I have slightly over 4,000 miles on my i4 e40 and finally figured out how the rear wheel drive i4 likes to be driven: like a Go Kart!
Race car driver Walter Rohrl once stated something to the sort that it was pretty much impossible to lose control of a Porsche Boxster. Boxsters/Caymans are the best handling vehicles out there. Besides my i4, the only other rear wheel drive cars that I extensively drove were Boxsters of differing generations including the latest 718 and a 718 Cayman T.
Since all the other cars I’ve owned besides the i4 were front wheel drive, I’ve had to get used to daily driving a rear wheel drive car. For the past 6 years I had two different GTIs with a limited slip differential up front putting power disproportionally to the outside wheel to pull the car around tight turns in a drifting like fashion. This technology is why the GTI set a record with a GTI Clubsport on the Nurburgring for the fastest lap time of any front wheel drive vehicle years back.
I learned to drive manual transmission off road in a hatchback with low and high 4WD when I was 13, but I also started regularly going to a slick track oval Go Kart track. I learned how to drift when I was 13 and regain control if my back started coming out while driving. In a torrential downpour on a freeway, while on an on-pass, merging from one freeway to another that knowledge was put to good use in 2012 when split second action in my turbo diesel Golf meant the difference between hitting a cement guard rail/wall and regaining control so quickly it was just like a walk in the park.
The i4 won’t get around a tight track as fast as a Boxster or GTI, but that is perfectly fine for a great handling sports sedan. In fact because the i4 handles more like a Go Kart on a slick track, it’s more fun! I’m 40 and driving a great handling fun to drive car that makes me think like I’m 13 again, sitting behind the wheel of a Go Kart. I raced my son with Go Karts on a slick track about a month ago so when I told him that I drifted my i4 e40 (in a responsible manner) and then explained to him how that is in the Go Karts we were racing/drifting, he knew exactly how fun it was/is.
If you want to better learn how to drive, enjoy, or recover from losing control from adverse conditions while in an i4 I highly recommend finding a Go Kart specific business and taking a powerful Go Kart (not a watered down miniature Golf Go Kart) out on an oval slick track!
(Extended Test Drive of a Boxster, “racing” an F18 at Miramar. My son riding shotgun was the photographer)
(Behind the wheel with my brother riding shotgun (R.I.P.) in a Boxster he rented for me the first time my birthday and Father’s Day were on the same day)
AND the best tool for mastering how to properly handle you i4:
