2020 Mercedes-AMG CLA 45 vs. 2020 Mini John Cooper Works GP: Supercars, Writ Small?

Maybe being stuck at home for the last five months has warped our sense of normalcy, but the 2020 Mercedes-AMG CLA 45 and 2020 Mini John Cooper Works GP strike me as two very odd cars. AMG's offering is a luxurious subcompact sedan with a slightly detuned version of the most powerful four-cylinder engine ever fitted to a production car. That by itself is one heck of a dichotomy, but it's the AMG way.

The Briton (but Bavarian by DNA) is the most powerful Mini Cooper ever made. Its scoops, ducts, wings, lightweight forged wheels, and lack of a back seat immediately communicate its hard-core intent. Only 3,000 are being made, so you won't see many around, either. These two little nutjobs represent completely different approaches to the hot-compact formula; upon closer examination, which philosophy wins out?

The AMG isn't a hatch at all. It's a swoopy compact sedan—even though Mercedes insists it's a coupe—that weighs in at 3,700 pounds. But the weight doesn't really matter when the hand-built 2.0-liter under the hood makes a frankly ridiculous 382 horsepower and 354 lb-ft of torque.

The third iteration of the Mini John Cooper Works GP features a beefed-up 2.0-liter of its own. That turbocharged mill churns out 301 horses and 332 lb-ft of twist, sent exclusively to the front wheels via an eight-speed torque-converter automatic. There is no manual option. "Just" 301 ponies might seem pedestrian next to the juggernaut from AMG, but consider this: The Mini weighs almost half a ton less than the Mercedes—just around 2,850 pounds.

Together, the two four-bangers make a Ferrari F8 Tributo-troubling 683 horsepower and 686 lb-ft of torque. Half a turbocharged Ferrari under the hood, each. That is, to use a technical term, a lot.

Power and weight aside, another key difference between the Mini and the Merc is the chasm between their as-tested prices. The GP will run you $45,750, which sounds like a pretty big check to write for a Mini—or any small car for that matter—until you see the price of the Mercedes. The not-so-mellow yellow AMG rang in after options at an eye-watering $76,155—that means very nearly $21,000 in add-ons were stacked on top of its $55,795 base price.

If you're wondering where the money goes, a decent pile is spent on the Mercedes' interior. Inside the CLA, you're surrounded with yards of leather and suede. The seats are supportive buckets that can be adjusted more than a dozen ways. There are also jewel-like air vents, LED ambient lighting, and two beautiful 10.3-inch displays that are endlessly customizable.

The Mini, on the other hand, looks and feels Spartan in comparison. The infotainment display is 8.8 inches, but it feels compromised because of the funky circular dashboard element in which it sits. Storage solutions are minimal up front, but there's more than 30 cubic feet of storage space in the back for the occasional IKEA run. And really, that's mostly because Mini took out the rear seat and replaced it with a metal strut-tower brace. All this to say it's a much less livable space than the Benz's cabin.

If the interiors weren't enough to make up the $30,000 price delta, the rest of it shows up during driving. Grip is ever-present in the AMG thanks to its 4Matic+ AWD system. Cane it up and down a mountain road, and you can feel the CLA 45 shuffle torque from wheel to wheel to ensure you're going as fast as possible through every bend and up every straight. Combine the confidence the AWD gives you with the Saturn V rocket that's tucked under the hood, and it's hard to avoid the temptation to post triple-digit speeds everywhere. Senior features editor Jonny Lieberman said, "I was seeing velocities that were on par with a Camaro SS 1LE." It would be safe to assume that everyone who drove it that day did.

The Benz's competence means you can attack every corner and the car will always turn in, stick, and scoot itself out. That said, its Alcantara-clad steering wheel returns little in the way of feedback. The story is much the same when you want to stop. The 14.2-inch front brakes haul the car down in a hurry but there's not much feel for how hard the binders are working, and no need for braking finesse. The car just stops.

The transmission is a nearly flawless dual-clutch automatic, and even though there are paddles to shift up and down, you wouldn't be blamed for never using them given its exquisite programming. Still, there's a numbness to the AMG, and, as features editor Scott Evans put it, it's more impressive than engaging. "The Mercedes neither rewards nor punishes. It just handles everything itself. Good driving doesn't deliver anything but raw speed; there's no emotional payoff. Bad driving results in the car simply just sorting it out," Evans noted. "The problem isn't that the AMG is expensive, it's that it's anodyne. " The CLA 45 doesn't so much drive up and down a road as it does calculate the best way to dominate it, and that might be its only real flaw. If you want something with oodles of personality, look no further than the Mini with the lava-red lipstick.

The 2020 Mini John Cooper Works GP just looks a little crazy, doesn't it? Those funky carbon-fiber barge boards, the hooped rear spoiler, and that bulging, wide-eyed gaze—it all adds up to something that's missing its straightjacket. And the quirks don't end at the styling.

Hop into the manic Mini, and you immediately notice you sit a little bit too high and the seat itself isn't quite as aggressively supportive as you'd expect given the car's race-car-inspired looks. The instrument cluster is a teeny digital display mounted on the steering column rather than on the dashboard, and there's that giant red brace bar that spans the width of the car where the back seats would normally be.

Get moving, though, and the first thing you'll notice is the brittle ride; of course, we'd say we were shocked, but its special sort of punishment was a hallmark of prior Mini GPs, too. Part of its firmness is a function of wheelbase, sure, but what's truly shocking is that Mini hasn't figured this out by now. Small cars like the CLA 45 and Honda Civic Type R prove small-car performance needn't come at the expense of broken vertebrae, but driving this Mini GP is akin to constantly being rattled around inside a pillbox, and the incredibly stiff damping also has the effect of giving the entire car a skittish, unsettled quality.

Testing director Kim Reynolds summed it up thusly: "The vertical shaking is not only uncomfortable, it also causes the car to feel unpredictable. Sometimes you wonder whether the tires are really on the ground. It seriously gets in the way of driving."

Further complicating the process of driving is the Mini's steering. The Civic Type R—the gold standard among hot hatches and compacts—does a fantastic job of transferring actionable intel from the road surface to your fingertips, but the Mini's steering is remote and overassisted. On turn-in, the front end quickly washes out, too, leaving you with understeer and, despite a mechanical limited-slip differential, armfuls of torque steer to constantly manage.

At first blush, it's easy to mistake the GP's lack of refinement for personality when driving it hard; one or two quick blasts and you might be tempted to forgive the steering, the ride, etc., as necessary for a more "visceral" experience. But that same fidgety steering and backbreaking ride mean the Mini makes you work hard for your speed, and not in any sort of enjoyable way. If the Mercedes is calculated, the Mini is discombobulated. Sure, with 301 horsepower and not much weight to lug around, it's certainly quick, but as features editor Christian Seabaugh noted, "So what? The segment has moved past cars that drive like a modded Mazdaspeed 3. The lack of refinement is appalling." And forget using the GP as a daily driver; even beyond the lack of practicality, the ride is even more irritating at low speeds than during spirited driving.

And that's why people buy hot hatches and compact cars, isn't it? They're fast and usable, and the AMG checks both of those boxes. To some extent, the Mini's wayward nature is charming, but that charm only goes so far. At the end of the day, you just end up babysitting something unruly and exhausting, and that's not the description of a driver's car we'd want to own.

Even if it is a slightly numb device, the CLA 45 AMG gives you the confidence and the tools to crush any road at any time, while at the same time offering up the refinement, practicality, and features necessary to use it as a regular car. Its competence and blistering performance blows the Mini out of the water, and in its most basic form, it's not absurdly more than the Mini—although it can certainly get that way with the options of our test car. Still, in this price spectrum, there's very little that can keep up with this sporty skittle.