When is Sport mode, not Sport?

[Mk1Macca]

When I owned my Mk7 GTD, if I set the car to sport, it would reset to normal every time the ignition was switched off.

My wife's 7.5 GTi, however, seems to keep 'sport' listed on the screen even if you turn the car off and back on.

Because it said sport on the screen, I always assumed that was the mode it was in and drove the car like that. Frankly, I found it a bit disappointing. The DSG box always seems to change up too quickly and made the ride a little dull.

Anyhow, I was driving her car last night, and after a bit of motorway driving, I set the car to normal to remove some of the drone from the windscreen sound. Set it back to sport when I got to to town driving, and HOLY sh!t. It was like a completely different car. Like, amazing. The box held the gears high, revved all the way up, drove like a bat out of hell. Now this was GTi territory.

Looking at the dash, the gear indictor now had S before the number, where previously it had D.

So this was true sports mode.

What's going on? The car is listing sport on the MIB screen, but not S on the gear box if you turn the car off. Testing seems to show that if I turn the car on after it's been in sport mode, it still shows sport, but you have to select normal, then back to sport to actually get sport.

Is this a glitch? Help!

[Bungleaio]

With a DSG car put it in sport and it's all in its most aggressive modes. When you start the car next it will remember it was in sport mode and everything will remain in sport apart from the gearbox, that will default back to normal. To get that back into sport just pull back on the gear selector and it will switch.

You can pull back on the gear selector in any mode to instantly put it into sport.

[Sequence]

Happens with all i believe same on GTD and R. I think i recall someone mentioning it is in the user manual and is an intended feature not quite sure on the reasoning though 

[TurboTrev]

Happens with all i believe same on GTD and R. I think i recall someone mentioning it is in the user manual and is an intended feature not quite sure on the reasoning though 

It might be to stop the engine revving too highly from cold?

[Sequence]

Happens with all i believe same on GTD and R. I think i recall someone mentioning it is in the user manual and is an intended feature not quite sure on the reasoning though 

It might be to stop the engine revving too highly from cold?

Good point although that is only an issue on DSG cars.

[MattCupra]

I've noticed this happen on my manual GTI. Just checked the online owners manual and it confirms -

The selected driving mode and individual settings will remain set even after the ignition has been switched off.

The driving profile Sport or Race will remain set even after the ignition has been switched off, however when the ignition is switched back on the engine or automatic gearbox could change to the driving profile Normal or the driving mode D.

To return to driving mode S and activate the sport functions in the engine, select the driving profile Sport or Race or push the automatic gearbox selector lever to the rear ⇒ Changing gear .

So it would appear that although all other settings for the Sport profile will remain active after the ignition is switched off the engine and DSG box could revert back to Normal. 

Amazing what you can find out if you read the instructions.