Just ahead of the 2017 Geneva Motorshow, Ford has revealed the new 2018 Fiesta ST. Based on the upcoming Mk8 Fiesta (or Mk7 if you count the 1999 to 2002 car as a Mk4 facelift not a Mk5), these images were made available yesterday by Ford Media. The car is expected to go on sale early next year.

The biggest difference is out goes the 4 cylinder 1.6 and in its place is a lighter, all aluminium 1.5L three cylinder. The new engine produces 197bhp/200ps, a 17bhp improvement on the 180bhp of the current model. Torque is up from 230Nm to 290Nm. No mention of an overboost function like the current model. 0-60 drops two tenths of a second to 6.7. With each new model comes more technology to reduce emissions and the new ST is no exception - lower CO2 and cylinder deactivation too.

Borrowing from its big brother, the Focus RS, the ST now has driving modes - Normal, Sport and Track. Inside the car the Recaro seats remain, but new additions include a flat bottomed wheel, 8 inch touchscreen with Sync 3, and an Electronic Sound Enhancement (ESE) feature, a device to “amplify the naturally sporty sound of the new 1.5-litre Ecoboost engine”.

Some Thoughts

The previous ST was a huge success and brought the return of the truely tunable Fiesta and this looks to carry on that story. The most interesting thing here is the 3 cylinder engine. It’s not new, having been in the Zetec-S for a while in 999cc form, but this is quite a step up in power output (approximately double). An odd number of cylinders usually gives a characterful sound so hopefully that will be the case here. It certainly sounds promising from the launch video Ford have produced.

As expected, the restrained styling of the last ST has remained with this one. Coupled with the smaller engine this perhaps leaves room for a 4 cylinder, 250bhp+, wilder looking RS to top the range? With the Focus now 4WD, a FWD Fiesta shouldn’t eat into its market too much (think Fiesta RS Turbo vs Escort Cosworth). Given that it’s 25 years now since we last had a Fiesta RS launch we can but hope!