After waiting for what seems an age for the ST Fiesta, I decided to order a Focus ST instead, have I made the wrong decission??

I would say bad move!!! First of all the new Focus comes out in Jan & you'll lose an extra £1000 over the £3500 you will lose each year. How do I know? My March 03 ST170 with its extras is only booking in at £9000 @ 19000 miles. Its is a good car if you can live with its faults, but it will be an old model.

Focus ST170 is going to lose a lot of cash once the new Focus comes out. I would hold tight for the Fiesta because it sounds like it is just around the corner.

Dont buy a Focus ST as it really would be a silly option...

1. As soon as the New Focus comes out Ford will be GIVING the ST170 away with all options + massive discount.

2. It will start to look old and as soon as udrive it out of the showroom u might aswell burn £2500.

3. The fiesta ST will be such a fun car to drive!

4. Its ur choice but whatever u decide... stick to it and never look back!!!

Good Luck with the decision but from a current Ford Focus 1.8 Zetec Owner i would recomment u DONT BUY THE FOCUS ST170!!!

On top of all those very good points... the Fiesta ST is quicker

Are you sure? because the Focus does 0-100 KM in 8.2 sec and the fiesta in 8.4 sec.......

ST170: 8.2

Fiesta ST: 7.9

I seem to remember you mentioning 8.4 before Bart... does the Non-UK Spec also have different performance figures?

I don`t know but 60 mph is about 96.5 kph so that might be the difference........................

but as mentioned in the press release, the Fiesta managed to be slightly faster on the testrack than the Focus....

I did some sums and by my calculations the ST should be really nippy, helped by it's low weight and high torque figure.

I neglected to mention that I get Ford discount, which means 2 things:
1) I have no idea when the Fiesta ST will be available on discount?
2) I got a lot of money off the Focus ST!

The ST will appear on privelege later this week I believe. I assume you've taken Ford up on the extra discount availble? It will cost the same as the Fiesta ST will on the scheme (I'm pitching for the 25% discount as available on the other derivatives).

It depends what you want from a car but as an ex-owner of a new ST170 reflecting now I would never ever buy another. I think it's a pants engine personally and very underpowered considering the capability of the chassis and the car has ridiculously high insurance premiums for what it is.

Sorry, but you did ask!

8.4??? What any american Focus SVT (roughly same car with duller style) gets lower than 8. Most mag tests got 7.2-7.6

May be geared differently altough i don't think so, they usually make gears even taller for US.

Let`s hope Ford does the same thing as they did with the Zs............... 0-60 in 7.9 but infact it`s alot faster....

If it helps, I've got a ST170 at the moment and I'm thinking of changing to a Fiesta ST.

Like all foci, the ST170 can handle and is fun to chuck around, but and it is a big BUT, the engine and gearbox combination makes sure it isn't a great car to drive. The gears ratios are too far apart, 68mph-ish in second, 180mph in sixth! The engine doesn't feel like 170ps and it really doesn't encourage you to rev it, a bad thing for an engine which doesn't come alive until 4800rpm. Finally, the engine is thirsty, really thirsty.

I still like the look of the present ST170, and the handling is great, but it a frustrating car to drive. I had a 1.8 Focus Zetec before the ST170, it was a more rewarding car to drive than the ST170.

The Fiesta ST like the ST170, on paper, promises so much, hopefully it won't disappoint

Hope this waffle helps.
James