Hey all
Great forum, came here before buying my GTI to get some tips and nothing but postive vibes (possibly biased tho)
My background\story: Well I class myself as a major newbie on two counts, 1) I am 30 and have only been driving since Feb 2011 2)Before the GTI I was driving a Citreon C1 :embarassed:
So, the C1 I was driving didnt actually belong to me and I recently had to give it back. This prompted me to go on a car finding mission. I trawled websites galore (whatcar, etc), gathered opinions from friends and colleagues. My first instincts were to stick with a small car that had good fuel economy and cheap to tax, but the more I looked at these cars, the more depressed I became at how rubbish they really were, not to mention at 30yo, I had a lot of catching up to do! This prompted me to check out bigger size engines of which I had a shortlist of about 5, GTI hadnt even made it yet (too expensive) but 1.9tdi was on the list. At this point Ford Fiesta zetec s was at the top of my list (oh boy). Armed with my shortlist, i decided to go to a car supermarket, not with the intention of buying but to get a closer look. I went through the car makes and tried the Zetec s, I was dissapointed to say the least. My last stop was VW and knew that I would at least be impressed with the build quality. When I arrived at the section, it was then that I saw them...Golf MK5 GTI. I tried looking at other Golfs, the GT sport, the FSI, but I was constantly drawn to the GTI. I asked for the keys to check it out, got in a leather interior model and fell in love instantly...it was like a revelation sitting in that car. After about 2 months of constantly analysing opinions, stats and figures, it was the look and feel of that car that did it for me.
Anyways...the rest is history. Went on autotrader and was so desperate to get one, that I pretty much bought the first one I went to see and £2k over my budget (its only money eh). However, I did have strict criteria - Leather, 18" alloys, Xenon's, buttons on steering wheel, 06 model (i heard that was a slightly better version) and ipod dock - and I got all of that. The car had full VW service and cam belt had just been changed at 54k (now 56k), so was pretty sure I was going to drive away in it before I even got there.
Since then, well the first time I drove it off that forecourt I almost ph**ed myself. Going from a 63bhp 1 litre engine to this was just crazy, but now I have got used to using a light foot. In fact, this sounds stupid but i'm already feeling like I need a bit more power
Proper love the car and sometimes have to look out the window just to admire it. Best £10k I will ever spend I think
I'll post some pics in the next post.
