Admittedly, there's not much commonality in the new Honda Jazz Sport and the latest fire-breathing Type R Civic. The former is a B-Segment people mover, cute and capacious, one of the finest city runabouts known to man whilst the latter is the Nurburgring weapon that, despite retaining its front wheel drive layout in a world that has gone all-wheel-drive mad. But its no exactly playing in the hot hatch segment, as it isn't a hatch at all. Its barely a saloon either, with a profile that can best be described as a notch-back. Visually its an assault on the sense, heavily spoilered and augmented with motorsport tinsel and aero. The end result is wild if a bit manic, especially when viewed alongside the tame Jazz.
It isn't as tame as it looks though, its 1.5-litre engine now rated at 97kW/155Nm hence the Sport moniker. This endows it with a sub-10 (9.8) second 0-100 sprint but check your performance expectations at the door as you'll be forced to contend with the Jazz Sports not-so-sporty CVT gearbox. It's yours for R310,000 and as you can see benefits from aero-inspired by the Type R. Cheeky.
The actual Type R however, that's clearly inspired by the need to go very, very quickly indeed. It goes like this 228kW/400Nm, 0-100kph in 5.8 seconds and a top speed of 272kph. Critically, you'll achieve those figures by virtue of a manual 6-speed transmission. What of the price? Well, you can park the latest Civic Type R on your driveway for R625,000 which isn't cheap but to be brutally honest, its very much par for the course. Where the course is the Nurburgring.
