A masterful mix of effortless potency, chassis ability and everyday usability

So what do we think of the new Focus RS? Bit full-on, isn’t it? The bulging arches, the bonnet louvres, the hunkered-down stance, the big rear wing, the gaping, downturned mouth. (Smiley cars had best run for cover.)

Hell, I’d be lying if I said it didn’t tickle my fancy, yet, well, here am I running this comparatively weedy Focus ST. But despite the shortfalls of 78bhp and 88lb ft, the ST remains a lovely car – a masterful mix of effortless potency, chassis ability and everyday usability. And it does form the basis for the RS, after all, 2.5-litre turbo five-cylinder engine an’ all.

Which clearly means the car has the potential for a less bombastic, maturely pitched performance hike that delivers something resembling the RS’s massively developed propulsive pecs without the macho posturing. One just like the Mountune upgrade kit that Essex-based Revolve (formerly Roush) has just fitted to our ST.

Can a Ford approved and warrantied conversion that costs just over a grand and comprises only three elements (larger intercooler, high performance air filter, ECU remap) really turn the ST into a car that could get into the same gym as the RS, never mind the same ring? To be honest, I had my doubts, but when I drove home I was in a state of mild shock and awe.

It wasn’t that the ST felt quicker and more flexible, it felt like a different car. Deliciously gnarlier soundtrack aside, its low and mid-range shove had become so prodigious that it was possible to leave it in sixth and, as long as I didn’t let the revs drop below 2000, dial-up the kind of acceleration that made the relative exertions of other fast cars impossible to gauge. A bit like observing the world from an Audi RS6 or a Merc SL65, they were history anyway.

Now, I don’t want tell any tales out of school, but my parting conversation with Mountune’s engine calibration man Nigel Pritchard did make me think. His brief was to design a map with a copper-bottomed 256bhp and 295lb ft of torque from 2500 to 4000rpm. Copper-bottomed, not copper-topped. He mentioned some figures that, to be frank, squared far more realistically with what my neck muscles were telling me. And the ST does weigh 70kg less than the RS. I’m happy.