T he Audi brand didn't have an all-out supercar' on its rosta - until the new aluminium-bodied, mid-engined R8 sports car rolled off the production line.

The R8 is a stunning and uncompromising sports car, developed with the benefit of knowledge gleaned from thousands of gruelling Le Mans laps culminating in six Le Mans victories.

The two-seat R8 just looks fantastic, a real supercar, stunning and a huge crowd puller - it demands attention and gets it. The pictures do much better justice to the styling than my words.

From the front, side or rear, the R8 is one of the most pleasing cars, I think, currently available and without doubt Audi's finest car to date.

The interior is also sporty, stylish and relatively roomy for both passengers and there is just enough luggage storage place under the front bonnet and behind the two seats for soft carrying bags. Audi says two golf bags can be carried behind he seats. Perhaps so, but there's no mention of bags with clubs in them and certainly there is no space for golf trolleys!

With an annual build of only 5,000 R8s for global sale, deliveries to UK customers will start in July. Just 450 of the cars will arrive this year and 750 in 2008.

Priced at £76,825 in manual form and £82,025 with the R-tronic automated sequential shift manual transmission, the R8 combines classic mid-engine configuration in an all aluminium space frame two-seater bodyshell with quattro permanent four-wheel drive.

Power comes from a high-revving 4.2-litre V8 FSI petrol engine delivering 420PS at 7,800rpm and 430Nm of torque from 4,500 to 6,000rpm. Maximum speed is 187mph with 0-62mph covered in 4.6 seconds.

Driving purists can choose a six-speed manual transmission to channel the 430Nm of torque to the four driven wheels, but they may also be tempted by the racing-inspired R-tronic sequential shift gearbox with joystick and paddle control, which uses shift-by-wire' technology to provide exceptionally rapid gear changes.

The R-tronic system also has a sports setting option which sharpens up the throttle, gear shift pattern and steering responses although it tends to hang on to the lower gears for too long.

Initial driving impressions suggest the manual transmission is faster and more precise although the six-speed racing gate' style gear change, whilst very positive and slick, does not allow for easy and fast block' gear changes. Fourth-to-second and sixth-to-fourth gears, for example, keeping the high-revving engine in its power band for rapid acceleration out of corners. The metal gearchange gate means it is easier, but not as quick, to go through the gears in numerical order rather than cross changing.

The semi-automatic transmission, not a torque-converter type because they absorb power, is not so smooth and can only be described as jerky. Not a very technical term, but that is how it performs.

The best transmission will depend on how the driver will use the car. For high performance cut and thrust' driving or track days the manual transmission is best, but for long legged cruising and day to day driving in traffic, the semi-automatic is more leisurely and refined.

I have not always been a great fan of the quattro all-wheel drive system. In some Audi models its weight dulls performance and driving all the wheels saps power, but in the R8 it is perfection. It allows the power and grip to be spread and applied as smoothly as butter on bread, making it an extremely agile and sure-footed sports car.

I think the optional magnetic ride system is a must. It sharpens up the handling, and the benefits are too great not choose it.

The R8 has so many styling and technical features worthy of mention, too many for this review, but as an example of attention to detail the stunning lines of the 4.43-metre long, 1.90-metre wide and 1.25-metre high R8 are accentuated by its striking bi-colour paint finish, with side blades in a contrasting shade and a choice of eight colour combinations.

From the end of 2007, the Audi R8 will be the first vehicle in the world to be equipped with LEDs for all lighting functions. The daytime running lights, horizontal strips of LEDs within the headlights, give the R8 an amazing-looking front end. At the rear, the all-LED light units have a unique three-dimensional look, irrespective of the angle from which they are viewed.

In short, the Audi R8 is a work of art. It performs and handles in most areas just a well as it looks. It does not need it, but it could handle even more power to make it an even more potent performer.

I loved it and so did everybody else at the launch event. We all just stood there at the end of it, nodding at each other in appreciation of the fact that Audi, at its first attempt, has come up with such an impressive sports car.