We'll start with a paradox that, should he ever ponder it, would give Stephen Hawking more sleepless nights than the mysteries of quantum gravity. The Vauxhall Astra. In white van form, it's impossible to overtake, even if you're travelling on a beam of light. And as the Coupe Turbo it annihilated all and sundry in every round of last year's British Touring Car Championship. At ΂£18,995 in roadgoing guise, it's the cheapest 150mph-plus car you can buy in the UK. Crazy thing is, Mr Hawking, it's also by far the dullest 150mph-plus car you can buy in the UK, possibly the Universe. Turns out speed isn't everything after all.

Which would be a shame, except for the fact that a full-on 'fix' has been granted to 100 Coupe Turbos by Vauxhall to commemorate the Astra's touring car rout and, if you've got ΂£20,995, you can buy one. The extra two grand pays for the input of Triple Eight Engineering, the company behind the Astra's domination of the BTCC, and a whole raft of racing-improves-the-breed style modifications to even-up the hitherto unequal battle between the Coupe Turbo's 187bhp 2-litre motor and the shellshocked chassis' front wheels. We're talking lower, harder, wider, beefier, lairier. And spectacularly horrible '888' badging. And a Superman-blue paint job.

The body sits 30mm lower at the front and 35mm lower at the back, the replacement Eibach springs and dampers are harder (much harder), the 17-inch OZ Racing alloys are wider (235/40 ZR 17 Michelin Pilot Sport wide), while beefier Ferodo brake pad material is said to enhance brake feel. Meanwhile the front splitter, flared sills, swollen arches, strut-hoisted tailgate wing, cold metal gearknob cap and handbrake button ? but, most of all, the pukka, Alcantara-trimmed Sparco sports buckets (predominantly electric blue, like much of the extra chunky steering wheel rim and all of the centre console) ? shovel on lairy with the conviction of a builder and a tipper truck of hardcore.

The other comparative newcomer is perhaps most famous for being compared, outrageously, to a Ferrari. And being the best ever car to come out of Korea. The original Hyundai Coupe was a genuine revelation ? unafraid to look the look and walk the walk of icons with arm-long pedigrees. It had a growly 2-litre engine, an entertaining chassis and an audacious shape, but it didn't look an awful lot like a Ferrari. (Blame the car bloke who writes for News of The World for starting the rumour.) The new one does, though. Follow the accent line that curls over the shark's gill vent behind the front wheelarch and tapers to the flank: Ferrari's 456 GT did it first. Other sources of inspiration are more implicit but at least the whole looks cohesive, interesting and, from most angles, very pretty.

Which means first blood to Hyundai if you're happy to go along with the idea that the Astra's quasi-racer visuals naturally limit the membership of its appreciation club and that the dramatic, edgy styling of the third car in this contest, the ΂£23,495 Toyota Celica 190 T-Sport, has lost its freshness, despite the new plastic eyelids that reduce the depth of its previously skinned back headlamp lenses. If you're thinking the price is a tad steep (we are), it's worth remembering that the 'T-Sport' bit adds ΂£3000 to the price of the mechanically identical Celica 190 VVLTi. For that you get slightly more aggressive skirts and a rear spoiler, T-Sport 17-inch alloys, leather and a six-deck CD autochanger. Hardly life-changing kit.

Not that the Hyundai is just a pretty montage of nicked pin-up features. It trades life's little luxuries virtually blow-for-blow with its Japanese adversary and presents a cabin with a similarly slick and sophisticated ambience, though the torque effort auxiliary gauge on the centre console is possibly a dial too far. Nice pseudo-titanium trim fillets and panels, all the same, and the plastics ? save for the low rent gearknob ? are pretty good, too. Don't get the idea that the Astra is actually a stripped-down racer, by the way. Its basic equipment spec mirrors the regular Coupe Turbo's, which is decently cushy.

The Hyundai's 2.7-litre V6 wins comfortably on capacity and number of cylinders, and its close-ratio six-speed gearbox gives it parity with the Celica though, arguably, the Astra does fine with just five cogs. Its excellent four-pot turbo develops 185lb ft at just 1950rpm against 182lb at 4000rpm for the Hyundai and just 133lb ft for the Celica at an even more frenetic 6800rpm respectively. And it isn't just that the Astra has that much more peak torque; it's also spread over a broader rev band. Probably much needed given its comparatively lazy 5400rpm power peak. The Astra's brawny flexibility will be an issue at the test track and on the road.

A more immediate one, though, is that for all its on-paper aerobic reach, the Hyundai's engine delivers a disappointingly modest 165bhp at 6000rpm, giving away respectively 22 and 24bhp to the Astra and the Celica which, moreover, hits its 189bhp at a screaming 7800rpm. These are cars with radically different engine dynamics. The fact remains, though, that at over 1300kg the Hyundai is no featherweight and its power-to-weight ratio of 126bhp per ton looks somewhat pale and sickly next to the 888's 141bhp per ton and the svelte Toyota's 158bhp per ton.

Subjectively, though, the Hyundai's all-out performance feels anything but off-colour. Although the big engine's power-band is pretty sumptuous ? and especially well-padded through the mid range ? it responds instantly to the throttle and revs out gamely, only becoming a little breathless over the final 500 revs. Stick your toe down and it feels sporty enough. And indeed 0-60mph in 8.1sec is nothing to be ashamed of, especially as it was recorded in the damp, the switchable traction control allowing a surprising amount of wheelspin off the line but proving deceptively effective.

The result almost exactly matches Hyundai's claim and isn't far adrift of the Celica's 7.5sec (no traction electronics but surprising grip). The Astra's 6.9sec, though, highlights not just the benefits of a superior traction control but honest-to-God thump. It simply feels more lusty than the others. That said, the Toyota's fizzing top-end power is having slightly the better of the argument by 100mph, posting a time of 19.5sec to the Vauxhall's 19.9sec, despite the fact that the Astra goes on to a higher claimed top speed of 152mph (140mph for the T-Sport). The Hyundai doesn't hit the ton until over three seconds later and eventually winds out to 136mph; it simply can't keep up.

For smoothness and hush, though, the Korean car has it. What we've got here is more of an anodyne hum than a multi-layered V6 gargle, but the subtlety is impressively unfatiguing and suggests 'expensive' in a way that neither of the four-pot motors can emulate. Perhaps a few more decibels and a slightly darker, gruffer tone wouldn't do any harm, but that's nitpicking.

Intriguingly, there's a racecar-like whine to the Astra engine under load that seems to have been engineered-in to synthesise the sound of straight-cut gears. Not a bad idea because it spices up another basically unremarkable engine note. It belongs to a fine engine nonetheless, one that can tap into oodles of overtaking thrust and deploy it without a hint of strain or fuss. All right, very top-end bite is a bit gummy and the gearshift isn't the model of snappy precision the Hyundai's is, but the cushioning and damping of the drive-line is actually the best of the lot. Certainly it's easier to drive the Astra smoothly in traffic than the Toyota with its sharp clutch and rather snatchy take-up, though the Celica's gearchange rivals the Hyundai's for slickness and speed.

Mind you, anything less would be a problem because the Astra's stubby lever gets used a lot. The Celica might as well have two engines. The first operates from zero to 6000rpm and is smooth but rather sulky and torpid. When it hits 6000 revs, though, number two snaps awake as if roused from a state of deep relaxation by the click of a hypnotist's fingers. Then the T-Sport 190 starts to motor in a way that lives up to the number in its name, piling through to eight thousand revs on a soaring curve of growling aggression. The transition from tepid to white- hot is instant and astonishing. Key the switch-like characteristics to the transmission's closely-spaced ratios and the results are spectacular. It can be quite hard work, but satisfying if it coincides with a great road.

Because the one thing the Celica can cope with brilliantly is a few curls and swirls in the blacktop. Supple and athletic, its chassis possesses a kind of fine-tolerance resilience that kills wasted effort and allows you to attack any kind of road with almost sublime levels of confidence. On fen roads east of Peterborough, where we did most of the photography, the quality of its damping on roads with ravaged surfaces established itself as a benchmark that wasn't bettered and rarely approached. Few front-drive cars steer as precisely, communicate as clearly or feel as composed and crisp as the Celica.

Not even the broadly talented Hyundai, though it gets respectably close in some areas. Its steering doesn't have as much feel but it is direct and meaty with particularly good around-centre responses. And while its suspension lacks the finesse of the Toyota's, the Hyundai at least gets the simple stuff right. The chassis is acceptably grippy, safe and neat ? if not as big on mid-bend adjustment as its predecessor's ? and has a firm (occasionally harsh) but resolutely well- controlled ride. No big gripes here; it's a car you can press on in and reap a few grins but it does the sensible stuff equally well.

The cabin is comfortable and well designed, too, with a good driving position, supportive seats and a fair amount of room, though the high waistline makes it feel smaller than it really is inside. The Celica has even better seats and an airier ambience but an architecture that, like the external appearance, appears to be dating swiftly, though the quality and finish of the materials outclasses those of the Hyundai.

The Astra is harder to slot into the static comparison. It's actually very well put together but all that electric blue Alcantara and plastic cheapens the overall effect and looks, well, naff. But then Vauxhall would probably argue that the mission of the 888 is to perform, not to pamper.

And up to a point, they'd be right. The 888's blend of grunt, grip and stopping power probably gives it a point-to-point edge in this company. The anchors are particularly tasty. All three cars wipe off speed effectively, but the Ferrodo-padded Astra has more bite and almost heroic resistance to fade. From the people who brought you the Astra van, after all. Moreover, it laces this concentrated cocktail of basic skills with the uncompromising feel of a track car. Only the steering, which is well weighted and has good feel but is far too woolly about the straight-ahead, spoils the impression. Fellow tester John Barker thought the steering wheel too big as well, but I didn't mind it.

Those Sparco buckets don't just clamp your derriere in place, they effectively hard-wire it to the tarmac's surface. Bumpy B-roads can border on the painful; the car doesn't even relax on motorways. If that's what you really want, then fine. And, of course, the 888 is an entirely different proposition to the comfortable but bland standard Coupe Turbo. Credit to Vauxhall for making the difference so palpable.

But it's a narrow repertoire and it ain't exactly subtle. Big on viscera-jiggling firmness and iron man braggadocio, but woefully short on the light and shade that contributes to genuine evoness, the Astra 888 is fatally flawed in our eyes. The Celica and Hyundai are both cars of greater depth that are easier and more rewarding to live with. The best thing about the Celica is its peachy chassis, but the car's character is actually defined by its schizophrenic engine, which is either mild or wild but nothing in between. If you feel the need for speed that only 189bhp at 7800rpm can deliver, then it's a better bet than the Hyundai which, 2.7 V6 or not, simply can't scale those heights.

But perhaps it doesn't need to because, by quite a margin, the Hyundai Coupe is the most satisfyingly balanced all-rounder. It has a flexible, silky engine, a well-sorted chassis, a fine interior and style that cuts a dash without poking out your eyeballs. Most remarkably, it gels as a complete car more successfully than the others. As if that wasn't enough, it's a few grand cheaper, too. Welcome to the club, Hyundai.