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74 Articles

IN PERFORMANCE CAR TERMS, 2022 saw a torrent of hardcore new metal, and that torrent shows no signs of abating in 2023. BMW’s M2; Alfa Romeo’s 100th birthday supercar present to itself; Aston Martin’s new DB11; a new McLaren, because there’s always a new McLaren; AMG-engined Emiras; the Corvette Z06; an SUV with a Ferrari V12 in its snout, and a 911 with a dose of the Audi All-Roads – all will be landing in the UK this year. As will a new Mustang, updated AMG A35s and 45s and a new Lamborghini Aventador. They are all also, pretty much without exception, either sold out or limited-run specials or priced at a level to make a banker wince (or all of the above). New, genuinely affordable driver’s cars have become an…

LESS IS MORE. AT LEAST THAT’S THE gospel we preach when it comes to sports cars. Right now, there’s no better example of this minimalist mantra than the Alpine A110, for at a time when hybrid-powered SUVs are approaching 3 tons and BMW M3s are getting on for 2 tons, this delicate and delectable machine can tip the scales at a barely believable 1102kg. Such skeletal mass seems nothing short of miraculous, but Alpine has pushed things even further with the new track-focused A110 R, trimming that figure down to 1082kg in the pursuit of performance. It’s testament to the famous French marque’s fastidious approach that such weight savings have been made on an already featherweight car. Indeed, the only heavyweight part of the A110 R is its £89,990 price tag,…

IN PERFORMANCE CAR TERMS, 2022 saw a torrent of hardcore new metal, and that torrent shows no signs of abating in 2023. BMW’s M2; Alfa Romeo’s 100th birthday supercar present to itself; Aston Martin’s new DB11; a new McLaren, because there’s always a new McLaren; AMG-engined Emiras; the Corvette Z06; an SUV with a Ferrari V12 in its snout, and a 911 with a dose of the Audi All-Roads – all will be landing in the UK this year. As will a new Mustang, updated AMG A35s and 45s and a new Lamborghini Aventador. They are all also, pretty much without exception, either sold out or limited-run specials or priced at a level to make a banker wince (or all of the above). New, genuinely affordable driver’s cars have become…

Maserati GranTurismo Trofeo

ONCE TARNISHED, MASERATI’S FAMOUS name is shiny again. The MC20, our reigning eCoty champ, turns out to be a mid-engined marvel for the ages, while the first new-generation GranTurismo to break cover, all 750bhp of whispering electric Folgore, has brought sexy to a mostly rather sterile EV sector. Facing a reputational fightback as well as the market’s baked-in challenges from the long-established Teutonic hegemony, Maserati still has it all to do but is proudly hauling itself back to a state of grace and, just as importantly, a place of relevance. Following a back-slapping fest for the MC20’s makers, protecting momentum is clearly key, and while the Folgore is necessarily a banker for an electron-dependent future, it’s the all-new, all-wheel-drive, petrol-powered, twin-turbo V6 GranTurismo that will either establish a post-MC20 hit factory…

Maserati GranTurismo Trofeo

Vauxhall Astra GSe

‘THIS IS PEAK HOT HATCH.’ THE message from John Barker arrived after he had just returned from pitting Honda’s new Civic Type R against its key rivals (see page 54). I won’t ‘do a Barker’ and give the result away here, but suffice to say that Honda, Hyundai and Audi are working overtime to create memorable final flings for those who worship the tripod cornering technique. So where does Vauxhall’s new Astra GSe sit within the heights of (nearly) affordable hot hatches? Er, some way back from the summit, pretty much back at base camp. There are some good elements to the Astra GSe (Grand Sport Electric, in case someone asks), such as the Mark Adams design that brings the strongest visual identity to the brand since, well, quite some time…

Vauxhall Astra GSe

Porsche Macan T

PORSCHE’S MACAN REMAINS A BENCHMARK small SUV. It’s not a car to flutter the hearts of evo readers, nor will it be the first choice for one of those drives we all lock away to be resurfaced when someone asks why driving matters. But like Alfa Romeo’s Stelvio it is a vehicle that’s clearly been engineered and developed by those prepared to go the extra mile and create a car worthy of the heritage its badge carries. Even in its twilight years – the Macan was launched nine years ago and has nearly 12 months to go before its all-electric replacement arrives – it still sets the benchmark for ride and handling, body control and feedback, and feeling like a Porsche hot hatch rather than a flat-footed crossover. As a daily…

Porsche Macan T

LESS IS MORE. AT LEAST THAT’S THE gospel we preach when it comes to sports cars. Right now, there’s no better example of this minimalist mantra than the Alpine A110, for at a time when hybrid-powered SUVs are approaching 3 tons and BMW M3s are getting on for 2 tons, this delicate and delectable machine can tip the scales at a barely believable 1102kg. Such skeletal mass seems nothing short of miraculous, but Alpine has pushed things even further with the new track-focused A110 R, trimming that figure down to 1082kg in the pursuit of performance. It’s testament to the famous French marque’s fastidious approach that such weight savings have been made on an already featherweight car. Indeed, the only heavyweight part of the A110 R is its £89,990 price…

Ford F-150 Lightning

KEEN STUDENTS OF AMERICAN TRUCKS will know this is not the first time Ford has used the Lightning badge on an F-150. The first generation of 1992 had a 5.8-litre, 240hp V8, while the 1999 sequel came with a 5.4-litre V8, supercharged to 360 horsepower. With their single cabs and none-more-’90s bodykits, they were pure and simple hot-rods, losing some of their trucky utility but vastly increasing their ability to lay elevens outside the local diner. This, the third-generation Lightning, is not like that. It comes with a practical double cab. There are no tacky ‘sports’ trimmings. And there’s no V8 because, third time around, with the Lightning name co-opted into being a low-level pun, this is a pure EV. There is one piece of common ground with its predecessors, mind…

Ford F-150 Lightning

Maserati GranTurismo Trofeo

ONCE TARNISHED, MASERATI’S FAMOUS name is shiny again. The MC20, our reigning eCoty champ, turns out to be a mid-engined marvel for the ages, while the first new-generation GranTurismo to break cover, all 750bhp of whispering electric Folgore, has brought sexy to a mostly rather sterile EV sector. Facing a reputational fightback as well as the market’s baked-in challenges from the long-established Teutonic hegemony, Maserati still has it all to do but is proudly hauling itself back to a state of grace and, just as importantly, a place of relevance. Following a back-slapping fest for the MC20’s makers, protecting momentum is clearly key, and while the Folgore is necessarily a banker for an electron-dependent future, it’s the all-new, all-wheel-drive, petrol-powered, twin-turbo V6 GranTurismo that will either establish a post-MC20 hit…

Maserati GranTurismo Trofeo

Vauxhall Astra GSe

‘THIS IS PEAK HOT HATCH.’ THE message from John Barker arrived after he had just returned from pitting Honda’s new Civic Type R against its key rivals (see page 54). I won’t ‘do a Barker’ and give the result away here, but suffice to say that Honda, Hyundai and Audi are working overtime to create memorable final flings for those who worship the tripod cornering technique. So where does Vauxhall’s new Astra GSe sit within the heights of (nearly) affordable hot hatches? Er, some way back from the summit, pretty much back at base camp. There are some good elements to the Astra GSe (Grand Sport Electric, in case someone asks), such as the Mark Adams design that brings the strongest visual identity to the brand since, well, quite some…

Vauxhall Astra GSe

BACK IN 2005, A VAST NEW SWATHE OF car enthusiasts became aware of the Radical brand for the first time when the firm’s SR8, driven by Michael Vergers, set a new Nürburgring Nordschleife production car lap record of just 6min 55sec. Four years later, with evo’s own Roger Green riding shotgun, Vergers drove a 460bhp SR8LM from Radical’s factory in Peterborough to the Ring and lowered that time to 6min 48sec, a record that would stand for eight years (evo 136). It was a contentious record because the SR8LM – and the SR8 before it – were road-registered via the UK’s single vehicle approval process rather than being fully type-approved production cars. But as a means of promoting the Radical name, it worked a treat. Formed in 1997 by two enthusiasts,…

Hit the track with us in 2023

DATES FOR YOUR DIARY Friday 19 May Bedford Autodrome (evening) Thursday 3 August Brands Hatch Indy Circuit (evening) Monday 14 August Goodwood Motor Circuit (full day) Friday 8 September Bedford Autodrome (evening) WHAT’S INCLUDED (ALL EVENTS) ▶ Restricted numbers to maximise track time▶ Event photography▶ Helmet hire▶ evo editorial team in attendance Bedford Autodrome & Brands Hatch ▶ Open pitlane format▶ 1-2-1 tuition (please book to avoid disappointment) Goodwood ▶ Welcome breakfast, lunch and afternoon tea▶ Session format▶ 1-2-1 tuition (£35 per 30 mins) TO BOOK YOUR PLACE SCAN THIS QR CODE OR VISIT EVOTRACKDAYS.CO.UK…

Hit the track with us in 2023

Porsche Macan T

PORSCHE’S MACAN REMAINS A BENCHMARK small SUV. It’s not a car to flutter the hearts of evo readers, nor will it be the first choice for one of those drives we all lock away to be resurfaced when someone asks why driving matters. But like Alfa Romeo’s Stelvio it is a vehicle that’s clearly been engineered and developed by those prepared to go the extra mile and create a car worthy of the heritage its badge carries. Even in its twilight years – the Macan was launched nine years ago and has nearly 12 months to go before its all-electric replacement arrives – it still sets the benchmark for ride and handling, body control and feedback, and feeling like a Porsche hot hatch rather than a flat-footed crossover. As a…

Porsche Macan T

Lawrence Tomlinson Chairman, Ginetta Cars

SOME OF US COLLECT SCALE MODELS OF the cars that we’ve owned, though If we had the means, quite a few of us would love to collect them for real. In part that’s what I’m looking at right now: an eclectic group of a 3-litre Capri S, Audi Quattro and Escort RS1600, all from Lawrence Tomlinson’s formative years. The upper floor of this garage space houses clusters of cars that reflect Tomlinson’s later passions. Tucked away at the back are four Le Mans race cars – three TVRs and a Panoz – while at the front are some tiny and rare Ginettas that represent the early history of the sports car company he bought in 2005. ‘I wouldn’t say I’m massively passionate about cars, just cars,’ says Tomlinson, ‘I like mechanical…

Lawrence Tomlinson Chairman, Ginetta Cars

Ford F-150 Lightning

KEEN STUDENTS OF AMERICAN TRUCKS will know this is not the first time Ford has used the Lightning badge on an F-150. The first generation of 1992 had a 5.8-litre, 240hp V8, while the 1999 sequel came with a 5.4-litre V8, supercharged to 360 horsepower. With their single cabs and none-more-’90s bodykits, they were pure and simple hot-rods, losing some of their trucky utility but vastly increasing their ability to lay elevens outside the local diner. This, the third-generation Lightning, is not like that. It comes with a practical double cab. There are no tacky ‘sports’ trimmings. And there’s no V8 because, third time around, with the Lightning name co-opted into being a low-level pun, this is a pure EV. There is one piece of common ground with its predecessors,…

Ford F-150 Lightning

I WOULD REALLY LIKE TO THANK YOU FOR THE ARTICLES about efuels (issues 271, 285 and 306). My physics/engineering background has enabled me to read, research and then compile my own analysis of the best way to achieve net zero carbon emissions and I’ve been deeply concerned by the blinkered push towards battery EV and the government’s misguided focus on zero emissions from the ‘exhaust’. If we didn’t have a carbon-driven climate-change threat and all we needed to do was clean up our air, this would be appropriate, but the message being conveyed that battery EV is the best way to reduce net carbon is just wrong. As I’m sure you understand, the issue with carbon-driven climate change is that so many processes are not cyclic but linear, meaning carbon is…

BACK IN 2005, A VAST NEW SWATHE OF car enthusiasts became aware of the Radical brand for the first time when the firm’s SR8, driven by Michael Vergers, set a new Nürburgring Nordschleife production car lap record of just 6min 55sec. Four years later, with evo’s own Roger Green riding shotgun, Vergers drove a 460bhp SR8LM from Radical’s factory in Peterborough to the Ring and lowered that time to 6min 48sec, a record that would stand for eight years (evo 136). It was a contentious record because the SR8LM – and the SR8 before it – were road-registered via the UK’s single vehicle approval process rather than being fully type-approved production cars. But as a means of promoting the Radical name, it worked a treat. Formed in 1997 by two…

letters@evo.co.uk @evomagazine @evomagazine Feeling hot, hot, hot I mangled opening the evo envelope this month and all I could see was the issue number: 306. Memories of that wonderfully tactile Peugeot GTi flooded back to me but my thoughts soon turned to the widely reported decline of the hot hatch. Then I collected my co-ordination and opened the envelope further and was presented with a Civic Type R flying sideways through the frame. Flicking through the magazine, absorbing the pictures and picking my starting point, there was an RS3 sliding in the opposite direction and a sideways Golf R. Lovely! Then, to my delight, there was Richard Porter’s newly acquired Panda 100HP in Fast Fleet. The hot hatch may have changed in the 25 years since the 306 GTi was king, but the class is still…

Hit the track with us in 2023

DATES FOR YOUR DIARY Friday 19 May Bedford Autodrome (evening) Thursday 3 August Brands Hatch Indy Circuit (evening) Monday 14 August Goodwood Motor Circuit (full day) Friday 8 September Bedford Autodrome (evening) WHAT’S INCLUDED (ALL EVENTS) Restricted numbers to maximise track time Event photography Helmet hire evo editorial team in attendance Bedford Autodrome & Brands Hatch Open pitlane format 1-2-1 tuition (please book to avoid disappointment) Goodwood Welcome breakfast, lunch and afternoon tea Session format 1-2-1 tuition (£35 per 30 mins) TO BOOK YOUR PLACE SCAN THIS QR CODE OR VISIT EVOTRACKDAYS.CO.UK…

Hit the track with us in 2023

Casio Edifice ECB2000MFG $399 casio.com A collaboration with Initial D creator Shuichi Shigeno, this new Casio bears the logo of his latest street-racing manga series, MF Ghost. Its red and black colour scheme references the Toyota GT86 that’s the four-wheeled star of the series, while the dial and underside of the strap are marked with the Japanese characters used to represent the sound of screeching tyres in the comic. Cuervo y Sobrinos Gran Premio De Cuba £3370 cuervoysobrinos.com Although short-lived and soon controversial, between 1957 and 1960 there were three Grands Prix held in Havana. This new chronograph from Cuervo y Sobrinos celebrates the inaugural running of the race on the streets of Havana, close to where the brand was founded in the late 1800s. Just 162 examples will be made, to match the race…

Lawrence Tomlinson Chairman, Ginetta Cars

SOME OF US COLLECT SCALE MODELS OF the cars that we’ve owned, though If we had the means, quite a few of us would love to collect them for real. In part that’s what I’m looking at right now: an eclectic group of a 3-litre Capri S, Audi Quattro and Escort RS1600, all from Lawrence Tomlinson’s formative years. The upper floor of this garage space houses clusters of cars that reflect Tomlinson’s later passions. Tucked away at the back are four Le Mans race cars – three TVRs and a Panoz – while at the front are some tiny and rare Ginettas that represent the early history of the sports car company he bought in 2005. ‘I wouldn’t say I’m massively passionate about cars, just cars,’ says Tomlinson, ‘I like…

Lawrence Tomlinson Chairman, Ginetta Cars

EVO’S IMMINENT 25TH ANNIVERSARY HAS GOT me reminiscing about the magazine’s formative years. Between 1998 and 2001 we spent much of our time heading south through Europe, aiming for the Côte d’Azur, or crossing the Alps and dropping down through the lakes and into Italy for various launches, factory visits and drive stories. These were happy, innocent days, free from the pressures of feeding a website and social media. Better still, traffic policing was far more analogue than digital, which fostered the unshakeable belief that, once on foreign soil, speed limits were very much open to interpretation. Issue 001 saw us start as we meant to go on – myself, Stuart Gallagher (then a fresh-faced staff writer) and photographer Gus Gregory embarking on a mission to take our recently purchased Ur-Quattro…

letters@evo.co.uk @evomagazine @evomagazine Feeling hot, hot, hot I mangled opening the evo envelope this month and all I could see was the issue number: 306. Memories of that wonderfully tactile Peugeot GTi flooded back to me but my thoughts soon turned to the widely reported decline of the hot hatch. Then I collected my co-ordination and opened the envelope further and was presented with a Civic Type R flying sideways through the frame. Flicking through the magazine, absorbing the pictures and picking my starting point, there was an RS3 sliding in the opposite direction and a sideways Golf R. Lovely! Then, to my delight, there was Richard Porter’s newly acquired Panda 100HP in Fast Fleet. The hot hatch may have changed in the 25 years since the 306 GTi was…

IT WAS A COLD AND WET DECEMBER DAY when I touched the ground at Phoenix, AZ, a Hertz booking ahead of me. There’s little as casually exciting to the car-minded person as the hire car lottery and the knowledge that, for some freewheeling rental companies, ‘Ford Focus or similar’ could lead inexplicably to a De Tomaso Pantera. In this case what I’d paid for was ‘Toyota Camry or similar’ so you can imagine my disappointment when I got an actual Toyota Camry. If you’re in the UK you might remember the Camry as the kind of understated machine driven only by Toyota dealer principals and local Rotarians and which was relaunched in 2019 after a 14-year absence only to disappear under the crashing waves of overwhelming disinterest. In the US it’s…

JETHRO BOVINGDON

A CAR, ACCORDING TO THE OXFORD ENGLISH Dictionary, is ‘a road vehicle powered by a motor (usually an internal combustion engine), designed to carry a driver and a small number of passengers’. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the mobile phone has a different definition. ‘A phone that does not have wires and works by radio, that you can carry with you and use anywhere.’ Maybe they haven’t been to Wales. Anyway, there’s also a distinction for a smartphone. ‘A mobile phone that also has some of the functions of a computer, for example the facility to use apps and the internet.’ As you can see, the car and the mobile or smartphone are not the same things. So why do car manufacturers want – so badly – to design phones? Touchscreens, augmented reality, apps,…

JETHRO BOVINGDON

I WOULD REALLY LIKE TO THANK YOU FOR THE ARTICLES about efuels (issues 271, 285 and 306). My physics/engineering background has enabled me to read, research and then compile my own analysis of the best way to achieve net zero carbon emissions and I’ve been deeply concerned by the blinkered push towards battery EV and the government’s misguided focus on zero emissions from the ‘exhaust’. If we didn’t have a carbon-driven climate-change threat and all we needed to do was clean up our air, this would be appropriate, but the message being conveyed that battery EV is the best way to reduce net carbon is just wrong. As I’m sure you understand, the issue with carbon-driven climate change is that so many processes are not cyclic but linear, meaning carbon…

CIVIC RECEPTION

IT’S DAY ONE, WE’VE BARELY driven the cars, and yet there’s a growing feeling of inevitability about this test. We’ve set up our weighing equipment in one of the PalmerSport garages at the Bedford Autodrome, just next door to the evo office, and editorial assistant Sam Jenkins is running the test cars back and forth. When he arrives with the new Civic Type R he says: ‘Wow… that feels like a hot hatch made by Porsche!’ Colour me unsurprised. The feel of the major controls in the previous FK8 model was superb and in our first drive of the new FL5 in the last issue, Dickie Meaden concluded that Honda’s obsession with the incremental improvement of everything driver-centric had delivered again. He liked the looks, too. I was able to forgive…

CIVIC RECEPTION

Casio Edifice ECB2000MFG $399 casio.com A collaboration with Initial D creator Shuichi Shigeno, this new Casio bears the logo of his latest street-racing manga series, MF Ghost. Its red and black colour scheme references the Toyota GT86 that’s the four-wheeled star of the series, while the dial and underside of the strap are marked with the Japanese characters used to represent the sound of screeching tyres in the comic. Cuervo y Sobrinos Gran Premio De Cuba £3370 cuervoysobrinos.com Although short-lived and soon controversial, between 1957 and 1960 there were three Grands Prix held in Havana. This new chronograph from Cuervo y Sobrinos celebrates the inaugural running of the race on the streets of Havana, close to where the brand was founded in the late 1800s. Just 162 examples will be…

IT STARTED WITH A LITTLE MISFIRE. My Porsche 996 was in daily service at the time and it idled beautifully, delivered strong mid-range torque, didn’t burn a drop of oil and sounded great. But at about 6500rpm it would stutter and go flat, then labour to the red line. I changed coil packs, lambda sensors and all the easy, little stuff. The misfire lessened slightly but it was still there. It was annoying but not disastrous. So I soldiered on for a few busy weeks and several hundred miles, a sense of dread hanging over me but optimism, too. How could it pull like a train in the mid-range if there was something seriously wrong? Of course, there was something seriously wrong. Something that would require a strip-down to fully diagnose.…

WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE

WATCHING THE TAIL END OF A BUGATTI CHIRON Super Sport squirm under full acceleration as all four of its vast tyres scrabble for grip momentarily is not, let’s face it, a sight many folks will ever get to witness up close and personal, in real life. But even if you are fortunate enough to see a Chiron SS in full flight as it thunders its way from zero to 62mph in 2.4sec and to 186mph (300kph) in just 12.1sec, it will inevitably be a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it experience, a seismic event that’s already unfolded long before you’ve had time to focus in on the details. Unless, that is, you happen to be sitting behind the Bugatti at the controls of a Rimac Nevera, in which case you’ll have all the time in the…

WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE

EVO’S IMMINENT 25TH ANNIVERSARY HAS GOT me reminiscing about the magazine’s formative years. Between 1998 and 2001 we spent much of our time heading south through Europe, aiming for the Côte d’Azur, or crossing the Alps and dropping down through the lakes and into Italy for various launches, factory visits and drive stories. These were happy, innocent days, free from the pressures of feeding a website and social media. Better still, traffic policing was far more analogue than digital, which fostered the unshakeable belief that, once on foreign soil, speed limits were very much open to interpretation. Issue 001 saw us start as we meant to go on – myself, Stuart Gallagher (then a fresh-faced staff writer) and photographer Gus Gregory embarking on a mission to take our recently purchased…

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UNLOCK ALL OUR SUBSCRIBER ONLY PERKS • Just £1.66 an issue, usual shop price £5.99• Unique subscriber-only covers• Receive £10 off track days• Never miss an issue – FREE delivery direct to your door• NEW! 10% off the evo shop JOIN EVO TODAY SEARCH: evo.co.uk/subscribe OR CALL: 0330 333 9491 QUOTING CODE: DFEB 23 Live outside the UK? For our best overseas subscription offers visit subscribe.evo.co.uk/overseas-subscriptions or call +44 (0)330 333 9491. Calls to 03 numbers will be charged at your standard local rate.…

GET YOUR NEXT 3 ISSUES FOR JUST £5

IT WAS A COLD AND WET DECEMBER DAY when I touched the ground at Phoenix, AZ, a Hertz booking ahead of me. There’s little as casually exciting to the car-minded person as the hire car lottery and the knowledge that, for some freewheeling rental companies, ‘Ford Focus or similar’ could lead inexplicably to a De Tomaso Pantera. In this case what I’d paid for was ‘Toyota Camry or similar’ so you can imagine my disappointment when I got an actual Toyota Camry. If you’re in the UK you might remember the Camry as the kind of understated machine driven only by Toyota dealer principals and local Rotarians and which was relaunched in 2019 after a 14-year absence only to disappear under the crashing waves of overwhelming disinterest. In the US…

SKIDDING AROUND IN CARS IS SOMETHING WE do rather a lot of here at evo. It’s not big and it’s not clever, but as anyone who has done it knows, it’s bloody good fun. So, when Skoda UK called to see if we fancied heading to northern Sweden for a crack at beating the existing record for the longest continuous vehicle drift on ice, we packed some thermals and headed north. There are several different records for drifting. The outright distance record of 374.17km (232.5 miles) was set by Johan Schwartz driving a BMW M5 (for eight hours!), while the EV distance record of 43.646km (27.1 miles) was set by Wei Pengda in a Zhiji L7. Both records were set on wet steering pads. The fastest drift is held by Masato…

UNWITTINGLY, THE DAY BEFORE we shoot the Audi RS6 Avant and BMW M3 Competition Touring on the rolling roads that thump and yump over the North York Moors, I remind myself just why the fast estate car is such a special concept. My first sight of the RS6 is at 6am. It’s shrouded in thick ice and the air is so cold that my clothes crackle as I walk towards it. A few minutes later I’m thawing in heated seats and pointed towards Brands Hatch, some 100 miles south. The miles accrue easily and the 4-litre twin-turbocharged engine slips almost silently into the background. It’s just the start of a very RS6 sort of day. The track is perilously slippery but the Audi barely notices. It’s acting as fast chase vehicle,…

JETHRO BOVINGDON

A CAR, ACCORDING TO THE OXFORD ENGLISH Dictionary, is ‘a road vehicle powered by a motor (usually an internal combustion engine), designed to carry a driver and a small number of passengers’. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the mobile phone has a different definition. ‘A phone that does not have wires and works by radio, that you can carry with you and use anywhere.’ Maybe they haven’t been to Wales. Anyway, there’s also a distinction for a smartphone. ‘A mobile phone that also has some of the functions of a computer, for example the facility to use apps and the internet.’ As you can see, the car and the mobile or smartphone are not the same things. So why do car manufacturers want – so badly – to design phones? Touchscreens, augmented reality,…

JETHRO BOVINGDON

HOW MUCH OF A PURIST do you have to be to be accepted into The Club? And does it even matter if you don’t adhere to a set of rules that were most likely defined by a collection of opinionated individuals who you’ve probably never met, and whose opinion might not matter a whole lot anyway? Thing is, most self-anointed purists will tell you that rules exist merely to be broken, and if that’s true then the Dakar – heretic as it will no doubt be regarded by some – is surely one of the most intriguing new 911s of the last 30 years. Think about it. Ever since Dr Ulrich Bez reinvented the 964 and turned it into the 993 almost one third of a century ago, Porsche has crafted the…

Lamborghini Murciélago

@evomagazine @evomagazine @officialevomagazine THE DEAFENING SHRIEK OF A Lamborghini V12 destroying itself isn’t something I wish to ever hear again. After the gut-wrenching realisation that this would be gigantic money to fix, it also began to dawn on me that, given my Murciélago’s colourful history, it might just be time to close the curtain on it for good and strip it down for parts. Long-standing evo aficionados may remember the big Lambo regularly appearing in these pages from 2005 to 2018. Back in 2004 it was the first Murciélago to be delivered by Lamborghini Manchester and one of the few with a manual ’box. Within weeks of it poking its short snout out of the showroom, it was earning its keep on track as a driving experience supercar, clocking up a huge mileage over…

Lamborghini Murciélago

CIVIC RECEPTION

IT’S DAY ONE, WE’VE BARELY driven the cars, and yet there’s a growing feeling of inevitability about this test. We’ve set up our weighing equipment in one of the PalmerSport garages at the Bedford Autodrome, just next door to the evo office, and editorial assistant Sam Jenkins is running the test cars back and forth. When he arrives with the new Civic Type R he says: ‘Wow… that feels like a hot hatch made by Porsche!’ Colour me unsurprised. The feel of the major controls in the previous FK8 model was superb and in our first drive of the new FL5 in the last issue, Dickie Meaden concluded that Honda’s obsession with the incremental improvement of everything driver-centric had delivered again. He liked the looks, too. I was able to…

CIVIC RECEPTION

Skoda Superb Estate Sportline Plus

I SEEM TO BE HAVING A SEVERE CASE OF déjà vu, as having only just said goodbye to our Kodiaq vRS, I now find myself in another big Skoda, this one a Superb Estate Sportline Plus. I’ve sampled quite a few fast Skodas since starting at evo back in 2014 and this model and spec has the potential to be the best yet. Let’s start with the powertrain. Our new arrival has the 2-litre petrol engine, which produces a very respectable 276bhp and is mated to a seven-speed DSG transmission and four-wheel drive, resulting in a surprisingly quick 0-62mph claim of just 5.3 seconds. To give that figure some context, a Golf GTI Clubsport, which has 20bhp more but no 4WD, takes three tenths longer for the same benchmark. Paired with…

Skoda Superb Estate Sportline Plus

IT STARTED WITH A LITTLE MISFIRE. My Porsche 996 was in daily service at the time and it idled beautifully, delivered strong mid-range torque, didn’t burn a drop of oil and sounded great. But at about 6500rpm it would stutter and go flat, then labour to the red line. I changed coil packs, lambda sensors and all the easy, little stuff. The misfire lessened slightly but it was still there. It was annoying but not disastrous. So I soldiered on for a few busy weeks and several hundred miles, a sense of dread hanging over me but optimism, too. How could it pull like a train in the mid-range if there was something seriously wrong? Of course, there was something seriously wrong. Something that would require a strip-down to fully…

Fiat Panda 100HP

WHEN THE PANDA 100HP WAS contemporary there were lots of very small cars, from C1s and Twingos to 107s and Kas. Today those models are no more, but not every car maker has given up on a sub-supermini model. Toyota, for example, announced a new Aygo last year, no longer a co-pro with Peugeot/Citroën though still made in the same Czech factory as its predecessors. Except it’s not just an Aygo, it’s an Aygo X, the new suffix marking a shift towards faux-SUV styling in an attempt to skate to the puck. You’ll see from the pic above that it looks pretty chunky next to my weeny Panda, though the Aygo’s bulk is exaggerated by the 18-inch wheels that are standard on all but the base model. And I suspect it’s…

Fiat Panda 100HP

WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE

WATCHING THE TAIL END OF A BUGATTI CHIRON Super Sport squirm under full acceleration as all four of its vast tyres scrabble for grip momentarily is not, let’s face it, a sight many folks will ever get to witness up close and personal, in real life. But even if you are fortunate enough to see a Chiron SS in full flight as it thunders its way from zero to 62mph in 2.4sec and to 186mph (300kph) in just 12.1sec, it will inevitably be a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it experience, a seismic event that’s already unfolded long before you’ve had time to focus in on the details. Unless, that is, you happen to be sitting behind the Bugatti at the controls of a Rimac Nevera, in which case you’ll have all the time in…

WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE

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Maserati Ghibli Trofeo

I MAGINE THE MASERATI MC20 OF supersaloons. Unique, understated, deeply esoteric and characterful but underpinned with dazzling dynamics that match or even exceed those of the nearest rivals. A quieter, more discreet BMW M5 CS that exudes confidence and class and a bit of sun-dappled mafioso murderous cool. Well, the Ghibli Trofeo is most definitely not that car. It’s pretty cool, that’s for sure. However, this is a car hopelessly outclassed by the aforementioned M5 CS or, for that matter, an M5 Competition or AMG E63. If all three started a lap of the Nürburgring at the same time, the two Germans would be lapping the Maser by Brünnchen. If it was wet it would be more like Hatzenbach. A true mafia-style bloodbath. And yet over the course of a few…

Maserati Ghibli Trofeo

BMW M240i xDrive

THE CHRISTMAS HOLIDAYS OFTEN result in a bit of a switcheroo between Fast Fleeters. This festive season Jethro B and I swapped our respective steeds, JBov needing a big four-door to ferry his in-laws about, while I needed something that could cope with a big trip and a bit of snow on a pre-Christmas trip to my own in-laws in Switzerland. I thought seriously about taking the Maser, but there’s no way it would have coped with snow and ice. With its xDrive all-wheel drive, the M240i was just what I needed. I’d hoped to get some winter tyres, or at least some all-seasons fitted prior to the trip, but sizing and supply issues thwarted me. Plenty of tyre brands do the correct sizes, but few if any offer a full range…

BMW M240i xDrive

SKIDDING AROUND IN CARS IS SOMETHING WE do rather a lot of here at evo. It’s not big and it’s not clever, but as anyone who has done it knows, it’s bloody good fun. So, when Skoda UK called to see if we fancied heading to northern Sweden for a crack at beating the existing record for the longest continuous vehicle drift on ice, we packed some thermals and headed north. There are several different records for drifting. The outright distance record of 374.17km (232.5 miles) was set by Johan Schwartz driving a BMW M5 (for eight hours!), while the EV distance record of 43.646km (27.1 miles) was set by Wei Pengda in a Zhiji L7. Both records were set on wet steering pads. The fastest drift is held by…

UNWITTINGLY, THE DAY BEFORE we shoot the Audi RS6 Avant and BMW M3 Competition Touring on the rolling roads that thump and yump over the North York Moors, I remind myself just why the fast estate car is such a special concept. My first sight of the RS6 is at 6am. It’s shrouded in thick ice and the air is so cold that my clothes crackle as I walk towards it. A few minutes later I’m thawing in heated seats and pointed towards Brands Hatch, some 100 miles south. The miles accrue easily and the 4-litre twin-turbocharged engine slips almost silently into the background. It’s just the start of a very RS6 sort of day. The track is perilously slippery but the Audi barely notices. It’s acting as fast chase…

VW Arteon R Shooting Brake

DASHBOARD WARNINGS. IF YOU’RE A Volkswagen veteran, they’re something you’re used to. Some you know are temporary (Driver Assist being unavailable), some are scary (instruments and infotainment powering off to darkness), some cause momentary panic (a tyre pressure being 0.1 bar off what it should be), but most are orange in colour and easily batted away, then ignored or put down to the weather. It was when I was literally ‘driving home for Christmas’ that I was hit by a new kind of warning: a deafening scream unlike anything I’d heard before in a VW, accompanied by some serious-looking red graphics and the words ‘COOLANT ISSUE. PULL OVER IMMEDIATELY. CONSULT OWNERS MANUAL’. I think, for once, it wasn’t bluffing. Best not ignore. Luckily I was close to home, so once the engine…

VW Arteon R Shooting Brake

HOW MUCH OF A PURIST do you have to be to be accepted into The Club? And does it even matter if you don’t adhere to a set of rules that were most likely defined by a collection of opinionated individuals who you’ve probably never met, and whose opinion might not matter a whole lot anyway? Thing is, most self-anointed purists will tell you that rules exist merely to be broken, and if that’s true then the Dakar – heretic as it will no doubt be regarded by some – is surely one of the most intriguing new 911s of the last 30 years. Think about it. Ever since Dr Ulrich Bez reinvented the 964 and turned it into the 993 almost one third of a century ago, Porsche has…

Mercedes-Benz C63 AMG Estate

LAST YEAR WAS FILLED WITH ROAD TRIPS, modifications and lofty fuel prices, and all the while the C63 ownership experience has continued to exceed my expectations. Of course, with the car now having covered just shy of 10,000 miles since I took on ownership, it hasn’t been completely plain sailing… Given its relatively low overall mileage and my somewhat obsessive maintenance habits, I hadn’t given much thought to MOT day. As I’d hoped, there were zero advisories, but the nasty surprise was an ageing suspension-arm ball joint that rendered it a failure. Perished rubber wouldn’t usually be an expensive fix, but the only way to replace it for OEM was to buy an entire suspension arm for almost £500. There’s the first AMG-branded bill, then. In more positive news, the Quaife limited-slip…

Mercedes-Benz C63 AMG Estate

IF YOU DROVE A LONG DISTANCE IN AN EV during the recent holiday period, chances are you have an opinion about the state of the public charging network in the UK. Of course, everyone’s experience is different, but generally speaking, it’s not great. I won’t go into how and why the system at large doesn’t work – that’s a job for the Daily Mail or your Twitter feed – but the Christmas break will have reiterated to many why we’re still a long way off being able to support a wholesale adoption of electric vehicles on these shores. For our Born, I depend entirely on the public charging network as I don’t have any off-street parking. With my typical and admittedly narrow usage pattern, I’m glad to report that this works quite…

Peugeot 208 GTi by Peugeot Sport

WHEN I BOUGHT THE PEUGEOT LAST YEAR, it came on a matching set of tyres – often rare in the world of used cars. But those tyres were old Nankangs, beginning to look a wee bit worn up front. I made a mental note to switch them for something more in keeping with the 208’s focus with reasonable haste. But that soon plummeted down the priority list, the car’s amusing balance – namely its love of lift-off oversteer that I was so enamoured of in early press cars – feeling exaggerated by its non-OEM rubber. In the dry, the car was deft and alert. In the wet it could border on the cartoonish. An ever-quickening slow puncture nudged replacement tyres back into view as autumn arrived, though, and my search for a…

Peugeot 208 GTi by Peugeot Sport

Lamborghini Murciélago

@evomagazine @evomagazine @officialevomagazine THE DEAFENING SHRIEK OF A Lamborghini V12 destroying itself isn’t something I wish to ever hear again. After the gut-wrenching realisation that this would be gigantic money to fix, it also began to dawn on me that, given my Murciélago’s colourful history, it might just be time to close the curtain on it for good and strip it down for parts. Long-standing evo aficionados may remember the big Lambo regularly appearing in these pages from 2005 to 2018. Back in 2004 it was the first Murciélago to be delivered by Lamborghini Manchester and one of the few with a manual ’box. Within weeks of it poking its short snout out of the showroom, it was earning its keep on track as a driving experience supercar, clocking up…

Lamborghini Murciélago

Skoda Superb Estate Sportline Plus

I SEEM TO BE HAVING A SEVERE CASE OF déjà vu, as having only just said goodbye to our Kodiaq vRS, I now find myself in another big Skoda, this one a Superb Estate Sportline Plus. I’ve sampled quite a few fast Skodas since starting at evo back in 2014 and this model and spec has the potential to be the best yet. Let’s start with the powertrain. Our new arrival has the 2-litre petrol engine, which produces a very respectable 276bhp and is mated to a seven-speed DSG transmission and four-wheel drive, resulting in a surprisingly quick 0-62mph claim of just 5.3 seconds. To give that figure some context, a Golf GTI Clubsport, which has 20bhp more but no 4WD, takes three tenths longer for the same benchmark. Paired…

Skoda Superb Estate Sportline Plus

Jaguar F-Pace SVR

THE SVR HAS HAD A STUMBLE. Don’t worry too much though, our ‘used’ long-termer hasn’t snapped a crankshaft or really disgraced itself. It simply had a small hiccup as we closed in on the 30,000-mile mark. The first I knew about it was when the ‘check engine’ light appeared. I hadn’t noticed anything untoward, but after logging the fault with Jaguar and awaiting their response I started to pay particular attention to how the powertrain was working. To begin with I could detect nothing, but then one day at cruising speed on the motorway I noticed a slight pulse in the engine’s delivery despite my right foot not wavering on the pedal. Then I began to feel – or was I imagining it? – all sorts of odd things: a sudden…

Jaguar F-Pace SVR

Fiat Panda 100HP

WHEN THE PANDA 100HP WAS contemporary there were lots of very small cars, from C1s and Twingos to 107s and Kas. Today those models are no more, but not every car maker has given up on a sub-supermini model. Toyota, for example, announced a new Aygo last year, no longer a co-pro with Peugeot/Citroën though still made in the same Czech factory as its predecessors. Except it’s not just an Aygo, it’s an Aygo X, the new suffix marking a shift towards faux-SUV styling in an attempt to skate to the puck. You’ll see from the pic above that it looks pretty chunky next to my weeny Panda, though the Aygo’s bulk is exaggerated by the 18-inch wheels that are standard on all but the base model. And I suspect…

Fiat Panda 100HP

WHAT AN ASTONISHING ENGINE the Puma’s 1.5-litre triple is. Its three-cylinder beat makes it sound relaxed, lazy almost, but it delivers ludicrously strong torque seemingly from tickover. It’s a remarkable example of how far turbocharging has come, and yet it was another reason why it took me far longer than I expected to drive the Puma smoothly. The first couple of times I drove it I felt clumsy, like a novice driver; the steering has more response and self-centring than I like or seems necessary so the car felt jumpy, while the brakes had too much dead travel and then a strong bite point. Two weeks later, I’ve adapted. My steering inputs are now slow and small, I lean gently into the brake pedal and I squeeze the throttle and ride…

INSTRUMENTS WITH HUNDREDS of possible display combinations. A touchscreen that’s infuriating to operate because the natural movements of a car mean you’re forever accidentally brushing the wrong option. A touch-sensitive button on the end of a steering-wheel spoke that your palm sometimes catches when you make a turn, activating something you didn’t want activated. The TT has none of these things, and is very much all the better for it. Instead there are real buttons that go ‘click’ when you press them and rotary controls that go ‘tick-tick-tick’ when you turn them. As for screens, there is just the one: the so-called Virtual Cockpit. When it debuted in 2014 – on the TT, no less – it initially seemed like Audi swerving the expense of fitting two screens to some of…

Maserati Ghibli Trofeo

I MAGINE THE MASERATI MC20 OF supersaloons. Unique, understated, deeply esoteric and characterful but underpinned with dazzling dynamics that match or even exceed those of the nearest rivals. A quieter, more discreet BMW M5 CS that exudes confidence and class and a bit of sun-dappled mafioso murderous cool. Well, the Ghibli Trofeo is most definitely not that car. It’s pretty cool, that’s for sure. However, this is a car hopelessly outclassed by the aforementioned M5 CS or, for that matter, an M5 Competition or AMG E63. If all three started a lap of the Nürburgring at the same time, the two Germans would be lapping the Maser by Brünnchen. If it was wet it would be more like Hatzenbach. A true mafia-style bloodbath. And yet over the course of a…

Maserati Ghibli Trofeo

BMW M240i xDrive

THE CHRISTMAS HOLIDAYS OFTEN result in a bit of a switcheroo between Fast Fleeters. This festive season Jethro B and I swapped our respective steeds, JBov needing a big four-door to ferry his in-laws about, while I needed something that could cope with a big trip and a bit of snow on a pre-Christmas trip to my own in-laws in Switzerland. I thought seriously about taking the Maser, but there’s no way it would have coped with snow and ice. With its xDrive all-wheel drive, the M240i was just what I needed. I’d hoped to get some winter tyres, or at least some all-seasons fitted prior to the trip, but sizing and supply issues thwarted me. Plenty of tyre brands do the correct sizes, but few if any offer a…

BMW M240i xDrive

Mazda MX-5 2.0 GT Sport Tech

IT’S MY FIRST WINTER WITH AN MX-5, and although a rear-drive sports car wearing summer tyres perhaps isn’t the most sensible option at this time of year, it’s proving to be a loyal companion. Slick roads and sub-zero temperatures had me concerned the Mazda might be less than friendly, but that couldn’t be further from the reality. Admittedly, as I write I’ve managed to avoid snow and ice, but the MX-5 still deserves credit for remaining predictable and enjoyable to drive. Our car is fitted with the optional lowering springs and Bilstein dampers, but its spring rates remain surprisingly low, which must be a contributory factor here. With a sensible displacement, the speed at which the MX-5’s engine comes up to temperature is also rather pleasant after the Fast Fleet C63. Despite…

Mazda MX-5 2.0 GT Sport Tech

VW Arteon R Shooting Brake

DASHBOARD WARNINGS. IF YOU’RE A Volkswagen veteran, they’re something you’re used to. Some you know are temporary (Driver Assist being unavailable), some are scary (instruments and infotainment powering off to darkness), some cause momentary panic (a tyre pressure being 0.1 bar off what it should be), but most are orange in colour and easily batted away, then ignored or put down to the weather. It was when I was literally ‘driving home for Christmas’ that I was hit by a new kind of warning: a deafening scream unlike anything I’d heard before in a VW, accompanied by some serious-looking red graphics and the words ‘COOLANT ISSUE. PULL OVER IMMEDIATELY. CONSULT OWNERS MANUAL’. I think, for once, it wasn’t bluffing. Best not ignore. Luckily I was close to home, so once…

VW Arteon R Shooting Brake

RATINGS = new entry this month. Cars in italics are no longer on sale. Issue no. is for our most recent major test of the car (D = Driven, F = feature). Engine shows details of the car’s combustion engine, or for BEVs the total output of the electric motors in kW. Weight (claimed) is as quoted by the manufacturer, with a manual gearbox if offered. In most cases this figure is to DIN standards, i.e. with fluids, including a 90 per cent full fuel tank, but without a driver. However, where only a ‘dry’ weight is quoted (i.e. without any fluids) this is indicated by *. Note that a dry weight makes a car’s power-to-weight ratio (bhp/ton) appear more favourable. Weight (tested) is our measurement of a test car, with…

Mercedes-Benz C63 AMG Estate

LAST YEAR WAS FILLED WITH ROAD TRIPS, modifications and lofty fuel prices, and all the while the C63 ownership experience has continued to exceed my expectations. Of course, with the car now having covered just shy of 10,000 miles since I took on ownership, it hasn’t been completely plain sailing… Given its relatively low overall mileage and my somewhat obsessive maintenance habits, I hadn’t given much thought to MOT day. As I’d hoped, there were zero advisories, but the nasty surprise was an ageing suspension-arm ball joint that rendered it a failure. Perished rubber wouldn’t usually be an expensive fix, but the only way to replace it for OEM was to buy an entire suspension arm for almost £500. There’s the first AMG-branded bill, then. In more positive news, the…

Mercedes-Benz C63 AMG Estate

DOA: PANTHER SOLO 1

OF ALL THE COMPANIES LIKELY TO MAKE a mid-’80s car mag cover star, you wouldn’t have bet on Panther. Founded in 1972 by fashion designer and some-time saloon car racer Bob Jankel, Panther spent the ’70s making a twee Jaguar SS100 replica, a faux 1930s saloon with Austin 1800 doors, a restyled Triumph Dolomite and, latterly, another fake pre-war roadster called the Lima. Most notoriously, in 1977 it created the Panther 6, a monstrous six-wheeled convertible powered by an 8.2-litre twin-turbo Cadillac V8, just two of which were made. This zany freak show carried on until the end of 1979 when Panther ran out of money. Fortunately, soon afterwards South Korean industrialist Young C Kim visited London for a classic car auction, spotted a Lima outside his hotel and attempted to…

DOA: PANTHER SOLO 1

IF YOU DROVE A LONG DISTANCE IN AN EV during the recent holiday period, chances are you have an opinion about the state of the public charging network in the UK. Of course, everyone’s experience is different, but generally speaking, it’s not great. I won’t go into how and why the system at large doesn’t work – that’s a job for the Daily Mail or your Twitter feed – but the Christmas break will have reiterated to many why we’re still a long way off being able to support a wholesale adoption of electric vehicles on these shores. For our Born, I depend entirely on the public charging network as I don’t have any off-street parking. With my typical and admittedly narrow usage pattern, I’m glad to report that this…

Peugeot 208 GTi by Peugeot Sport

WHEN I BOUGHT THE PEUGEOT LAST YEAR, it came on a matching set of tyres – often rare in the world of used cars. But those tyres were old Nankangs, beginning to look a wee bit worn up front. I made a mental note to switch them for something more in keeping with the 208’s focus with reasonable haste. But that soon plummeted down the priority list, the car’s amusing balance – namely its love of lift-off oversteer that I was so enamoured of in early press cars – feeling exaggerated by its non-OEM rubber. In the dry, the car was deft and alert. In the wet it could border on the cartoonish. An ever-quickening slow puncture nudged replacement tyres back into view as autumn arrived, though, and my search…

Peugeot 208 GTi by Peugeot Sport

Jaguar F-Pace SVR

THE SVR HAS HAD A STUMBLE. Don’t worry too much though, our ‘used’ long-termer hasn’t snapped a crankshaft or really disgraced itself. It simply had a small hiccup as we closed in on the 30,000-mile mark. The first I knew about it was when the ‘check engine’ light appeared. I hadn’t noticed anything untoward, but after logging the fault with Jaguar and awaiting their response I started to pay particular attention to how the powertrain was working. To begin with I could detect nothing, but then one day at cruising speed on the motorway I noticed a slight pulse in the engine’s delivery despite my right foot not wavering on the pedal. Then I began to feel – or was I imagining it? – all sorts of odd things: a…

Jaguar F-Pace SVR

WHAT AN ASTONISHING ENGINE the Puma’s 1.5-litre triple is. Its three-cylinder beat makes it sound relaxed, lazy almost, but it delivers ludicrously strong torque seemingly from tickover. It’s a remarkable example of how far turbocharging has come, and yet it was another reason why it took me far longer than I expected to drive the Puma smoothly. The first couple of times I drove it I felt clumsy, like a novice driver; the steering has more response and self-centring than I like or seems necessary so the car felt jumpy, while the brakes had too much dead travel and then a strong bite point. Two weeks later, I’ve adapted. My steering inputs are now slow and small, I lean gently into the brake pedal and I squeeze the throttle and…

INSTRUMENTS WITH HUNDREDS of possible display combinations. A touchscreen that’s infuriating to operate because the natural movements of a car mean you’re forever accidentally brushing the wrong option. A touch-sensitive button on the end of a steering-wheel spoke that your palm sometimes catches when you make a turn, activating something you didn’t want activated. The TT has none of these things, and is very much all the better for it. Instead there are real buttons that go ‘click’ when you press them and rotary controls that go ‘tick-tick-tick’ when you turn them. As for screens, there is just the one: the so-called Virtual Cockpit. When it debuted in 2014 – on the TT, no less – it initially seemed like Audi swerving the expense of fitting two screens to some…

Mazda MX-5 2.0 GT Sport Tech

IT’S MY FIRST WINTER WITH AN MX-5, and although a rear-drive sports car wearing summer tyres perhaps isn’t the most sensible option at this time of year, it’s proving to be a loyal companion. Slick roads and sub-zero temperatures had me concerned the Mazda might be less than friendly, but that couldn’t be further from the reality. Admittedly, as I write I’ve managed to avoid snow and ice, but the MX-5 still deserves credit for remaining predictable and enjoyable to drive. Our car is fitted with the optional lowering springs and Bilstein dampers, but its spring rates remain surprisingly low, which must be a contributory factor here. With a sensible displacement, the speed at which the MX-5’s engine comes up to temperature is also rather pleasant after the Fast Fleet…

Mazda MX-5 2.0 GT Sport Tech

RATINGS = new entry this month. Cars in italics are no longer on sale. Issue no. is for our most recent major test of the car (D = Driven, F = feature). Engine shows details of the car’s combustion engine, or for BEVs the total output of the electric motors in kW. Weight (claimed) is as quoted by the manufacturer, with a manual gearbox if offered. In most cases this figure is to DIN standards, i.e. with fluids, including a 90 per cent full fuel tank, but without a driver. However, where only a ‘dry’ weight is quoted (i.e. without any fluids) this is indicated by *. Note that a dry weight makes a car’s power-to-weight ratio (bhp/ton) appear more favourable. Weight (tested) is our measurement of a test car,…

DOA: PANTHER SOLO 1

OF ALL THE COMPANIES LIKELY TO MAKE a mid-’80s car mag cover star, you wouldn’t have bet on Panther. Founded in 1972 by fashion designer and some-time saloon car racer Bob Jankel, Panther spent the ’70s making a twee Jaguar SS100 replica, a faux 1930s saloon with Austin 1800 doors, a restyled Triumph Dolomite and, latterly, another fake pre-war roadster called the Lima. Most notoriously, in 1977 it created the Panther 6, a monstrous six-wheeled convertible powered by an 8.2-litre twin-turbo Cadillac V8, just two of which were made. This zany freak show carried on until the end of 1979 when Panther ran out of money. Fortunately, soon afterwards South Korean industrialist Young C Kim visited London for a classic car auction, spotted a Lima outside his hotel and attempted…

DOA: PANTHER SOLO 1

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