Mercedes-AMG has released a festive YouTube video that celebrates the Driftmas holidays.
Petrol heads don’t necessarily celebrate the holidays in the same way that normal people do. Whereas most people are taking part in the capitalist frenzy known as Christmas shopping and enduring the neverending onslaught of Christmas carols that entails, true driving enthusiasts are instead out on the track tearing up their tires by performing sick drifts to the sound of a more modern beat.
Mercedes’ in-house performance division, AMG, is no exception to this rule.
Rather than wishing us happy holidays, they are instead wishing us a Happy Driftmas with a brand new semi-teaser video of the upcoming A45, the sportiest of the new A-Class hot hatchbacks.
The redesigned A-Class debuted earlier this year with the A45’s little brother, the A35, already on sale. It comes with the same 2.0-L turbocharged inline 4-cylinder engine as the A45 has, but producing somewhat less power at 302 horses and 295 lb-ft. Zero to sixty is done in a respectable 4.7 seconds with power heading to all four wheels through a 7-speed dual-clutch transmission.
The A45, on the other hand, is said to produce over 400 hp from the same 2.0-L turbo engine. That’s over 200 horses per liter, which makes it more powerful per liter than a McLaren Senna.
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Mercedes’ hottest of all hot hatches will also have AWD, but with power routing through a brand new 9-speed dual-clutch transmission.
Other aesthetic upgrades include a much larger quad-exhaust, a far more impressive rear wing, and a front grille that’s reminiscent of the same design used on the AMG GT. Mercedes calls it the “Panamericana” front grille, for reasons that baffle the world at large.
As you can see, the A45 appears to be nearly production ready and has no trouble drifting around Mercedes’ test track thanks to those 400 ponies.
Sadly, the A45 is not slated to arrive in America where hot hatches are seen to be reviled rather than revered. Everywhere else can expect to see the A45 debut sometime in the first half of 2019, judging by how nearly there the car seems to be.
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