DRIVEN: Mercedes-Benz C300 AMG-Line – Desire, Uncomplicated

Sometimes things just fall into place.

It was a Tuesday morning when I got a phone call from a communications executive at Mercedes-Benz. Hey, she said, we have a C300 AMG-Line this weekend, would you like to have a go? My mind immediately leapt to thoughts of the panoramic sunroof, the AMG-Line steering wheel, and being an audiophile that recently discovered Sting’s new album, the Burmester audio system.

I’d have been stupid to say no.

Keys handed over, I noticed it was about to rain. I hate dirty cars and, having just been washed before it was given to me, I didn’t want the white C-Class to get any dirtier. So I quickly settled in, found a comfortable driving position (not a hard task given the electrically-adjustable steering column, lower-thigh bolster, and headrest), and set off.

Immediately, I took note of the power at hand. 255hp and 370Nm is what Mercedes reports the 2.0-litre 4-banger makes in the C300 AMG-Line, but in less geeky terms, it felt like a huge dollop. You don’t have to mash your foot into the floor to get a huge torque surge, which is harnessed best thanks to the 9G-Tronic automatic transmission. This, to my mind, is exactly what you want out of a luxury car. A sense of effortlessness, as it were.

Once I was outrunning the raincloud, I took stock of the cabin. Open-pore black-ash wood surrounded me, with door-tops covered in stitched Artico leather, peppered with laser-cut Burmester speaker grilles and silver controls. There was a widescreen infotainment display atop the centre stack, beneath which sat a gorgeous long slide of more wood. I noted the new digital instrument cluster, as well as the ‘old-school’ knob-and-touchpad arrangement of the infotainment controls. While Mercedes-Benz is enjoying praise for its MBUX infotainment system, the W205 C-Class remains paired with an older COMAND system. And yes, it’s COMAND, with one M.

It wasn’t for a couple more days until I had proper time to spend with the C300. I’d been rushing from appointment to appointment the two days prior, taking me through alot of the Klang Valley and its notorious traffic. I’d been warned that the C300’s 2.0-litre mill would consume quite a bit of fuel in such conditions – and yet without really trying, I never managed to nudge it past 10L/100km, despite other local motoring journos claiming figures between 11L-13L/100km. Maybe they have lead feet, but I can report that a full tank on a C300 AMG-Line would easily cover 600km between fillups. Not bad.

But it was a Sunday, and with filming done for the video review and more than half a tank of fuel yet, I told my girlfriend that we were going for a drive. We packed some things and headed out at 4pm, aimed for the old Gombak road that would take us up to Genting Sempah.

The roads themselves were beautiful, albeit badly paved, though the C300 soaked up the worst of the imperfections. We snaked along the narrow road with steep drops on the left and cliffside on the right, enjoying the scenery with the sunroof wide open and the windows half down. We passed quite a number of Mercedes-Benzes going the other way, no doubt returning from either an exciting squiz up Genting or a relaxing holiday on the East Cost and avoiding the queue on the Karak Highway – I surmised that that must be the life of the average Mercedes-Benz owner. While I nodded and smiled as we passed, I felt briefly like a bit of a pretender, no doubt the only person sat behind a three-pointed star with one eye on the fuel gauge.

The old Gombak road is not one that you tackle with gusto, I feel. You ought to stick the car in ‘Comfort’ mode and enjoy the drive, given that the rutted road surface would undoubtedly see the car shimmy from one edge of the tarmac to the other in ‘Sport+’ mode where there’s little give in the suspension. The ambiance was only improved by the audio system, which I had employed to play my favourite album by the late songwriter Nujabes.

At Genting Sempah we ploughed onwards to Janda Baik, a place that holds great meaning to me. I spent many formative years up that hill, with family on every corner. We’re not from Pahang but quite a number of us made Janda Baik our home, and as a result, I feel like the little kampung is an extension of me. Up we went, on slightly better roads this time, improved steadily as the population in the hilltop village expanded. We stopped by a couple of choice spots for photos, and a little roadside stall for some durian kampung.

I warned my girlfriend, who promptly selected a 3kg durian, that we’d have to eat it all. If even the slightest bit of durian got in the car, I’d wager I’d end up very quickly on Mercedes-Benz Malaysia’s list of blacklisted publications.

So we finished it.

And it was over dinner at Chef Zamri’s Nero Bianco Deli that I felt I’d finally been able to truly understand the C300 AMG-Line. Though it bears the famous Affalterbach abbreviation, it isn’t to be mistaken for a sporty compact saloon. Rather, it is very much the embodiment of the luxury compact saloon. Effortless to drive, comfortable to sit in, and ridiculously well appointed, the C300 is a gathering of Mercedes-Benz’s strengths. The only fly in the ointment is the lack of insulation, with road & tyre noise creeping in steadily once you move into triple-digit speeds.

While many would take fault with that, particularly if having recently sampled BMW’s new 3-Series or the Audi A4, the C300 sits right between the two. The 3er is no doubt the driver’s car of the lot, while the A4 is so amazingly plush you really think that they might’ve shrunk an A6.

But the C300 is the jack of all trades, or at least that was the opinion I held when I departed our dinner stop with home set firmly in our sights.

2019 MERCEDES-BENZ C300 AMG-LINE – RM304,888 AS TESTED