Hello and a request for some quick feedback
 

Hello everyone -

New member here on the forums. Recently I have decided that I want to move away from my truck and dip my toe into the sport luxury car segment. Ever since I was 16 I have owned nothing but Ford trucks in one flavor or another but now that I am in my mid 40's I have an urge to finally drive something a bit sporty.....mid-life crisis at its best lol!

After driving a couple BMW's....a couple Lexus, Lincoln, Cadillac, Infiniti etc I finally drove an S3 this weekend and instantly fell in love.....just felt like the car I wanted.

So now I am looking for a recent CPO (2015 or 2016) and have pretty much narrowed the options down to what I want except for one....which is why I need help/advice.

And the advice i need - Seats - specifically the sport seats. I love the way these seats look in the pictures I have seen with the diamond pattern quilting and the extra stitching you get on the interior as well.

That being said I have also read that these may not be as comfortable as the other seats and this concerns me as I need the car to be comfortable on long cruises and rarely will I push the car to its limits except in straight lines.

Unfortunately I cant find a car close by in the Raleigh, NC area with those seats to go sit in them and even if I did I would still worry about comfort after sitting in them for 3-4 hours.

Any feedback or advice you guys and gals may have is greatly appreciated!

I can't comment on the sports seats, but I have the regular seats and took a ~4.5 hour (each way) drive a couple weekends ago and the standard seats (12-way?) were very comfortable and I didn't find them lacking at all. I'm 5'8 about 170 fwiw.

there are some pros and cons. regular seats are power, sport is manual. also, the leather on the sport seats are very soft and crack easily, but they do look amazing.

If you drive aggressively on twisty roads the sport seats are outstanding. Same if you ever plan to take the car to the track. The downside of sport seats is twofold with your size a consideration - big people tend to find them confining. The other aspect is getting in and out of the car. With a higher bolster you are pushing up and over each time you enter and exit. That is slightly annoying over time. In addition the bolster will show significantly more wear over time.

I love sport seats, but I love to push my cars through the twisties so I like the extra bolstering. My wife hates it when I push it in the twisties, and she hates the higher bolsters. She does like going fast in a straight line, or at least she doesn't yell at me.

Also, I don't know if anyone else will be driving your car, but the power/memory of the standard seat I consider a must for shared vehicles. I use my wife's Benz frequently at the moment and if we had to adjust the seat manually every time I think we'd be really frustrated by now. Which is fun, because she wants to drive the RS3 when I get it and that only comes with the manual sport seats. We'll see how much she actually drives it.

From what you describe of your driving habits to be I would personally go with the standard seats. They may not look as cool but will be far more functional/comfortable in the long run.

My 2015 S3 has the 'regular' seats. Very comfortable to me. Great on long drives. There is also the thigh pullout extension which can aid people with longer legs on longer drives. Power option is nice but I could live without it as I'm about the only person who ever drives my car. The sport seats do look better overall.

i have regular power seats, but no seat memory. :-(