There is something rather wonderful, and at the same time a little disconcerting, about driving the single example of a particular car in the entire country, but I must say I never thought I would experience the feeling from behind the wheel of a Volkswagen Polo. But I did, and that's because the car tested here is, at the time of writing, the only new-generation Polo in the UK, fresh off the boat from South Africa where all the five-door models will be built (the three-doors, for those of you who like to know this sort of thing, being produced in Spain).Don't worry - there will be plenty more Polos coming along after this one, though in fact a large proportion will be almost identical to it. The test car was fitted with Volkswagen's 69bhp 1.2-litre three-cylinder petrol engine (69bhp being the Imperial equivalent of the metric 70PS in the title) and came in SE trim, a combination which VW reckons will be the most popular among Polo buyers.Richard Dredge gave an excellent overview of the whole range in his launch report so I won't repeat all the details here, but I will say that the new design, intended to make the Polo resemble the larger Golf and Scirocco, works very well indeed. There are a couple of typical slips, though. Volkswagen is never much good at providing room for rear passengers, and that certainly applies to the Polo, which I find slightly harder to get into the back of than a Suzuki Alto (hardly the sort of car that Volkswagen would consider as a benchmark, you might think).Rear visibility isn't a VW strong point either, and sure enough the Polo has very little of it, which makes reversing round a T-junction even into a wide and deserted street a more worrisome process than it ought to be.Despite all that, there is much to admire. Stop me if you've heard this one before, but I'm a big fan of that 1.2-litre engine, and have enjoyed it in every VW Group product I've ever tried. I'm surprised to learn that a colleague who drove the test car on the same day as I did finds it noisy, since I thought the sound levels were impressively low, but there we have it. The new 1.2 accelerates harder than the old one, partly because it's lighter, though if you really want high performance this is probably not the Polo you would pick.Fuel economy and CO2 emissions, at 51.4mpg combined and 128g/km respectively, are easily beaten by similarly-sized (though more expensive) diesels, but they're pretty competitive compared with petrol-engined rivals. The 1.25 Ford Fiesta is slightly better, but the Polo easily beats the 1.2 versions of the Renault Clio and Vauxhall Corsa.In terms of luggage space, the Polo lags further behind. With the rear seats up it offers 280 litres, which is slightly more than before but less than you get in a Fiesta, Clio or Corsa, though not by much. With the seats down the volume has dropped by 78 litres to 952 litres, considerably less than in the Clio and Corsa.Very soft, but well-damped, suspension means that the ride quality is exceptional for a car that qualifies as a supermini in modern terms (even though it's bigger than the Golf used to be), and although some exploratory charging around country roads suggested that the body roll might reach uncomfortable levels if you tried hard enough, there is at least no shortage of grip.With not much more than an hour's driving available, it wasn't possible to see how well the Polo fares as a long-distance car, but the signs so far are good. There is a lot of room up front (a big contrast from the situation in the rear) and the seats are more comfortable than they look, so if I ever find myself having to embark on a big journey in a Polo I won't be worried in advance about possible aches and pains.Polo prices start at £10,035, and Volkswagen - understandably defensive about claims that its cars are unusually expensive - is quick to point out that this is lower than the bottom price of either a Fiesta or a Corsa. For that money you get a 59bhp version of the 1.2 engine and the base-level S trim.The extra £1960 you're asked to pay for the car tested here buys you an extra 10bhp and quite a bit of extra equipment over the S, including some interior chrome, drawers under the front seats and storage pockets in their backs, semi-automatic air-conditioning, rear loudspeakers, a 60/40 split-folding rear seat with a false floor underneath which you can store valuables remote central locking and 15" alloy wheels (not the ones shown in the pictures here) rather than the 14" steels on the S. Engine 1198 cc, 3 cylinders Power 70 bhp @5400 rpm Torque 83 ib/ft @3000 rpm Transmission 5 speed manual Fuel/CO2 51.4 mpg / 128 g/km Acceleration 0-62mph: 14.1sec Top speed 103 mph Price From £12225.00 approx Release date 12/10/2009
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