A1 ad infinitum

Want to know more about Audi's forthcoming A1 to be premiered at this year's Geneva motor show in March?

Audi certainly would like you to, as it builds up expectations for its new sub-A3 model that was talked about quite a bit after exposure of the A1 project quattro (pictured) and Sportback concepts at the 2007 Tokyo motor show. Subsequently though, things went quiet.

The volume has now been cranked up. The company says today that the "real" A1 will be a lot more than simply a rework of the show cars, as the designs have been "systematically refined ever since".

With this claim in place, the hype department at Audi is in full swing as it continues a drip-feed of information intended to keep the forthcoming sub-compact at front of mind for both the motoring press and the public.

Latest salvo in the dissemination of information bytes is the establishing of a site that will give the motoring press advance information on new details as they are released.

The intention is to give the press time to prepare material for release before the information becomes public.

Although it is common for auto makers to provide the press with embargoed advance material prior to officially launching a new model, it is less common to use the same ploy with minor drip-feed details.

So, although we have already been told there will be something special about the A1's A and C pillars, the single-frame Audi grille and the headlight design, there's more to come.

All we really know about the A1 through Audi so far is that it will be less than four metres long -- although a leaked image of the car being filmed with singer Justin Timberlake for an upcoming TV commercial made its way into the media in November last year. The images showed distinctly Audi themes without any real suggestion of radical styling departures.

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