unique'; it's basically a top-end sporting version of SEAT's Ateca mid-sized SUV with a different brand badge and something of a premium price. There's plenty of 'sophisticated performance' though. CUPRA Ateca buyers get 4WD, paddleshift DSG auto transmission and in the top model, pretty much the same rip-snorting 2.0-litre TSI petrol turbo engine that's fitted to a VW Golf R, here putting out a potent 300PS.

Driving Experienceword count: 337

In terms of the engineering behind this car, there's nothing we haven't seen before in a Volkswagen Group model, but the CUPRA engineers credit themselves with bringing all the various ingredients together in a form never previously seen in one of the Wolfsburg conglomerate's SUVs. For the top variant, the elements in question include a 300PS 2.0-litre TSI turbo petrol engine borrowed from the VW Golf R, a seven-speed DSG gearbox, a Haldex four-wheel drive system and stiff, strong modular MQB architecture. Dynamic Chassis Control adaptive dampers are also standard-fit and there are six driving settings, including a choice of 'Comfort', 'Sport' or max-attack 'CUPRA' driving modes. CUPRA is also offering two more affordable powerplants, a 1.5-litre TSI 150PS engine; and a 2.0-litre TSI 190PS unit. In all its forms, this car sits 10mm closer to the road than an ordinary Ateca and uses retuned springs and dampers along with big 19-inch wheels, so the ride quality will inevitably be firmer than that of a standard Ateca model but of course body control and corner turn-in will be of a different order too. It's satisfyingly rapid, rest to 62mph occupying 4.9s en route to 152mph flat out. That's if you make full use of the standard launch Control system and select the angriest of the 'drive profile' driving modes - 'CUPRA' - at which point the quad pipe exhaust parps and pops engagingly as you flick through the steering paddles and enjoy quicker downshifts from the DSG gearbox. As mentioned earlier, the 300PS model has CUPRA's '4Drive' technology to help get all that torque to the tarmac, the set-up continually analysing road conditions in real time, including the speed of the car, the speed of each wheel, the steering wheel position, your driving style and the drive mode selected. To control all this, you're going to need a decent set of brakes and, as you'd want, the front and rear discs on the 300PS performance Ateca variant have been appropriately enlarged - to 340 and 310mm respectively.

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