Ford Fiesta S1600 or Fiesta Sport+ or Fiesta Sport S revealed

Ford Fiesta S1600 2011

Ford knows its market, and in particular it knows its hot-hatch market. Or in this case, its slightly warmer hatch market. Which explains the different monikers in the headline. Which Fiesta you get (or which badge, at least) all depends on which country you buy it in.

If you buy your new, warmed-over Fiesta in the UK, then you’ll get the Ford Fiesta S1600. If however you grab yourself the latest Fiesta Sport in Germany, it will be the Fiesta Sport S, and in the other European markets – Austria, Switzerland and Belgium – you’ll get the Fiesta Sport+. All clear?

But actually, wherever you buy the Fiesta it will – as far as we can work out – get exactly the same makeover. In cosmetic terms that’s pretty much what it got when it surfaced a year ago as the Fiesta Sport+, or when it appeared as the Fiesta S1600 a month later.  All very confusing.

Cosmetically you’ll get a go-faster kit including new front bumper and valence, side skirts, boy-racer spoiler and rear diffuser with a set of white, 17″ alloys. Paint jobs are blue or white with contrasting stripes (that’s Frozen White or Performance Blue with Motorsport stripes, in Ford-speak)

The inside of the Fiesta S1600 / Sport+ / Sport S also gets a bit of a tweak with a set of blue-stitched heated seats, leather steering wheel, gear knob and handbrake gaiter and a set of side airbags. You also get Motorsport branded mats and scuff plates.

But what you also get – which you didn’t get with last year’s Fiesta Sport+ or last year’s Fiesta S1600 – is a power tweak. Last time out there was a choice of diesel or petrol lumps, but this time its Hobson’s – but a decent Hobson’s.

The 1.6 litre Duratec T-VCT from the Fiesta S gets a bump from 118bhp to 132bhp and a smidge extra torque, which translates in to an 8.7 second 0-62 – down from 9.9 seconds in the Fiesta S.

Ford UK hasn’t given us a price for the Fiesta S1600 yet, but they’ve said we’ll get it by the end of the week.

We’ll update then. If we’re not too confused.

By Cars UK