Almost everything you do in Multiversus in one way or another brings you closer to the next level. However, there are some ways that can take you there much faster than others. This guide will provide you with tips on how to level up fast in Multiversus.
Play Co-op vs. AI Mode
Many players believe that playing against AI bots in Multiversus is useless, as typically you don't get any XP for that.
That's the case if you play 1v1, but not that many players know that playing in Co-op vs. AI mode actually grants you XP and much faster than in any other case.
You can find this mode in the "Play" menu, and either play with a random player online vs. a pair of bots, or link up with one of your friends and do the same. The latter variant is recommended, as cooperative play with friends grants you 30% bonus to both XP and gold earnings.
Utilize Rested XP
No matter what you do, always try to use the Rested XP gauge, which can be found in the "Battle Pass" menu.
This mechanic allows players to double up their daily XP earnings by playing less rather than more. You can read more about this mechanic in our dedicated Rested XP guide.
Complete Seasonal Milestones
No other missions in the "Battle Pass" give you as much XP as the seasonal milestones that rotate only once a season. But if you want to get as much XP as soon as possible, then completing these first will get you there much quicker than anything else.
Once again, try to bring a friend to these missions, so you can earn 30% more XP after completing them.
Related guides
That's all you need to know on how to level up fast in Multiversus. For more, click the links or visit our dedicated Multiversus guides page.
On Friday, it was still thought that Lando Norris could, in certain circumstances, cause a surprise in Hungary. Qualifying ended with a surprising winner, but it was not Norris. The Briton is satisfied nonetheless.
Norris not on pole, but strong qualifying
Norris took P4 and finished four tenths behind George Russell who was on pole. The Ferrari was also ahead of the Briton. Norris thinks his lap could have been better, but even if he had improved a little, it would not have been enough to get close to Charles Leclerc on P3. Norris tells Viaplay: ""It wasn't a perfect lap, it was still a good one. The wind was tricky and the car difficult to drive. We can be quick, it is just not easy. It is really difficult to be on the limit every corner of every lap."
Norris believes he might have gained another tenth, but it would have made no difference to his position. "As a driver, you would like to maximize, but P4 is a very good job," he said. The race looks good for the Briton for Sunday: "It looked good yesterday. I think everyone else has closed up a little bit. We had a good day, and others had a bad day. Today its a bit more equal. Im confident. I feel like I got a good car I can challenge with."
There has been quite a contrast from the summer of 2021 to the summer of 2022 for many North Bay businesses.
Kyle Selle, who operates Sellebration Productions Entertainment Services in North Bay says the changes from the summers of 2021 to 2022 have been drastic.
"From 2021 to 2022, I went from collecting CERB - so at a standstill for my business - now to an average of four to six events per week," said Selle.
"I have done more quotes in the last couple of weeks than I have done in ages," said Selle.
"We went from zero to 100 very fast."
Selle says he tried his best to re-schedule all the events that were postponed due to COVID-19 protocols last summer.
"A lot of them [Customers] have thanked me for not changing my prices from when they originally booked in 2020," he said.
"I was able to keep it at what was quoted back then and kind of fulfill that old contract at the old price but still be able to pay staff and all the overhead and still come out ahead."
The well-known local DJ is grateful and fortunate that he was able to maintain his staff.
"I am extremely fortunate that the crew that we have was excited and 'amped up' to get back. All of my crew has returned, not one of them has said no," said Selle noting that he pays his employees well.
As for the type of events that are filling his schedule, he estimates 85 per cent of those booking are weddings.
Selle says his business has expanded outside of North Bay due to some other entertainment businesses closing during the pandemic.
Now his company is providing event coverage in places like Sudbury and Huntsville.
"We are expanding outside the area a lot more than we were before," he said.
"We have been trying to re-schedule weddings that had been booked in the past and fitting them into dates and to have multiple crews on the same night to cover those events where people are not stuck. We are lucky that way."
Selle believes success comes from great teamwork.
"We have a team of 20 and when we have a day with four or five events we are able to cover them and that's what I call a team effort. I am thankful to have a team as dedicated as they are to fulfill all these events and needs for people."
He hopes his entertainment bookings will continue to roll in just like this for the summer of 2023.
How do your leadership skills stack up compared to your peers? There are innumerable statistics and metrics driving never-ending debates about how to measure leadership effectiveness. So rather than adding to what is likely an irresolvable debate, let's keep things simple.
An essential characteristic of great leaders, regardless of one's preferred management model, is approachability. This doesn't mean that your door is always open or that you're easy-going; it simply means that people feel comfortable giving you the information that you need to hear.
Approachability means that if you were to ask your employees to share with you their frustrations, demotivators, or challenges, they would candidly tell you.
While it seems like a simple leadership skill, being approachable entails a few different activities and attributes. First, it requires a sufficient level of trust with employees. Too many instances of shooting the messenger and employees are more likely to hide, not share, critical or bad news. Second, being approachable necessitates being open-minded and willing to consider suggestions and complaints. Unfortunately, as we learned in the study, The State Of Leadership Development, only 27% of employees say their leader always encourages and recognizes suggestions for improvement.
Finally, approachability requires empathic listening. If an employee calls their boss to share a work problem, and the leader's response is, "life isn't fair, and griping about it won't help," it won't be long before that employee abandons any thought of approaching their boss in the future. Although listening seems like an easy skill, less than a third of people receive a perfect score on the test "Do You Know How To Listen With Empathy?"
How To Test Your Approachability
There are many ways to test the extent to which your employees find you approachable. You can track how much bad news you get (including whether you're the last person to hear it), you could use employee engagement surveys, or you could assess the candor and openness of your one-on-one employee conversations (especially those involving coaching or stay interviews).
But the easiest way to test your approachability is to simply ask each of your employees this question: "At work, what's one frustration you have that you believe I have the authority to fix immediately?"
This question comes from the Leadership IQ study, Frustration At Work, and it provides a great test of whether employees truly feel comfortable sharing with their boss. Why does it work so well? Some of the frustrations employees face at work are caused by their boss, and it takes a lot of managerial approachability for an employee to share those.
Look at some real frustrations that employees shared in the study:
My boss never leaves his office and won't resolve the rampant conflicts we have on our team.
My boss doesn't know where to find answers but he still wants me to run all requests through him, which delays me for days rather than letting me go directly to the other departments.
My boss brought us back to the office supposedly for collaboration but they closed all our conference rooms and we have to maintain social distancing so we don't have face-to-face meetings anyways.
If an employee is comfortable enough to share those frustrations directly with their boss, then that leader has top-notch approachability. But if you're a leader whose employees aren't sharing at least some of their frustrations, then you know where you need to focus.
One final thought: The study, The Risks Of Ignoring Employee Feedback, revealed that only 23% of people say that when they share their work problems with their leader, the boss always responds constructively. But if someone does say that their leader always responds constructively, that employee is about 12 times more likely to recommend the company as a great employer.
Britain's Boohoo, China's SHEIN and Hong Kong's Emmiol are the main players in a sector that produces items and collections at breakneck speed and rock-bottom prices.
So-called "ultra-fast fashion" has won legions of young fans who are able to snap up relatively cheap clothes online, but campaigners say the trend masks darker environmental problems.
Britain's Boohoo, China's SHEIN and Hong Kong's Emmiol are the main players in a sector that produces items and collections at breakneck speed and rock-bottom prices.
Their internet-based business model provides fierce competition to better-known "fast fashion" chains with physical stores, like Sweden's H&M and Spain's Zara.
According to Bloomberg, SHEIN generated $16 billion in global sales last year.
However, environmental pressure groups slam the "throwaway clothing" phenomenon as grossly wasteful—it takes 2,700 litres of water to make one T-shirt that is swiftly binned.
"Many of these cheap clothes end up... on huge dump sites, burnt on open fires, along riverbeds and washed out into the sea, with severe consequences for people and the planet," Greenpeace says.
Nevertheless, with inflation across the globe soaring to the highest level in decades, there is huge demand for low-price garments.
And after the coronavirus pandemic, high-street shops with big overhead costs are struggling to compete.
'Quantity not quality'
With T-shirts costing just the equivalent of $4.80 and bikinis and dresses selling for just under $10, for high-school students, such as 18-year-old Lola from the French city of Nancy, ultra-fast fashion shopping appears to offer unbeatable bargains.
Turning a blind eye to the environmental cost, she says brands such as SHEIN allow her to follow the latest trends "without spending an astronomical amount".
Lola says she normally places two or three orders per month on SHEIN with an average combined value of 70 euros ($71) for about 10 items.
Ultra-fast fashion's young target demographic are looking for "quantity rather than quality," says economics professor Valerie Guillard at Paris-Dauphine University.
Much of the success of SHEIN, which was founded in late 2008, is attributable to its massive presence on social media networks, such as TikTok, Instagram and YouTube.
In so-called "haul" videos, customers unwrap SHEIN packages, try on clothes and review them online.
On TikTok alone, there are 34.4 billion mentions of the hashtag #SHEIN and six billion for #SHEINhaul.
Climate campaigner Greta Thunberg also slams the ultra-fast fashion trend.
The brands also extend their reach via low-cost partnerships with so-called social-media influencers to build trust and increase sales.
Irish influencer Marleen Gallagher, 45, who works with SHEIN and other firms, praised them for offering broader-size ranges.
"They are unrivalled when it comes to choices for plus-size women," she told AFP.
Carbon footprint
But not only does the industry have a reputation for devouring valuable resources and damaging the environment, ultra-fast fashion companies have also been plagued by scandals over allegedly poor working conditions in their factories.
Swiss-based NGO Public Eye discovered in November 2022 that employees in some SHEIN factories worked up to 75 hours per week, in contravention of China's labour laws.
Britain's Boohoo similarly faced criticism following media reports that its suppliers were underpaying workers in Pakistan.
The industry's carbon footprint is equally disastrous.
The French Agency for Ecological Transition estimates that fast fashion accounts for two percent of global greenhouse emissions per year—as much as air transport and maritime traffic combined.
It comes as no surprise, then, that climate campaigner Greta Thunberg is damning.
"The fashion industry is a huge contributor to the climate and ecological emergency, not to mention its impact on the countless workers and communities who are being exploited around the world in order for some to enjoy fast fashion that many treat as disposables," Thunberg wrote last year.
The authorities are also beginning to scrutinise the brands' practices.
The British Competition and Markets Authority has opened a "greenwashing" probe against Boohoo, Asos and George at Asda over concerns that some of the environmental claims about their products are misleading.
Charlotte, 14, says she has decided to stop ordering from SHEIN and Emmiol.
"I was happy to have new clothes, but then I felt guilty," she said.
Now "I look for them on Vinted", an online marketplace for buying and selling new and secondhand items, the teenager said.
Citation: Ultra-fast fashion charms young despite damaging environment (2022, July 29) retrieved 29 July 2022 from https://ift.tt/po0buYx
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Ryan Napierala on maintaining The Meadowlands’ lightning fast oval.
by Debbie Little
Without the track, there’s no racing. And without The Meadowlands’ Ryan Napierala, there’s no track.
Napierala, director of racing properties and track, has been in charge of grooming the speedy mile oval for almost a decade and it’s a job he loves and, perhaps, was born to do.
Napierala, who turns 42 next week, was raised by his grandparents, Chuck and Sharon Sylvester, so he spent a lot of time learning the business from the Hall of Famer that he refers to as “dad” or “pops”.
“I’ve been going to The Meadowlands since he won his first Hambletonian [with Mack Lobell in 1987],” said Napierala. “Pops and Carl Allen helped me along the way a lot. And Clint Warrington. He was just a track wizard. He was absolutely one of the best.”
Courtesy Ryan Napierala
In the late 1990s, Sylvester owned and operated Magical Acres, a training facility in Chesterfield, NJ, where Napierala honed his skills.
Napierala remembers being 15 and in New Jersey for the summer to get his driver’s license.
“And pops said, ‘If you can’t drive a water truck, you can’t drive anything,’” said Napierala. “Then, I think he put me on a bulldozer out in the infield. I think we were digging out a pond. The equipment and all that is just natural to me and I kind of fell in love with it. It’s my niche.”
Rod Allen, Carl’s son, remembers being stabled at Magical Acres and Napierala being good natured.
“I don’t doubt that [my dad] put Ryan in the grater alongside him,” said Allen. “He just loved to run that machinery. He probably got more tutoring from my father because he did run a lot of heavy equipment and he put our own track in and he wasn’t shy about giving [Ryan] his opinion of how it should be, I do remember.”
By 19 or 20, Napierala was responsible for the track at Magical Acres.
“I got good at it because I got tired of being yelled at, because bad tracks are out there,” said Napierala. “They’re a dime a dozen.”
Sylvester was a visual teacher and would take Napierala to watch when the vet would draw fluid out of a horse’s knee, which meant the track was too hard, or, he would have him look at a horse’s beat up feet to show there were rocks on the track.
“So, I learned to get the rocks off the track and learned to make it springy, so the knees didn’t have fluid on them,” said Napierala. “I got insight from one of the best on what they want and then I just kind of ran with it. It’s tough when your dad’s Chuck Sylvester and he’s trying to show you something in harness racing. You better pay attention.”
Trainer Noel Daley has been stabled at Magical Acres for quite a while and is currently in Sylvester’s original barn.
“[Ryan’s] actually got the right temperament for the job,” said Daley. “He might get the abuse but he doesn’t appear to worry about it. Horsemen aren’t afraid to express their opinion, so if you want to be a trackman, you need to have a thick skin. It’s good to see that he’s gone on with it and made something of it.”
This is definitely the busiest time of year for Napierala with the Meadowlands Pace just about two weeks ago and the Hambletonian a week from Saturday.
Unless you live close to The Meadowlands, you may not be aware of the deluge that happened between 2 and 3 p.m. on Pace Night, but Napierala remembers it well.
“We anticipated the rain, what we didn’t anticipate is that it was going to be four inches of rain in like an hour,” said Napierala. “When the rain’s that bad and it’s moving the material, the screens are catching it and pulling it over to the next little indent and if you do it enough then you take away the washouts. A lot of tracks have to stop to fix their washouts, which normally we don’t have to do, because the track’s that good. That afternoon, there were washouts over the entire track, which never happens.”
As the sun came out and the track started to dry, Napierala and his crew began to cut the track, reopening it, to give it a little cushion. And even though local weathermen were saying the rain was done, Napierala was wary.
“I check a million different things out there for weather, which I think is going to give me PTSD one day,” said Napierala. “There was more rain coming so I started retightening it but it was a good surface. It wasn’t too hard at all and kind of worked out to be really good and really fast.”
When it comes to Bulldog Hanover’s world record mile that night, Napierala gives credit where it’s deserved.
“People are like, oh it’s the dirt,” said Napierala. “The dirt is the dirt, it ain’t got nothing to do with it. There’s no motor in the dirt, the motor’s in the horse. The track was tight because we had rain in the area and it’s a fast track when it’s tight like that, but I don’t like to take anything away from that horse. He just did something that was next level.”
Hambletonian Day is too far away to know for certain what the weather will be, but no matter what happens, Napierala will be ready to roll.
“It is the hardest day by far because my guys start at 8 in the morning, because it is Hambo Day,” said Napierala. “There’s no other day in harness racing that matters that much. That’s the epitome of the sport. If we have to be there from 6 in the morning until 10 at night that day, it doesn’t matter, we’re there.”
Allen had a thought about Napierala’s chosen profession.
“The two worst jobs on the track or in harness racing is the trackman and the race secretary, because you can’t please everybody,” said Allen. “Whenever a horse goes lame, it’s always the track. It’s not that they’ve been trained too hard or they have the wrong shoes on, it was the track.”
When you consider how fast miles have been this year at The Meadowlands, at least in part, it was the track.
When it comes to beauty practices and products, slow and steady *usually* wins the race; gradually weaning your skin onto retinol, incrementally adjusting your hair color (drastic overnight changes typically don't end well, just trust me), so on and so forth. However, as a notoriously impatient person who constantly craves instant gratification, allowing my favorite rituals and formulations the time and space to work their eventual magic is challenging. So, whenever possible, I prioritize the products that not only work fast—if not immediately—but are ultra-transformative, and, dare I say, miraculous. In fact, lots of said products I've discovered over the years work so well and efficiently, that they've even replaced costly in-office or salon procedures like filler, hair treatments, facials, brow appointments, blowouts, lash lifts, hair extensions, and more.
I have a sneaking suspicion I'm not the only one who wants to get the most by doing the least, so below, I compiled a list of 13 product categories that have completely transformed my routine and my results, plus the specific finds I rely on that work better, not harder to grant fast and noticeable results. Keep scrolling—these formulas guarantee 100% satisfaction.
Note: The following is based upon content from Variety Intelligence Platform’s special report devoted to exploring free ad-supported streaming TV (FAST), available exclusively to subscribers.
Sports are a key genre on FAST, accounting for 117 distinct channels as of July 2022.
Yet while sports channels are numerous — as they are on cable — the reality of FAST is very different. Many major sports leagues and brands lack a presence, be they cable networks, leagues or digital brands that could easily cross over.
What does exist in the world of sports FAST is a cornucopia of channels making the most of one of the major premises of the format: inexpensively bringing niche content to viewers. To that end, the four most distributed sports by distinct channels are MMA, adventure sports/outdoors, motor sports and professional wrestling, all of which fall beneath the major sports leagues when viewed on TV.
The carriage of sports varies drastically by platform. Some, such as Allen Media Group’s Local Now and Sports.TV services, offer a wide variety of sports programming, even if a lot of it is niche. Key, however, is the fact that the vast majority of FAST platforms do offer some mix of sports content, with most including over 10 channels in their lineups.
When assessing the most widespread sports FAST networks, a few interesting patterns emerge. First is the use by some networks that are also available as over-the-air diginets of FAST as an alternative means of distribution. Channels such as beIN Sports Xtra and Stadium are utilizing FAST to the maximum in order to be in front of as many viewers as possible.
Next there is the plethora of special-interest channels, led by World Poker Tour, Outside TV+ and Outdoor America. These channels are able to thrive as FASTs given the low start-up costs, which dramatically reduce the scale of audience needed in order to turn a profit.
Brands with an established TV presence looking to take advantage of monetizing existing audiences also account for some of the most widespread sports channels. Impact! Wrestling, Pac-12 Insider and ACC Digital Network are widely distributed and point to a future where, in particular, other college football conferences launch their own channels.
But not all of sports has embraced the potential of FAST. Many cable networks either spurn it entirely (ESPN) or program their FASTs with older talk-show content that isn’t a viewer draw (Fox Sports).
Leagues too are slow to act on what FAST can bring. There are no NHL, NBA or NASCAR channels available at all, with leagues like EPL (1), MLS (1), UFC (1), PGA Tour (3), (WWE (1), NFL (4) and MLB (4) all yet to see big expansion. This is a big mistake, as FAST offers a way for leagues to monetize old content and engage fans more frequently. A shift in strategy should soon occur.
The same could be said for SVOD services with exclusive sports rights. The likes of Paramount+, Peacock and ESPN+ have no upsell channel, showcasing some content in order to advertise and attract more viewers. For Paramount+ and ESPN+ specifically, with their range of sports content available, this is a strategy that could be easily rectified without compromising existing subscriptions.
Some sports have shown that they recognize the value FAST can offer. Within the next 18 months, anticipate many of the major sports brands to fully engage, too, and radically alter the face of sports FAST.
More From VIP+ on FAST
Are African Americans Underserved by FAST Channels? — Analyzing key differences in the utilization of FAST for African American content versus Spanish-language channels
For some species conquering new territory, it might be better to live fast and die young.
In a new study, biologists at the University of Iowa looked at why a type of freshwater snail that has invaded ecosystems worldwide has been so successful. Their conclusion: The lineages that were the most successful invaders matured and reproduced more quickly than noninvasive counterparts within the species.
The freshwater mud snails studied by the researchers are native to New Zealand and have spread—likely beginning on commercial ships—to dominate numerous lake and river ecosystems in Asia, North America, Europe, and elsewhere. The species are interesting to biologists because they reproduce both sexually and asexually—the latter where females reproduce without males by making genetic copies of themselves—and thus can be used to better understand the advantages and disadvantages of sexual reproduction.
“A lot of invasive species research focuses on prevention measures. We have so many invasive species, once they’re there and established, it’s harder to get rid of them. If we can find some way to predict what would be good invasive species, we could implement prevention measures.”
—Maurine Neiman, UI professor of biology
The asexual snails have been the more successful invaders, despite having much lower genetic diversity than the sexual snails. Moreover, the successful invaders also had slower growth rates—and were smaller in size—than the sexual snails, the researchers found. That combination would generally sink a species’ ability to compete in a new setting.
“It’s like these snails have this unusual constellation of traits that becomes almost ubiquitous in the invaders. So, that gets to the core question we’re asking, ‘What makes an invasive lineage invasive?’” says Maurine Neiman, professor in the Department of Biology at Iowa and the study’s senior author.
“I think the data suggest there seems to be a real advantage to this combination of slow growth rate and early reproductive maturity,” Neiman continues. “Their generation times are faster, and they are likely to outcompete other snail lineages that mature more slowly.”
In a lab, the researchers grew populations of snails originally collected in Belgium and in six locations across the United States. They examined the progeny for “life history traits,” meaning the characteristics related to an organism’s fitness or reproductive success that would allow them to thrive in a new environment.
“They grow up substantially faster than their New Zealand counterparts,” says Carina Donne, the study’s corresponding author who earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Iowa and is pursuing a doctorate in biology at Colorado State University. “That just shortens the whole life cycle. If you can make babies at a younger age, then all things being equal, your populations will grow faster.”
While it’s the success strategy for one invasive species, the biologists think it may show that life history traits could be fundamental to whether and how other species root themselves in new settings.
“A lot of invasive species research focuses on prevention measures. We have so many invasive species, once they’re there and established, it’s harder to get rid of them,” Neiman says. “If we can find some way to predict what would be good invasive species, we could implement prevention measures.”
The study, “Life-history trait variation in native vs. invasive asexual New Zealand mud snails,” was published online July 25 in the journal Oecologia.
Contributing authors, all from Iowa, include former undergraduate and master’s students Katelyn Larkin and Claire Adrian-Tucci, and former undergraduate students Abby Good and Carson Kephart.
The U.S. National Science Foundation, Carver Trust, and Rick and Linda Maxson funded the research.
Charting 20 years of the ultra-fast Audi wagons in the 591-hp RS 6 Avant
Static photo Daytona grey (2002 - 2004) , Misano red (2013 - 2018), Daytona grey (since 2019), Inuit white (2008 - 2011), Sedan Nimbus grey (2008 - 2011)Photo by Audi
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A fast Audi wagon is not a variant, it is the soul of the breed. Unlike Mercedes’ AMG and BMW’s M, Audi Sport’s ‘RS’ badge was first found on a hatch, and it will likely always be on one. Not that Audi doesn’t build more emotion-stirring fare like the mid-engined R8, but the company’s flagship model will always be a practical wagon with plenty of cargo space for your luggage — and enough accelerative power to compress your carefully packed socks and underwear like a neutron star.
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And finally, finally, Audi’s letting us at the good stuff. Launched for the 2021 model year, the RS 6 Avant is this year celebrating twenty years of being just the biggest enthusiast-car tease on the planet. You’d see these overpowered estate cars in European magazines or when on holiday, blitzing down the unrestricted autobahn with as much horsepower as your average Lamborghini and a useful tow bar.
The new one’s a 591 hp monster, with a twin-turbocharged wave of torque that flings the driver towards the horizon in an unrelenting surge. At the same time, it is the most discrete and clearly differentiated RS 6 that Audi has yet built. This is no rocket booster strapped to an A6 Avant, but something completely different, carefully tweaked using the lessons learned in building four generations of RS 6 Avant. It’s also unlike the competition — not that there’s much competition — being relatively drama-free while still carrying a distinct personality.
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With the C8 generation of RS 6 Avant, Audi has built its best fast wagon yet. It did so by listening to its customer base, rather than benchmarking rivals. In the shadow of the Rocky Mountains, a multi-generation wagon train of fast Audis tells the story. We had to wait, but it was worth it.
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The very first Audi RS (Renn Sport, literally “Racing Sport”) model was the RS 2, co-developed with Porsche. At the time, Porsche had the go-to expertise on turbocharging, and the company was winding down production of the 500E, which it was building under a contract with Mercedes. Made in 1994 and 1995, the RS 2 was small, nimble, and had a dose of Audi rally-car heritage about it.
Porsche got a healthy 310 hp out of the RS 2’s 2.2L five-cylinder engine, which combined with Audi’s all-wheel-drive to make the RS 2 unbeatably quick off the line. Because of the Porsche connection, these cars have become very collectible, and prices have spiked sharply.
With the followup RS 4 Avant in 1999, Audi Sport moved development in-house. This time, power was a twin-turbocharged V6, similar to that found in the Audi S4 sold in Canada at the time. However, the RS 4 had over a 100 hp more than the version we got, as well as upgraded brakes, suspension, and a wider body.
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Things really came to a head with the first RS 6. About 90 of these were sold in Canada in the sedan version in 2004, making them equally as rare as the original Canadian-spec Ur-Quattro. Unlike the RS 2 and RS 4, the RS 6 wasn’t intended to be a rally-infused machine, nor a sporty wagon. With a twin-turbocharged 4.2L V8, it was an absolute freight-train.
A wolf in wagon’s clothing
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The RS 6 was first made available as a wagon, debuting at the Geneva Auto Show in the spring of 2002. This was a strong moment for subtle German engineering, with the V8-powered E39 M5 still considered one of the high points of the breed and the brutish AMG E55 sedan soon on the way.
Audi’s take on the executive express was even more wolf-in-sheep’s-clothing. A partially assembled standard A6 Avant was taken from the production line, and the incomplete cars were sent to the quattro Gmbh factory to be fitted with specially designed engine and aerodynamic parts.
The specs are impressive even today. That twin-turbocharged V8 is good for roughly 450 hp, but the real story is the torque curve — or rather, a torque mesa. Full boost comes on by 1,950 rpm and holds until 5,600 rpm, putting 428 lb-ft of torque through a six-speed automatic transmission to all four wheels.
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The power is sufficient to give the speedometer needle the sweep time of a stopwatch second hand. There’s none of the rush to redline of a contemporary BMW or AMG hot-rod bellowing — the RS 6 Avant just plants and goes, with near-unlimited passing power under your foot.
Thanks to Canada’s fifteen-year grey market, this generation of RS 6 Avant is now importable from Europe or Japan (Japanese-market RS models from this time are still all left-hand-drive). It’s an enormously complex car, so you need to have an Audi expert at close hand, but it still feels as fast now as it did then.
Ten cylinders and all of the torques
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As mentioned, the first salvo of the RS 6 was all about that low-end shove. Really, the only rival to the car was the likes of specialist manufacturer Alpina, which also built cars that felt like they were bred for running the unrestricted autobahn at above 200 km/h, totally unperturbed.
As a followup, Audi Sport went completely insane. Thanks to Audi’s development of the ‘baby Lamborghini’ Gallardo, engineers now had access to a new V10 engine. They did what any sensible enthusiast would: stuffed it in a nondescript wagon and twin-turbocharged it.
The second-generation RS 6 Avant is both the most discreet version and also the most bonkers. With 570 hp out of 5.0L, it was the most powerful Audi at the time — and more powerful than any road-going Gallardo — and still boasts the largest engine fitted to an RS car.
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By “fitted” you can read ‘squeezed into.’ All RS engine bays are crowded by the piping required for twin-turbocharging, but the V10-engined car is an exceptionally tight fit. Audi Sport’s engineers like to joke that you can pour a glass of water into the open hood and none will leak out onto the tarmac below.
This much engine up front made the car quite nose-heavy, so it is not the RS 6 for windy roads. In terms of power delivery, however, it outclasses its ancestor by an additional hundred horsepower, warping off into the distance on the straightaways. Yet, especially in white, it is utterly unremarkable to look at.
The 305 km/h tow bar problem
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Seeking to bring a little poise back to the RS 6, Audi declared V10 power a single-generation experiment and returned the model to V8 power. Output was slightly down, but performance improved thanks to a new eight-speed transmission.
Canadian Audi fans got a taste of at least the powertrain in this new model thanks to the RS7 liftback. Interest was piqued, but there would be no Avant on this side of the water — at least not yet.
Meantime, Audi Sport was dealing with customer feedback on its packaging. RS 6 Avant customers were highly loyal and loved the blend of performance and practicality. But in designing this generation of RS 6, some options clashed. If you wanted adaptive suspension and its higher top speed of 305 km/h, you had to forgo putting the optional tow back package in — it would only fit on the air-suspension car, which was limited to 280km/h.
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This seems like a crazy problem to have, but roughly half of all RS 6 Avants are fitted with the tow bar package to carry bikes and the like — and you don’t buy an RS 6 to have the slower version. For the next version, Audi would have the solution ready.
The wagon stands alone
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Today, you can have your towbar and still hit a top speed of 305 km/h. Audi engineers gently suggest removing the trailer first.
In terms of Swiss-army-knife do-everythingness, the current RS 6 is an unbeatable package. It’s no longer a wolf in sheep’s clothing, more a wolf in a shirt that says, ‘A wolf? I haven’t seen any wolves lately. Don’t ask me any more questions.’ But pick the exterior options right and forego the brushed aluminum trim, and it’s still subtle enough to whisper where other marques shout.
The performance is much the same. The BMW M5 is a sort of track-ready intercontinental ballistic missile, loud and drifty. The Mercedes-AMG E63 wagon lifts its nose on acceleration and bellows like an angry dinosaur, all Swabian hot-rod.
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The RS 6 just grips and goes. If anything, you hear a bit less of the hissing boost in the cabin than with the older cars. It’s not drama, it’s just power and speed — the kind made for either sustained autobahn velocities or warping past a tractor-trailer in a short passing zone.
The people who buy these tend to have a second car for track duties, so the road-going focus makes sense here. With rear-wheel steering, the RS 6 is very stable at speed, but also more maneuverable in a parking lot. The trunk is still huge, it’s comfortable and luxurious, and it delivers organ-rearranging acceleration with minimal fuss and drama.
In short, the current RS 6 Avant is the same as all the others that went before, just with one big change: it is still very very fast; it is still very practical; but now, for the first time, it’s here.
