2008 Audi R8: Cracking 25,000 Miles

I like the gauges. Nissan, Mitsubishi and Fuji should all take note on how they should be done.

Why not? It kills resale value, for one thing. People who own this type of car usually care about that.

Resale value, schmeesale value.

I applaud InsideLine. It's a car. Drive it. These exotics are largely just trading cards for the uber-wealthy. They sit in heated garages, go out for pampered little runs every few weeks (only in the summer, of course) and after three years, the owner's sell them with less than 4k miles to some other d**chewang who's going to do the same thing. Such a freaking waste.

There was a great letter in a recent Roundel issue (BMWCCA's mag) that lamented the number of cars in the mag's "for sale" section that had "never tracked." The writer said that meant "never loved," and I agree. I just don't understand the point of dropping that kind of cash on a car and parking it for 99% of its life.

Oops... "owners." Damn I hate it when people put apostrophes on plurals. ;)

I would agree that it's unfortunate that cars like these don't get driven as they should be, which makes it also unfortunate that the people who would drive them a lot typically can't afford them either.

I mean, goodness, if I had the money for an R8, it'd be my daily driver.

I know there is a 2008 S5 with around 56,000 miles on it (I religiously look for A5/S5's on Cars.com) at Riverside Audi in NJ. But the highest mileage on an R8 I can find has 16,000 and it's in your guys neck of the woods.

I've vowed that, provided I make it to the point where I can afford one of these, I'll be using it regularly with another high-performance car (think M3). The car is going to depreciate regardless of if I use it, so what's a few extra bucks when I can afford this beauty. It's like buying a mansion and living in 2 rooms- it just doesn't make sense.

I love the beautiful elecroluminescent gauges. Has the car performed any differently now after 25 grand on the clock? And how does it feel now after the extensive servicing? Keep us posted!

Well done on the 25k miles, IL. Does anyone remember the Ferrari Enzo owner who decided to not only use his car as a daily driver, but to also make it the highest mileage Ferrari in existence? He loaned it to Road & Track for a long road trip story and rallied it extensively. Unfortunately, on one such rally he flipped it doing triple digits on a public road

"I like the gauges. Nissan, Mitsubishi and Fuji should all take note on how they should be done."

Maybe it's the overexposure, but that photo of the gauges doesn't do anything for me. It seems like everyone is copying the center rectangle informationometer these days and the rest is pretty standard stuff, though I do appreciate the amount of information displayed at one time.

tenfifteen, +1 on the mis-usage of apostrophes as plurals.

I do just under 30k miles per year and if the R8 was my ride I'd do the same to her.

Too true, dragonflight... the thing is, it's a rare, rare exotic that doesn't depreciate (limited run Ferraris, usually; Enzo, 288 GTO, 360 CS, Scud, etc.). So it's either going to depreciate a little if you drive it like it's some precious jewel, or a little more if you drive it like it was meant to be driven. I'd like to think the gulf between the two would be more than made up for by the amount of enjoyment I'd get out of, you know, driving it. To wit, I bought an '06 M3 in April of this year, and have already put 10k on it. Considering I take the train to work most days, that's quite a bit for me.

And cwc1, yes... doesn't that drive you nut's? ;)

Very nice gauges indeed, that's so important. I found at least one R8 in Southern France with 47000 km (29204mi): http://www.lacentrale.fr/auto-occasion-annonce-7249053.html
Also a few in Germany/Netherland with 30k miles.
By the way how bad is the wear on the driver's seat by now?