Nope - it all comes down to homologation!
Both cars, be it US or European spec, are powered by the same 1.6-litre EcoBoost engine, and in truth the only difference between the cars is that the US model has a five-door body, while the Irish version a three-door. The confusion is down to the ST's 'overboost' function.
When required the Fiesta ST can deliver 200hp and 260Nm of torque - rather than the 182hp and 240Nm that the spec sheet lists - for 20 seconds at a time. Now I know that you are thinking "that will make overtaking handy but little else." Well here's the thing - while the extra power is limited to 20 second chunks at a time before the car's ECU automatically throttles back, if during that 20 seconds you lift off the accelerator the clock starts afresh.
Lift off to change gear - that's a fresh 20 seconds. Lift off while approaching a corner - that's a fresh 20 seconds and - assuming you do not employ left foot braking - if you brake for a tighter corner that's a fresh 20 seconds. The amount of time you are off throttle has no bearing on the outcome; all the banks of computers have to sense is a release of throttle before charging the system again and sending you on your merry way.
So if, in a 61-second timeframe, you momentarily lift off to change gears three times you could feasibly have 60 seconds of full 200hp/260Nm (assuming you can do three gear changes in a second) and in all reality, unless you are doing a full speed run on the Autobahn, you are unlikely to be at full throttle for longer than 20 seconds at a time anyway.
So any notion that Ford has ceded a power advantage to its two main rivals is tosh - for all intents and purposes the Fiesta ST has the same 200hp power output as the Clio Renaultsport and Peugeot 208 GTi - it just could not convince European certifiers of that.
Click here for our first drive of the new Ford Fiesta ST.
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