For more than four decades, ‘RS’ has stood for some of the greatest and most exciting Ford cars ever made, from the Escort RS2000 to the Sierra RS Cosworth and, of course, the new Mk3 Focus RS.
Those two little letters stand for Rallye Sport, a tip of the hat to Ford’s global success in racing and rallying, whcih twists otherwise mild models into fire-breathing performance monsters.
One of the cars which Ford fans have always wished would get the RS treatment has been the ever-popular Fiesta, and 12 years ago Ford finally delivered with the Fiesta RS Concept unveiled at the 2004 Geneva Motor Show.
The previous year, Ford had brought production of the first-generation Focus RS to a close. Controversially unruly but unbelievably fast and aggressively styled, the Mk1 Focus RS had fuelled the fire in the bellies of RS fans, who now demanded a flagship Fiesta to sit above the 150bhp ST.
Inspired by the Fiesta Rallye Concept from 2002, the Fiesta RS featured swollen wheel arches with huge 18-inch alloy wheels tucked under them, along with angry bumpers like the Focus RS and a striped livery that harked back to the GT and the Shelby Mustangs.
Part rally car and part Need for Speed: Underground creation, even more than a decade on the Fiesta RS still looks relatively modern and no less aggressive than it did back in 2004. Ford was really serious about making it too, in a virtually identical form to that of the Geneva concept model.
Aggressive looks, 200bhp turbo engine
The head of RS at the time was a chap named Jost Capito, who has since gone on to spearhead Volkswagen’s record dominance in the WRC and who most recently was announced as the next person to try and spur on McLaren’s Formula One fortunes.
Fair to say he knows a thing or two about fast cars, then, and at the time Capito noted that the sort of person who would want to buy a Fiesta RS wouldn’t be happy unless it came in all of its ASBO-courting, Max Power glory.
Ford insiders at the time insisted that the production version would be on sale sometime around 2006 and would be powered by a 2.0-litre turbocharged engine that produced as much as 200bhp; phenomenal horsepower for a car of its kind at the time.
Unfortunately, that same dedication to aggression proved to be the end of the much-anticipated Fiesta RS. The Focus RS, as game-changing as it had been, reportedly lost Ford £4,500 for every car that was produced, due to the fact that it was finished by hand.
Despite huge interest from would-be buyers, Ford’s financiers just couldn’t get the numbers to add up, and Capito specifically stated: “I don’t want to be seen as a man who loses money”.
Reluctantly, Ford shelved the project and instead turned its attention towards the second-generation Focus ST. The next Ford to wear an RS badge would be five years away, in the form of the hugely successful and hyper-violent Mk2 Focus RS.
Financial troubles
The decision would end up hurting the manufacturer anyway, as Ford reported diminishing demand for the Fiesta ST in light of the RS’ cancellation. Buyers wanted more power and more aggression, and with the RS cancelled they instead flocked to rival hot hatches like the Renaultsport Clio.
Rumours of a new Fiesta RS have continued to persist in the years since, with many publications claiming that an RS-badged Fiesta is still just around the corner despite the fact that Ford has continually quashed the hearsay.
The runaway success of the latest Focus RS may change that, however. Ford has spoken recently about the importance of the RS brand and stated that the same four-wheel drive system developed for the Focus RS will eventually make its way into other cars in the manufacturer’s lineup.
Current rumours claim that prototype Fiesta RS mules have been spotted testing, with the race-tuned supermini tipped to generate up to 250bhp and potentially come with four-wheel drive, though there’s been no credible sources to confirm this as yet.
The fact that the current generation Fiesta will cease production next year further pours cold water on those rumours, as Ford would have to move pretty swiftly to bring an RS model to market before the Fiesta is replaced.
In the meantime, the closest you’ll be able to get is one of M-Sport’s Fiesta RS WRC rally cars, but given that one of those will set you back around £400,000, it’s probably a little outside the price range of most RS buyers. Still, a fan can dream…
