The very best of AMG

Unforgiving, technical, and with runoff that looks modelled on a photo from the Mars Rover, Willow Springs is a racetrack with consequences... Welcome to the venue for the Best of AMG 2013. And welcome to yours truly's introduction to AMG's premier road car, the SLS Black Series.

With over 620hp (somehow 464kW doesn't sound quite as impressive), 635Nm and carbon ceramic brakes that look like they're big enough to stop an A380, the Black is a serious piece of kit. And as I try to come to terms with Willow's challenging side of a mountain nine turn 4.0km layout, it's laughing at me.

Ahead is Max Gotz, German GT3 champ, AMG instructor and Nurburging master. He's in an SLS GT, thank God! At least the mid-level GT's shagged tyres, overactive rear suspension and less potent brakes (still supercar strong, but not what the Black's got) are conspiring to give me a chance to keep him, and his lines, in sight.

I write off the first session as a learning experience – I'm that far off the pace. Maxi's advice, that the fastest apexes for Willow are not necessarily tight to the edge of the track, mean the second set of laps are faster... Much faster... The SLS Black Series is still laughing, but as the cliché goes, this time it's with me, not at me...

The Best of AMG is a new initiative – a chance to drive a cross-section of the performance arm of Mercedes-Benz's best and brightest. It's organised by AMG's American cousins in the largest overseas market for AMG products – California.

A-Class hatches aren't sold in the USA, but the new CLA is – hence the Best of AMG line-up kicks off with the CLA 45. Between that and the SLS Black, there's plenty of variety and horsepower: SLS cabrios, SLs – both V8 (SL 63) and V12 (SL65) – assorted E and CLSs and the pinnacle of the current (and about to be runout) C-Class line-up, the C 63 Edition 507. Add in a full set of AMG SUVs, ML, GL and the very silly G63 and there's plenty to keep us busy over the two-day program.

Willow Springs is in the high desert adjacent to Edwards Air Force Base. At this juncture I could invoke a pun about the AMGs having The Right Stuff. But I'll resist... Almost. Certainly a fighter pilot would be more at home in the SLS's cockpit than this writer, especially in the long G-loaded turns of Willow.

Turns Three and Eight have your neck muscles straining to keep a helmeted head upright. In contrast to the standard SLS and GT we're chasing, the Black Series has preternatural grip and once the special Michelin Cup street-legal tyres are warm, I'm able to feed ridiculous amounts of throttle into the rears.

When slides come, they're sharp but tempered by AMG's remarkably subtle stability control system. AMG event planners are brave but not stupid – we're under strict orders not to turn the nannies all the way to OFF.

Our SLS Black drive is just the beginning of the adventure but it's the highlight. At the motoring.com.au coalface it doesn't get much better than this.

In Australia the SLS Black will set you back over $630K plus on roads. In the USA its $275,000 and Mercedes-Benz USA already has orders for 120 – just nine were allocated to Oz. Thus the five SLS Blacks we have lined up at our beck and call are a sight unlikely to be repeated Down Under.

That we have essentially unlimited access to them and the Willow Spring layout is, even in hindsight, still hard to believe.

POCKET ROCKET
Soon enough, we leave the rarified air of Supercartown USA and are let loose in the smallest AMG sedan, the CLA 45, on the Streets of Willow – a pocket version adjacent to the main track. It's tighter and, though not nearly as blindingly quick, plenty technical.

Just released and already a sell-out success Down under, the CLA is a new style of AMG. Based on a front-drive donor car, the engine is transverse. Both are firsts for an AMG production car. It's also a four-cylinder... But what a four: the world's most powerful production four-cylinder no less.

Not very long ago, Mercedes V8s almost three-times the capacity weren't pumping out the level of power the CLA (and A) 45 AMG delivers. The bare numbers are now well publicised: 265kW and 450Nm. It's the aplomb with which the blown 2.0-litre four produces the numbers that's even more impressive.

With its 265kW output requiring a large single turbo to deliver close to 2bar of boost, the engine should by any measure have enormous amounts of lag and thus be cranky and almost undrivable. We've already learned via a road drive in Australia it's anything but... In normal street driving, the CLA 45's seven-speed dual-clutch gearbox readily grabs the tallest gears with just middling revs on the tacho for smooth, quiet and relatively economic progress.

On the streets of Willow, the CLA shows its other side – a genuine pocket performer.

Although actually longer than a C-Class sedan, the relatively tight cabin and low roofline lends the CLA a much more compact feel. On the tight twisting layout of the Streets of Willow, I'm immediately at home, though AMG Chief Instructor Reinhold Renger sets a cracking pace in a standard SLS.

The CLA's on this tight course for one thing – to demonstrate the effectiveness of the car's all-wheel drive system. Unlike other AWD set-ups, the CLA 45 in a static state is 100 per cent front drive. It's only in extremis that drive is transferred rearwards – the 'Streets' layout and Renger's pace provide the conditions necessary.

After a sighting lap or two, the CLA 45 is soon fast enough to harry Renger in the SLS and proves amazingly predictable. Push too hard into a corner and the CLA will still understeer but the attitude becomes more neutral as drive shifts noticeable to the rear. Unlike some other systems, the CLA is unable to transfer more than 50 per cent of torque to the rear so wild oversteer slides aren't likely. Fast purposeful progress is!

As we noted when we tested the A 45 in the Bass Hills recently, ultimately grip levels for the new AWD four-cylinder AMGs are governed by the Dunlop SportMaxx rubber that's fitted. That these slip relatively early and benignly is not a bad thing. It gifts the CLA a wonderful, controllable, chuckable nature that puts a smile on your face every lap.

AMG boss Tobias Moers has green lighted a program to develop a racing version of the CLA 45. Already one market has signed on and the engineer-cum-Chairman and CEO thinks there'll be more.

AMG's Customer Race division currently offers a single turn-key racer, the seriously expensive and seriously fast SLS GT3. Moers tells motoring.com.au that he sees many would-be racers intimidated at the spend and cojones required to secure an SLS GT3 and race it. The CLA 45 racer could be a good stepping stone onto the racetrack for many would be AMG customers.

Ironically, as racing rules are structured for key European events such as the Nurburgring 24hr, the CLA 45 racer may end up a front-drive only racer. Moers hints at gifting us a drive of the finished product – an offer I intend to take him up on.

SMOKE SCREEN
The CLA induced smile gets even wider when we sample what will likely be the last naturally-aspirated V8 C-Class – the Edition 507 C63 AMG.

A couple of years ago this writer got very close to spending a prodigious amount of my own money on a C63 Estate. The Streets of Willow and the latest SLS-engined 507 C63 coupe has done nothing to bolster my flagging will power.

The 507 is a C63 turned up to... Well, if not 11, then 10.5! Under the bonnet there's the same 6.2-litre V8 as the lesser C63 but a dose of Gullwing engine internals boosts power to 373kW and torque to 610Nm.

It's not just the power boost that defines the 507 though –this is an engine that now revs like an SLS. The rate at which it's happy to spin up towards redline is in a different category than the 'standard' C63.

There are other detail changes such as bigger, stronger brakes. And a mix of standard C63 and C63 Black Series goodies make the car stand out visually. It looks the business.

And it goes and sounds like the business. It's fast even on a 'small' circuit like 'Streets' – so much so it almost feels under braked. After five or six fast laps, the pedal would soften just a touch – though to be fair that is after nearly two days of abuse.

If you're not paying the tyre bill, being very silly is very easy in the 507. Even with the stability and traction controls in place, this car is still only too happy to turn on the throttle. Indeed, if you're smooth and keep the lock levels reasonably sedate, it's possible to hold the car in a near-perfect slide out of one corner and into the next.

This sort of behaviour is hardly going to provide the feedback you need to make an informed buying decision, but boy, it's F-U-N!

Nevertheless after a few sessions I started to think the 507 would have been happier stretching its legs and bellowing alongside the SLS Black on the Big Willow track. How well it would have coped with the circuit's bumps might have been a question mark, however...

THE FOUR Es
If there's a surprise package from Best of AMG 2013, however, it's the all-wheel drive variant of the E63S. Big, wide and never (really) intended to go near a racetrack, it's a revelation after just a few corners of the Streets of Willow.

Aussie E63 buyers get a unique E-AMG model which combines the higher output 430kW E63S engine with rear-drive running gear. Simply, the current E and C-Class platforms cannot be engineered for AWD in right-hand drive form.

In Aussie form, therefore, the E63 is nearly always traction limited – breathe on the throttle in almost any sort of cornering situation and the nannies are cutting in, limiting your pace. Even a straight line acceleration test requires careful throttle modulation.

AMG's version of Mercedes-Benz 4MATIC fixes all of this. With a static front-rear drive bias of 33:67, the AWD retains the rear-drive characteristics of the 'standard' car but adds a whole lot more grip – and pace. Wider front and rear tracks make this big car absolutely surefooted.

At the risk of cheapening the whole experience, imagine a Lancer EVO that's been stretched a foot in every direction, now add a 430kW twin-turbo V8 that has almost zero turbo lag and enough torque to turn tyres on the rim... 800Nm... Got it?

Every one of the Aussie contingent got out of the E63S 4MATIC shaking their heads... It simply appears to defy normal auto rules. Here is a near two tonne executive saloon that can be driven to and over its limit with almost total abandon.

The manners are resolutely rear-drive, but the driven front tyres deliver a get out of gaol free card effect when you over step the mark. Just make sure they're pointed in the right direction and don't over-correct.

At one stage one of the AMG officials flagged in our E63S convoy because he'd seen smoke coming from a couple of cars. He had but it wasn't oil or something untoward– it was tyre smoke whisping from front and rear wheels! Amazing...

The good news is that the next generation of both C and E-Class families (the former of which debuts at 2014 Detriot Motor show in January) will at last be package protected for both AWD and right-hand drive.

AMG's Moers admitted to motoring.com.au that where the AWD option is available over 90 per cent of E63 buyers are ticking the box. He also says AWD will be part of AMG's DNA moving forward.

This change is all the more interesting given AMG's past insistence that rear-drive defined purity of performance, and that both Benz and BMW have for years derided Audi's quattro mechanicals as unnecessary complications...

A SPOT OF G
The high desert near Edwards and Willow Springs is not known for its scenery in the conventional sense... But the desert is stunning in its starkness. As much as the racetrack and the cars on it were hard to leave, there was one very different AMG all-wheel drive I wanted to experience.

The roads around the circuit in the main are frost and heat scarred (even in early autumn the temp overnight was close to zero) and gunbarrel straight. But the few corners we found were plenty good enough to prove our other outrageous AMG mount, the squared rigged G63 is no canyon carver.

Towards the end of the day I took a breather and drove the outrageously silly G63 around a 30km loop. After loping along at around the 130kmh a corner signposted 45mph emerged and as I tipped the G in for just a split second I thought I'd overcooked it... The big square rigger just lurched on its suspension and headed tangentially towards the cactus.

It took longer than was comfortable and a second bite of the steering to negotiate that bend... You're not in Kansas anymore, Sinkers – and definitely not in a sportscar.

In reality, the impression was magnified after the almost synaptic connection the SLS Black and even the E63S offer to their driver.

Very much an AMG, the G is, however, a statement, not a sports car.

Mercedes-Benz AMG SLS Black Series
What is it: GT3 racecar for the road. AMG's top of the range performance weapon
Under the hood: 6.2-litre naturally-aspirated V8, modified for more power and increased 8000rpm readline
Pull or push: Push. Seven-speed DCT transaxle, electronically controlled mechanical locking diff.
For the sort of driver who: also owns an SLS GT3 racer
Pick a road/track: Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit
Final word: Better than you are... Everywhere

Price: $639,000
Output: 430kW/610Nm
0-60mph (US figures): 3.5sec
Wheels: AMG forged alloy 10x19/12x20
Tyres: Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 275/35 R19 325/30 R20

Price: $172,407 (Coupe)
Output: 373kW/610Nm
0-60mph (US figures): 4.1sec
Wheels/Tyres: AMG alloy 19/ 235/35 R 19 and 255/30 R 19

Price: $86,900
Output: 265kW/450Nm
0-60mph (US figures): 4.5sec
Wheels/Tyres: AMG alloy 19/ 235/35 R 19

Price: $249,900 (rear-drive E63S)
Output: 430kW/800Nm
0-60mph (US figures): 3.5sec
Wheels/Tyres: AMG alloy 19s/ 255/35 R 19 and 285/30 R 19

Price: $229,725
Output: 400kW/760Nm
0-60mph (US figures): 5.3sec
Wheels/Tyres: AMG alloy 9.5x20 / 275/50 R 20