I haven’t driven a diesel in a long time. My first exposure was a diesel VW Rabbit in the early eighties. Acceleration was not a word to apply to that vehicle, it slowly gathered momentum. So little happened upon depressing the accelerator pedal that I was convinced the clutch was slipping.
A few years back Jeremy Clarkson did a review of the very drivetrain that was in my car,but in a larger sedan.He wanted to see if their claim of 145mph top speed was accurate.So he put his foot down and called out the speeds...."50mph"..."60mph"..etc.When he got it up to about 80 he said something like "it's not electric but it *is* *relentless*".And he did stress both words.And relentless is the perfect word to describe my car.I used to call it "the beast".
And FYI...I'm only familiar with older diesels by reputation but today's,many of which sport twin turbos,are anything but slow,smelly,loud or terrible.For example,BMW sells a 6 cylinder diesel in Europe (a mid sized 5 Series) that boasts something like 535 ft lbs of torque.I've read that that thing is amazing.