SENSATION MEETS FESTIVAL OF ELECTRIFICATION

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Plug-in hybrid,
the best of
both worlds?
Please…
If I hear that the plug-in hybrid represents
‘the best of both worlds’ one more time I’ll
scream. The PHEV, bastion of misinforma-
tion and synonymous with triple-digit
WLTP mpg figures, is a concept born of
compromise. And it’s compromised.
You almost don’t need to read the tests.
Whether it’s BMW’s new XM super-SUV,
Peugeot’s ‘It’s the 405 Mi16 reborn!’ 508
Sport Engineered (spoiler: it isn’t) or Cupra’s
PHEV Formentor, the issues are always the
same – too heavy, fast but inert, disappoint-
ing EV-only range, poor real-world mpg. It’s
telling that even right now, in 2023, the best
powertrain in the Range Rover isn’t one of
the PHEVs, despite the hype Land Rover’s
experience with such systems. It’s the diesel.
And as for the seamless integration of
electric and engine power, you can only as-
sume it’s nightmarishly difficult. There’s no
other explanation for the fact that so many
cars from so many talented teams can’t
deliver a package that hangs together across
a range of use scenarios. If you thrive on
chaos, and like the idea that, Forrest Gump-
style, you never know what you’re going to
get when you push down on the accelerator,
then PHEVs are absolutely for you.
I will generously cede that PHEVs can
work well as family cars, carrying out local
duties on electric power and being able to
trundle to Cornwall in the summer without
range anxiety or charging woes. You just
have to get over the price and the abysmal
economy when charging isn’t an option.
And now we’ve a plug-in hybrid V12 Lam-
borghini, of all things. It had to happen, of
course. I first drove an Aventador in 2015
and it felt dated then, though it still had
magic – the rolling roadblock of pandemo-
nium it prompted on the M1, ring-fenced by
window-down onlookers calling for just
one more full-throttle 40-80mph assault,
remains unmatched in my experience.
Yet Lamborghini is neither willing nor
able to deliver a battery-electric flagship just
yet – the V12 still has too much to give and
too much of a following. (Plus it won’t have
escaped CEO Stephan Winkelmann’s no-
tice that selling electric hypercars is a battle,
whereas the appetite for hypercars with big
noisy engines appears insatiable.)
But I’m worried for the Revuelto. History
is stacked against it. You can count the
number of brilliant-to-drive plug-in hybrids
on less than half of one hand; the McLaren
P1 and the Porsche 918 Spyder. And yes,
Lamborghini’s created a successor nearly
200kg lighter than the Aventador, despite
the battery and three e-motors. But just im- Our postcard from Sebring, scene of Ferrari’s
return to top-flight endurance racing (p48),
agine the Revuelto without the PHEV stuff comes from Ben Barry and Alex Tapley.
– it’d be hundreds of kilos lighter again, and
perhaps a car to keep the famously an-
ti-PHEV Gordon Murray awake at night.
What’s more, the best Lamborghini I’ve
ever driven was the simplest and least ex-
pensive: 2016’s Huracan Rear Wheel Drive.
The Revuelto isn’t simple, inexpensive or
rear-wheel drive.
So, there it is. PHEVs are hopeless. Except
that I drove a Ferrari 296 GTB to Le Mans
last year. At one point I was mired in pre-
race traffic. The raging 819bhp twin-turbo
V6 dropped silent and we inched forward on
cool, calm and collected electric drive. Bliss. Georg Kacher pulls no punches. Witness his
Ah. Exception that proves the rule? drive across Arizona in the XM (p28), the first
Enjoy the issue. M-only BMW since the M1 supercar.
Ben
Miller
Editor
The promised Lamborghini Revuelto (p76)
photo-shoot ‘studio’ was a room. Not a
problem for wizard Olgun Kordal.
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 3
 ISSUE 730 | M AY 2 0 2 3

Inside the hybrid

Revuelto, Lamborghini’s
last V12 supercar
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Insider
6 Kia unveils the audacious EV9: an
electric Range Rover rival from Korea
12 Scoop: Bentley’s Continental GT
reborn and reimagined as a luxury EV
14 How Britain is getting left behind as the
car industry hurtles into the electric age
15 Inked In: Polestar’s Thomas Ingenlath
16 Soundbites: Porsche boss Oliver Blume
16 The Critique: The problem with Ford’s
new VW-based electric Explorer
18 Inquisition: the man behind Chinese-
owned MG’s new era of success in the UK
20 Watches: great prices for new classics

60 Used car stars: 14 great secondhand

buys – and half of them are electric

86 Peugeot 408 meets electric

and hybrid crossover rivals
18 Why MG is booming again

Tech
22 Innovations from VW and Renault that
should help EVs get less expensive
24 Inside the Multimatic suspension
breakthrough that helps the Purosangue
handle like a proper Ferrari
26 Does It Work? Mazda’s trend-bucking
new straight-six diesel engine

First Drives
28 300-Mile Test: BMW XM. The first M-only
48
SUV is a plug-in hybrid that’s almost
as big as an X7. We explore Arizona in
search of what it all means
36 Lexus RX: new generation of the
long-running crossover finally comes
with a plug-in hybrid option
38 Rolls-Royce Black Badge Cullinan:
bringing out the slightly harder edge
of the luxury SUV
June’s Le Mans 24 Hour battle
began in Florida for Ferrari combustion-engined option. We find
seven fine choices in each flavour
76 Revealed: Lamborghini’s last V12
supercar, the carbonfibre-bodied,
hybrid-assisted, 1001bhp Revuelto
86 Giant Test: Peugeot 408 meets Kia EV6
and Cupra Formentor in a petrol vs hybrid
vs electric showdown between three
variations on the coupe SUV theme
100 If the M2 is a showcase for BMW
M division’s ability to squeeze its
performance genius into a compact and
affordable package, how come the new
one is so big, heavy and expensive?

28 M division unleashes a hot
hybrid: BMW XM tested
Our Cars
106 VW Multivan: looks like an electric
camper van but is actually a hybrid MPV
100 New M2 driven: bigger, more
expensive, but still great?

106 Looks great, but what’s the

VW Multivan like to live with?

Opinion The big reads

40 Letters: Everything is too expensive, plus
fun in hire cars and the promise of e-fuels
44 Gavin Green: The doomed Merc estate
46 Mark Walton: Concrete car parks – yay!
123 The Good, the Bad & the Ugly
48 The countdown to Le Mans 100 starts
here. We’re at Sebring as Ferrari, Porsche,
Peugeot, Ferrari, Cadillac and Toyota vie
for 2023 endurance-race glory
60 Used car stars: time to decide if your next
buy should be electric, or maybe another

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 5

 CARS I PEOPLE I SCOOPS I MOTORSPORT I ANALYSIS – THE MONTH ACCORDING TO CAR

Designed to
catch the eye –
and to maximise
interior flexibility

6 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 I N T H E S P OT L I G H T

KIA TAKES ON THE

RANGE ROVER
Cheap and cheerful? Pah. These days,
Kia excels at both electric and premium.
The EV9 is its most ambitious car yet.
By Guy Bird and Jake Groves

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 7

 Remember the Sedona MPV? Kia’s
come a long way since the days of the
bland and forgettable family car. Or,
indeed, its focus on cheap runabouts
for the masses. These days, the brand
has an attitude, thanks in huge part
to the confidence of its design team,
and has started building cars people
desire, rather than need.
It’s tricky following on from the
EV6 – a truly great EV that we love at
CAR – but somehow, Kia’s managed
to keep up its momentum. The new,
all-electric, futuristic-looking EV9 is
another part of that seemingly un-
ending upward trajectory, launching
towards the end of 2023 in Europe.
The EV9’s geometrically-inspired
lines – from its flared triangular
wings and chunkily wraparound
windscreen, to the ‘star map’ LEDs
and animated, customisable digital
lighting patterns – add up to a new
design approach. Much of which will
filter down to its smaller electric cars,
and fulfil Kia’s masterplan of having
14 EVs on sale by 2027.
Kia’s design confidence is high-
lighted by the fact that the produc-
8 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
tion-spec EV9 shares so much with
the concept that came before it, bar
the even wilder interior. The brand’s
head of global design, Karim Habib,
cites ‘aerodynamic reasons’ as to why
the EV9 has ‘slightly less ground
clearance than a normal SUV’, before
admitting that making it look good
has also been a huge factor.
‘I think that’s partly what makes
the car, like the bonnet being shorter,
the cabin longer and the beltline low.
The beltline is definitely lower than
on the concept car. In its glass-to-
body proportion, it’s a bit less classi-
cal SUV-like. That was all part of the
message of this more “living space”
architecture.’
Inside, the EV9 sports one large
27-inch instrument panel combining
a trio of slim screens, which Kia’s
global head of interiors, Jochen
Paesen, says is a ‘newer generation of
screens beyond the EV6, which will
be rolled out across the range’. The
EV9 also has a new steering wheel
with a chamfered top edge to create a
shallow, elongated capital ‘D’ shape
to make viewing that driver display
Design boss easier, while all of the key physical
Habib says EV9 driver controls are clustered around
sits low for
aero benefits the steering column to avoid greater
visual clutter elsewhere.
The instrument panel, door grab
handles and centre armrest – with
major open storage beneath – all re-
flect a ‘floating’ design aesthetic,
seemingly suspended in their various
locations, which Paesen says is about
‘concentrating on the negative space
and shadow and as an antithesis of
the over-busy interior design ap-
proach of other SUVs’.
Talking of that ‘living space’, the
EV9’s designers have created myriad
flexible seating options within the
otherwise restrained interior. Availa-
ble in the UK with six or seven seats,
the second row does most of the
functional heavy-lifting.
In six-seat mode, captain’s-style
chairs can swivel through 180º and
be horizontally offset in relation to
the forward-facing third row, so all
passengers can find a place to put
their legs without clashing kneecaps.
Those second-row seats can also be
adjusted so that when the door is ⊲

T H E D E B AT E : K I A ' S E L E C T R I C S E V E N - S E AT E R
‘Kia’s on such a roll it’s
managed to make a
cool seven-seater’
JG: Look at this! How can
Kia continue to be on
such a roll, design-wise?
It looks different enough
to not be a bloated EV6,
and the interior is another
step forward for the brand.
Kia’s managed to make the
seven-seater cool.
CO: Just because it’s not
as troubling as the BMW
THANKS IN PART TO
XM, this is still an eyesore.
ITS DESIGN TEAM, It invokes the meaningless
KIA IS BUILDING chunkiness of the GM era
CARS PEOPLE that gave us the Chevrolet
DESIRE, RATHER Orlando and Dodge Nitro.
THAN NEED
JG: You have to admit that
the seating arrangements
are clever, surely? Seats
that move all the way out
to the door’s edge to help
those that need it – a
solid idea, even if it meant
quite a bit more additional
engineering.
CO: Doubtless a benefit
to many people. But truly
clever packaging would
have found a way to offer
six or seven seats in a
slightly smaller car, the way
Merc has with the EQB,
and a previous generation
of MPVs did. After the
Vauxhall Zafira and Honda
Insider
Jazz, user-friendly seating
has stalled rather.
JG: I must say, though,
I find Kia’s outlook a bit
confusing. The higher ups
are so keen to say it’s not
rising towards being a BMW JAKE
or Audi rival, and yet this GROVES
looks like something that’s Our deputy
come from the premium news editor
Germans. You can stick is smitten
with the EV9
your EQE or Q8 e-Tron – I’d
rather have this. already
CO: I suspect a lot of
people will be tossing up
between this and the Volvo
EX90 – another boxy EV
with a fine interior – rather
than any of the Germans.
JG: At the very least, you COLIN
have to commend the OVERLAND
versatility of the E-GMP CAR’s
platform. Unlike the damp managing
squib of MEB, or Mercedes editor isn’t
and BMW’s confusing mix convinced
of options, Hyundai and
Kia’s engineers have built
something to last.
CO: And they’ve passed
every penny of the
development costs on to
the consumer; £65k, you
say? It’ll be a Dacia Jogger
for me, thanks all the same.
CAR’s
team argue
whether the
EV9 is truly
innovative
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 9
 open they face outwards, to aid frail
folks’ exit and entry.
Kia’s also taking more of a stand
when it comes to sustainability.
Marilia Bill, head of the colour, mate-
rial and finish design team, says the
EV9 marks the start of Kia’s phasing
out of leather upholstery across its
entire range, for example. The idea is
to increase the amount of plant-
based components. ‘And, in the fu-
ture, we plan to go further. We’re in-
vesting in something called
biofabrication in order to be part of a
material revolution by growing our
own materials.’
Then there’s the technology on
board. By now, we’re almost used to
Hyundai Motor Group’s silver bullet
of an EV platform – E-GMP – com-
plete with 800-volt electrical archi-
tecture for faster charging and V2L
technology for powering external
devices. But Kia promises Level
3-ready autonomous driving tech-
nologies, a remote parallel parking
assistant, a platform for new soft-
ware to be installed over-the-air, a
10 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
T H E R I VA L
Where JLR
fears to tread
On the face of it, Kia has created
something that Land Rover hasn’t yet
managed: an electric SUV that fits seven,
can go the distance, is quick and loaded
with technology. While Kia insists it’s not
a premium player – that’s the job of sister
brand Genesis – its design team and
E-GMP engineers have combined to create
a car to woo Range Rover buyers.
2500kg towing capacity (matching
that of a Range Rover Velar), the abil-
ity to power your home (like Ford’s
F-150 Lightning) and even vehi-
cle-to-grid power supplementation.
‘It’s another first for Kia,’ says Kia’s
head of global business planning,
Spencer Cho. ‘With vehicle-to-home
and vehicle-to-grid, we’re offering
capabilities not available elsewhere.’
With the EV9, the standard-range
car has a 76.1kWh battery pack and
rear-wheel drive, and a long-range
model will be available with rear- or
all-wheel drive and a 99.8kWh pack.
The thriftiest EV9 is capable of
around 336 miles of e-range, while
the quickest is capable of a 5.3sec
0-62mph time. Kia’s top brass also
confirmed there would be an EV9 GT
– likely to have a similar 577bhp
power output to the EV6 GT – arriv-
ing in early 2025.
Kia’s executive team are at endless
pains to say the brand is not trying to
go ‘premium’, but that doesn’t change
the fact that the EV9’s list of tech, the
materials used and an estimated
 Insider

B LO O D L I N E

THE EV9’S DNA

LAID BARE
It’s got a great foundation

THE EV9 MARKS THE

START OF KIA’S PHASING Kia EV6
OUT OF LEATHER The unusually-styled yet brilliant electric car was the first
UPHOLSTERY ACROSS ITS arrival in Kia’s new dedicated EV line-up. And, with the
ENTIRE RANGE OF CARS E-GMP platform, efficient motors and tech USPs Tesla
could only dream of, it’s a good one.

base price of around £65k in the UK Cabin includes

loads of storage
all point to the contrary. options, as well
Even the vice president of brand as swivelling
strategy, Kumasegawa Kaoru, ad- seats in the Hyundai Seven
middle row
mits the EV9 skirts close to the fring- This concept previews what will be the EV9’s Hyundai
es of Kia’s remit: ‘I think this will stay sibling, set to launch later in 2023. The production Ioniq 7
within the DNA of the brand, but will also be available with up to seven seats, and include
just touch upon the boundaries be- the pixel-heavy design cues from the 5 and 6.
tween premium and mainstream –
those boundaries are getting more
blurred,’ he says.
‘But as people shift to electrifica-
tion, we think this is a great opportu-
nity for Kia to be present in this new
landscape of brands. EV9 is a tre-
mendous opportunity for us to show
what we can do, and these values will
be trickled down into our future
line-up. We’ll be tailoring everything
for each and every segment.’
Charles Ryu, Kia’s head of global
brand, emphasises that cars as ambi- Kia Sorento
tious as the EV9 will be offered as Currently the closest thing Kia has to an electrified family
well as more mainstream fare, not SUV. It’s a seven-seater, with a choice of powertrains
instead of: ‘We’ll still be positioned spanning PHEV, hybrid and diesel. Smartly turned out,
to appeal to a wide audience. I can rather than the visual treat of the EV9.
promise you this: we’ll never leave
our core customers behind.’

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 11

 T H E S C O O P
BENTLEY’S SILENT RUNNING
CONTI GT
Asked if the Continental GT will
survive into the electric era,
Bentley boss Adrian Hallmark
TO GO
(above) tells CAR: ‘Yes,
absolutely.’ Electric propulsion
ELECTRIC
can be a good fit with a GT:
‘When I’m on a long journey,
I’m not listening to the engine
turn; I’m looking at the scenery,
As Crewe bids farewell to the chatting and listening to a
fantastic sound system.’
W12 engine, Bentley says its
grand tourer will morph into a
pure EV. By Jake Groves
GROUND UP
Instead of having to re-engineer
existing parts from within the
VW Group as it has done in the
FACTFILE past, Bentley has been a player
P OW E R TR A I N from the start in the group’s
100kWh (est) battery, twin battery-electric platform
e-motors, all-wheel drive development. ‘It’s a bit of a
CHASSIS game-changer,’ says Hallmark.
Steel and aluminium ‘With this new generation,
monocoque we’ve been at the top table
DUE from the very beginning.’
2027 (est)
12 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
BATUR’S INFLUENCE
Bentley’s limited-run Batur
by Mulliner (above) previews
what Crewe’s future electric
cars will look like. The next
Continental GT is also likely to
be influenced by the dramatic
EXP 100 GT concept, albeit
with some of the current car’s
most recognisable details (such
as the double-headlight front
end) likely to stay.
BUT FIRST, THE SUV
It’s likely that the first electric
Bentley will be an SUV to
replace the Bentayga (above)
in 2026. As Hallmark told CAR
in 2021: ‘If you’re not in SUVs,
you’re nowhere.’ But the brand
still sees the Continental GT as
Illustration: Avarvarii
a crucial pillar of its business, so
it’s likely to be the next electric
model launched after the
big-selling SUV goes EV.
Conti GT
transformed
Bentley 20
years ago; now
it’s going EV
Ignite your BLUE.
 Insider

B E H I N D T H E H E A D L I N E S

IS THE UK CAR
INDUSTRY BEING
LEFT BEHIND?
Instability, trade blockages and failed projects
have stung the UK – how does it recover?

Point the finger at whatever reason the SMMT, tells CAR. ‘Brexit gave us
you like – Brexit, semiconductor five, maybe six years of uncertainty,
shortages, the pandemic, inflation or we’ve had Covid and political insta-
a simple lack of competitiveness – bility and a gradual erosion in the
the UK’s car industry has been competitive offering of the UK. We
harmed by it all in recent years. need to address all these points.’
It’s a sector of the economy that And this is before getting to Brit-
employs around 780,000 people and ishvolt – the battery manufacturer
accounts for around 10 per cent of that was billed as crucial to the elec-
the UK’s exports. It includes huge car trification transition, as well as to the
factories, R&D and design centres as UK’s net-zero goals. The dream col-
well as commercial vehicle and bus lapsed, with the business briefly go-
manufacturers. But while those ing into administration before Aus-
numbers sound impressive, data tralian start-up Recharge Industries
from the Society of Motoring Manu- finalised its takeover in February.
facturers and Traders (SMMT) says But decreasing car manufacturing
car manufacturing has slumped to numbers raises the question as to
its lowest level since the 1960s. how effective another UK-based ‘gi-
Honda has gone from Swindon; gafactory’ (besides the Envision
Vauxhall Astras are no longer made plant in Sunderland, which is plan-
at Ellesmere Port; Ford makes en- ning to expand) could be in the first
gines but not cars or vans in the UK. place. For example, Jaguar’s plans to
Potential incomers go futher upmarket as
are being put off by a ‘THERE’S it electrifies ‘will inevi-
lack of competitive- NO POINT tably mean a smaller
ness mixed with seem- HAVING A volume than they were
ingly endless uncer- making,’ says Hawes.
BATTERY Relieving the
tainty; in 2019, for Bentley CEO Adri- EU-UK trade deal, meanwhile, is
example, Elon Musk
FACTORY IF an Hallmark agrees: gloom, the worded to smooth out hiccups at the
chose to build Tesla’s YOU DON’T ‘There’s no point in
British-built
Nissan Qashqai border – essential given the multina-
first European factory BUILD CARS’ having a battery facto- was the UK’s tional nature of car making. But the
ADRIAN HALLMARK, best selling
in Germany rather ry if you’re not going to car in 2022 rest needs to come from public and
BENTLEY CEO
than the UK. And Chi- build cars. Key players private investment, and some pro-
nese car maker BYD within the UK must motion of the UK’s myriad talents.
ruled out the UK as a have strategies them- ‘We still have some incredible
location for its first European plant. selves to source batteries, either strengths,’ says Hawes; ‘we have
Both cited political instability. through their own gigafactories or world-renowned brands, and a
The Financial Times reports that through secured supply routes. If global reputation for engineering
several more decisions like this hang there isn’t adequate investment, it’ll excellence. And let’s not forget that
in the balance, for example whether just put the UK car industry under most of the F1 teams and their pow-
Nissan will build another EV besides pressure.’ ertrain developments are based
the Leaf replacement at Sunderland, So how to get out of this hole? here. We’ve also got a highly
or whether Toyota will build the next Inflation is tipped to drop productive labour force that’s
Corolla at its Deeside facility, both from double digits to very flexible and a great
undecided at the time of writing. 2.9 per cent by the end supply chain that we just
‘Right now, we’re playing catch- of 2023, which will need to scale up.’
up,’ Mike Hawes, chief executive of help. The post-Brexit JAKE GROVES

14 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 I N K E D I N

My career in
three sketches
THOMAS INGENLATH
POLESTAR CEO

▲
FIRST CAR
VW PHAETON
‘Really the Phaeton was the first car where
you could say it went fully to production. I
was Volkswagen’s head of exterior
design at the time.’

▲
MOST IMPORTANT CAR
VOLVO XC90
‘It was such an important car to get
right. It’s when Volvo were suddenly
A battle plan for the UK’s car industry responsible for themselves and it was
make or break.’
Mike Hawes’ five steps to future success

Cut energy costs Nurture talent Fund the future

‘We use a huge ‘We need to ‘We need to make it
amount of energy. safeguard what we easier for us to upskill
Some other sectors, have, and increase and attract people to
treated as energy the volumes of cars the industry. Cutting
intensive, get price built, then attract new business rates would
mitigation.’ investment.’ help.’

End the instability Promote UK plc ▲

‘Just don’t give us ‘Build on your LATEST DESIGN
complexity. If politics strengths, address POLESTAR FAMILY
is boring for the next the weaknesses, sell ‘It’s creating something that, on one hand,
few years, I don’t yourself to the world. has a focus on design, but also stands for
mind. It means we’re The industry brings a tasteful, authentic brand expression at
doing the right thing.’ the UK big benefits.’ every touch point.’

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 15

Insider
S O U N D B I T E S
This month’s
conversations
with CAR
OLIVER
BLUME
PORSCHE & VW
GROUP CEO
▼
‘The new Formula
1 regulations really
make sense for us.
We’ve been in talks
with Red Bull but
we couldn’t find an
agreement. There
aren’t any further
activities with F1, but
I won’t exclude this
in the future.’
▼ which has engineered Europe’s dy-
‘The 718 will be an
all-electric car. In the
beginning, we’ll have
a parallel combustion
offer but then it will go
100 per cent electric,
transferring to the world
of electromobility. As for
the 911, we’ll introduce a
PHEV. We’re aiming for
a plug-in hybrid with an
e-mode range of more
than 80km [50 miles].’
▼ that get your pulse racing more.’
‘E-fuels are a useful
addition. It’s all
about showing how
they can be used in
new cars equipped
with a combustion
engine even after
2035; we believe the
German government
needs to take the
respective steps.’
16 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
T H E C R I T I Q U E
FORD’S PARTS BIN EV
New Explorer spells a new, less unique future for the Blue Oval
There’s no crime in platform sharing,
otherwise all car company CEOs
would be behind bars. But the car
world feels a poorer place when Ford,
namic benchmarks with the Fiesta
and Focus hatches, is buying in VW’s
MEB electric architecture to under-
pin EVs like the new Explorer.
‘The Fiesta and Focus are making
way for a new Ford strategy in Eu-
rope,’ protests a Ford spokesman.
‘We’re not going to be the same com-
pany that people grew up with, going
after volume and playing in every
single segment. We’re going to dou-
ble down on differentiated vehicles
Differentiated is a loaded word
when the wheelbase is the same as
the ID. 4’s to house identical batter-
ies, with either 55 or 82kWh capacity.
And the small-battery Explorer has a
125kW (168bhp) motor driving the
rears, like the base ID. 4.
‘Judge for yourself, but we don’t see
any trace [of ID. 4],’ says Murat Güler,
passenger car design chief.
Interior quality and aesthetics
take a massive step forward com-
pared with recent Ford’s bleak and
cheap cabins. There’s some ingen-
ious stowage, with the Mach-E-in-
spired 15-inch vertical touchscreen
swinging through 30˚to reveal a hid-
den cubby behind, and a modular
centre console that can stow three
big bottles. But the pulse hardly races
when stowage is a car’s biggest USP.
Can it still drive like a Ford? ‘The
springs, dampers and anti-roll bar
are all tuned to the Ford philosophy,’
says engineering manager Thomas
Riehm. ‘There’s been a lot of adapta-
tion: the steering and brakes are tai-
lored to the Fordness people are used
to.’ The car also gets bespoke Conti-
nental tyres. Time will tell if Ford can
soup up MEB’s solid but hardly en-
thralling dynamics.
The situation that created the Ex-
plorer is understandable. But to this It may carry a
Essex boy and Ford fan, that doesn’t familiar Ford
name, but it
make it any less regrettable. might fail a
PHIL MCNAMARA DNA test
CHOOSE LIFE
WITHOUT BOUNDARIES

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Just map out a virtual boundary in the app and Navimow will follow
the planned route, leaving fewer tracks on the lawn.

VisionFence Sensor
With AI inside, the VisionFence Sensor enables your Navimow to detect
various objects and mow even more intelligently.

Perfect Lawn Maintenance

Navimow cuts a little bit each time and cuts more frequently,
allowing the clippings to become natural fertiliser.

navimow.segway.com/uk
 GUY
PIGOUNAKIS,
M G M OTO R
COMMERCIAL
D I REC TO R

that there’s any sense of triumphal-

T H E C A R I N Q U S I T I O N ism, just confidence from this indus-
try veteran of 46 years – a veteran

‘OUR VIEW? WE
who’s enjoying his second stint at
MG, having led the sales operation

NEED TO DISRUPT’
MG is booming – but this
is just the beginning.
By Phil McNamara
MG is the UK’s fastest growing
marque, registering 51,050 cars last
year (up 67 per cent) and confident of
hitting 70,000 in 2023. Its retailer
base will soar to 180 locations, with
more dealer groups being drawn to
its franchise. And the pipeline is so
which relaunched the brand with the
MG F roadster in 1995.
‘I look back on those days with
huge affection, the motor racing, we
made fortunes. The MG F time was
my most fun, but [today’s] MG is the
most relaxed,’ he remarks.
It’s no surprise he’s relaxed when
everything MG touches turns to
commercial gold. The mid-sized HS
SUV was Britain’s best-selling car in
January: ‘a bit of an anomaly’ he ob-
Illustration: Chris Rathbone

full of fresh metal that the acclaimed
4 electric hatch will be the range’s
oldest car by late 2024.
As commercial director, Guy Pig-
ounakis is in the nerve centre. Not
jects, as MG delayed some EV regis-
trations to give it a headstart on
2023’s CO2 targets. The smaller (and
pure electric) ZS SUV was also in the
top 10 – and that was before Pig-

18 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023


‘PEOPLE WILL
BE SHOCKED BY
HOW GOOD THE
ROADSTER IS
DYNAMICALLY,
AND WHAT IT
LOOKS LIKE’
ounakis got news that its drippy sup-
ply tap was about to start flowing.
Worrying about CO2 targets (fines
for missing them are ‘horrendous’, he
warns) seems unduly cautious when
he predicts 20,000 registrations of
the electric MG 4 this year. ‘And if I
want more I can get them.’ And MG
being all-electric by 2028 is achieva-
ble, though it’s planning for 2030.
The fun-to-drive 4 has impressed
in two CAR comparison tests, and
Pigounakis reckons once you factor
in its price tag, it’s a compelling buy.
‘It’s probably the first credible electric
car that is competitively priced with
an equivalent petrol, and that hasn’t
been lost on [people].’
The commercial chief says MG is
working to ‘quite lean margins, de-
liberately. We’ve taken a view that we
need to disrupt the market to estab-
lish our brand.’ MG, he says, stands
for fun, value for money and increas-
ingly competitive cars – all under the
banner of a loved brand with huge
recognition, thanks to the legacy of
the MG B, MG F and hot saloons.
Sporty cars are coming back this
year, with a dual-motor hot-hatch 4
packing 443lb ft of torque and a sub-
4.0sec 0-62mph sprint (fettled by
Pigounakis’ nine engineers at MG’s
small technical base on the old Long-
bridge factory site), and a reborn
roadster. Sharing its flexible, rear-
drive platform with the 4, that’ll be
Europe’s first electric droptop.  or six cars that will be great value,
‘We’ve shown a select group of
dealers, some with prestige sports
car brands, and they’ve stared at it
with mouths open! I think people
will be shocked by how good it is
dynamically, what it looks like and
the technology in it.’ Pigounakis
reckons its closest rival is the BMW
Z4, and promises ‘it’ll offer outstand-
ing value but it won’t be cheap’.
MG is owned by China’s biggest
car maker, SAIC, which assembled
more than five million cars last year,
many in partnership with VW and
GM. Its low-cost Chinese factories
give it a big advantage, one that has
provoked fierce criticism from Stel-
lantis boss Carlos Tavares, who’s
fearful of being undercut in Europe.
‘That particular company has vir-
tually stopped selling cars in China,
so there’s no potential backlash for
casting aspersions against Chinese
brands,’ retorts Pigounakis. ‘How
many times have you heard Europe-
an or American manufacturers say
it’s all unfair, such as when the Japa-
nese or Koreans came in?’
Could geopolitical tensions spike
MG’s guns? ‘If there were tariffs,
[more people would] realise how
many everyday products or essential
components come from China.
I genuinely hope cool heads prevail
on these issues and nothing changes.’  Pond was the best of them.
A happier prospect is MG’s cente-
nary, which is coming up earlier than
the team envisaged after enthusiasts
uncovered two invoices proving ini-
tial sales were in 1923, not a year later.
And it will be commemorated
with even more new cars: the immi-
nent facelifted HS, a small hybrid to
replace the 3 supermini and the next-
gen Marvel R flagship electric SUV.  destroyed my car.’
And where will MG Motor UK be
in three years’ time? ‘In volume,
probably 100,000 cars,’ concludes the
sales lead. ‘We’ll have a range of five
and right up there with totally credi-
ble cars from accepted mainstream
brands.’
Like the fun
and fruity
4, ZT was
rear-drive
Insider
THE CAR CURVEBALLS
Six questions
only we
would ask
Tell us about your first car…
‘A Ford Corsair 2000E, which I
loved. But I failed my driving test
first time and had to walk past it
to college every day.’
 
Which achievement makes
you most proud?
‘I think launching the
MG F. Great times.’
 
Best thing you’ve
done in a car?
‘I got very close to Tony Pond
before he died. He did a lot of
work on the MG F Cup for me
and he used to take me out in
his 6R4. I’ve been driven by a
lot of very well-known racing
drivers and rally drivers, and
to my dying day I will say Tony
Probably the most underrated
race/rally driver ever.’
 
Tell us about a time you
screwed up…
‘I did destroy my second car, a
Lotus 7 with a Ford BDA engine
in it. We’d better not get into
the details but I lost a bet and
 
Supercar or classic?
‘Classic. I’m going to have
to buy an MG B. I’m slightly
self-conscious that I haven’t had
one. I had a Midget, though.’
 
Company curveball… do you
know which unusual building
is now on the site of the
former Abingdon factory?
‘I know it’s a business park, but
the actual factory? I’ve failed
this one!’ (It’s a Thames Valley
Police control centre.)
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 19
 Insider

WATC H E S

TRIPLE
WHAMMY
British sub-£1k three-handers,
all punching above their price.
By Ben Oliver

Three fresh, original takes on the classic

three-handed watch this month: all just launched
by start-up British brands. You could easily spend
10 times as much on the same style of watch from
a mid-market Swiss brand but you’d be getting the
same materials, a similar automatic movement,
no greater accuracy and much more ubiquity than
these simple, high-quality watches.

Alsta Nautoscaph
V Anacapri £795
Revived by Scottish entrepreneur
Angus MacFadyen in 2017 after a
long hibernation, Swiss watch maker
Alsta is booming again. Its more subtle
steel-cased, black-dialled diver’s
watches are still available, but this new
bronze and blue Nautoscaph V adds
visual punch. The on-trend bronze
case will acquire a unique patina with
age, like an early diver’s helmet.
alstawatch.com

MHD SC £495 Spinnaker Dumas Automatic

(pre-order for August delivery)
Former Morgan designer Matthew
Humphries’ car-design background
is apparent in this new homage to
Marcello Gandini: the SC stands
for supercar, with the hallmark arch
shape Gandini used on the Countach
and the Stratos HF Zero concept
replicated in the watch case. This
packs in features and flourishes which
make the Swiss look lazy.
mhdwatches.com
Inkdial Limited Edition £410
Spinnaker’s maritime-inspired watches
subtly and affordably reference some
great diving designs of the past. The
Dumas nods to Gerald Genta’s work
in the ’70s for Audemars Piguet and
Patek Philippe, but for a lot less outlay.
New colours have just been launched
in collaboration with artist Ben Li, aka
Inkdial, who has also produced the
prints which come with each watch.
spinnaker-watches.co.uk

20 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 THE INNOVATIONS TRANSFORMING OUR DRIVING WORLD

I N D ETA I L

THE SUPERMINI
ISN’T DEAD YET
A new wave of small, affordable EVs is coming as manufacturers
find smart new ways to meet the challenges of weight and cost.
By Jake Groves and Tom Wiltshire

22 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

The battery-electric supermini is about to hit its stride, Production
after a tricky start. It’s no coincidence that the first main- 5 EV will use
new CMF-
stream EVs from many manufacturers have been Fo- BEV platform;
cus-size or bigger: the batteries are heavy, which is a big is- VW concept
previews junior
sue in a smaller car, plus the new technology is at first too electric hatch
expensive for small-car buyers.
There have been some notable exceptions, and they’re
about to be joined by an influx of new supermini EVs, as
manufacturers reap the benefits of improved battery
chemistry, increased electric know-how and the cost effi-
ciencies that come from ramping up production.
The Stellantis group has stolen a lead on its mainstream
rivals with the e-CMP platform, which sits under various
modern, efficient electric cars including the Peugeot e-208
and Vauxhall Corsa Electric. They’re about to get some se-
rious competition from the VW and Renault groups –
which both have plenty of previous experience with EVs,
but currently offer nothing to directly challenge those
Stellantis star performers.
VW’s ID. 2all concept car previews a Polo-sized EV
named ID. 2 coming in 2025, with a target price of around
£22,000. Expect it to look highly conventional and to fix
many of the ID. 3’s interior fails, but the biggest difference
is under the skin. It’ll be the first car on the new MEB En-
try platform designed for superminis and even smaller
cars. Where MEB is rear- or all-wheel drive, MEB Entry is
front-driven only. But it’s closely related enough to benefit
from shared MEB tech, thus reducing unit costs. THE NEW VW ID. 2 MAY LOOK
Kai Grünitz, VW’s technical development chief, says the CONVENTIONAL, BUT THE BIG
platform ‘sets new standards’. It’s lighter and comes with DIFFERENCE IS UNDER THE SKIN

BATTLE OF THE NEW EV PLATFORMS
ON A DIET
Both new platforms are designed
to be lighter and cheaper than
those that came before them,
with Renault claiming around
a 30 per cent cost saving with
CMF-BEV compared to the Zoe.
NO ICE, PLEASE
These are designed exclusively
as battery-electric platforms,
unlike the Stellantis e-CMP
architecture, which is closely
related to its combustion cars.
DOING THE NUMBERS
Renault is being conservative
with its range estimations,
expecting around 250 miles
from a charge, claiming that
‘right-sized’ batteries are the
way forward – a smaller battery
reduces weight and cuts costs.
VW, meanwhile, promises
flexibility in performance and
range, estimating that the new
ID. 2 supermini will be capable
of 280 miles of e-range and a
possible 0-62mph sprint time of
just 7.0 seconds.
ENDLESS SPIN-OFFS
The CMF-BEV and MEB Entry
platforms will be deployed
by their respective wider
automotive groups. Cupra
has already shown us the
UrbanRebel concept as a way to
use MEB Entry, and Nissan’s next
Micra will be on CMF-BEV.
up to 222bhp – and possibly more later. VW speaks of a
range approaching 280 miles, with Golf cabin space at a
Polo price. And helped by that front-drive layout it has a
larger boot volume than an ID. 3.
Meanwhile, Renault is focused on ensuring that the 5
EV – which wowed the car world when it was revealed in
concept form two years ago – and other upcoming com-
pact electric cars handle well, aided by relatively light
weight. Although Renault and its partner Nissan have
both already sold many EVs, with the Zoe and Leaf respec-
tively, the new cars will involve next-generation tech in the
form of the new CMF-BEV platform, which we’ve driven
in advanced prototype form.
‘The Zoe was a good EV but it was the first generation;
bespoke platform, expensive, comfortable to drive rather
than fun to drive,’ says Renault engineer Maxime
Vergnault. ‘If the Megane E-Tech is the next step, R5 is the
next generation.’ And the CMF-BEV platform will spawn
an Alpine hot hatch, as well as a new-age Nissan Micra.
How will Renault be able to offer state-of-the-art EV
tech in a compact package at a competitive price? CMF-
BEV project manager Vincent Theuillon tells CAR: ‘The
new platform re-uses around 70 per cent of its compo-
nents from the existing CMF-B cars [such as the Clio and
Captur]. That has allowed us to reduce the cost – CMF-
BEV is around 30 per cent cheaper than the Zoe, which
was more bespoke. We’re aiming the new R5 EV to be the
most competitive EV in terms of cost versus performance.’
Big claims. But even more so than VW, Renault is a
company built on compact cars, so it has immense exper-
tise and every incentive to succeed.

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 23

 C AR E X PL A I N S

FERRARI’S
HAND OF GOD
SUSPENSION
Suspension without compromise?
It’s here. By Ben Miller
Like watching the girl in The Exorcist spider-walking
down the stairs or gazing upon The Blue Marble, the photo
the Apollo 17 crew shot of the Earth, some images stay
with you. For F1 nerds it’s the grainy clip of the Williams
crew playing with the FW15C, its active suspension rising
and falling in a vaguely sinister manner as if by magic.
Williams’ active suspension was created to maximise
downforce. Against inhuman forces and epic physics, its
hydraulics toiled to maintain the optimum ride height for
peak aerodynamic performance. But the car’s remarkable
speed – together, the FW14B and FW15C whitewashed the
’92 and ’93 titles respectively – was proof of the riches that
awaited anyone who could mitigate or even eliminate the
compromises intrinsic to passive suspension.
Years ago, talking of the Purosangue crossover/SUV/
high-rise fastback (delete as you see fit) at a shareholder
meeting, Ferrari’s then CTO, Michael Leiters, claimed his
team were working on a ground-breaking suspension TrueActive
enables
technology for the car, one that would enable a tall, rela-
tively heavy vehicle to drive like a Ferrari.
roll control,
eliminating
Now that we’ve driven it, it’s clear Leiters wasn’t exag- the need for
anti-roll bars
gerating. A third-party bit of kit from race and hypercar – active or
engineering gurus Multimatic (who masterminded the otherwise
Ford GT and its anniversary Le Mans win), the Purosangue
debuts TrueActive Spool Valve dampers. Enabling fast and
accurate control of the car’s body, the system opens up a
world of opportunity when it comes to optimising perfor-
mance. It can endlessly manipulate every element of the
suspension’s behaviour, including ride height, roll, pitch
and wheel movement, while also offering variable damp-
ing via its twin spool valves at each corner.
Says Multimatic president and former Ford Perfor-
mance top man Raj Nair: ‘TrueActive dampers were creat-
ed to empower the suspension system with the ability to
simultaneously deliver what the driver wants, what the
tyres want, and what the vehicle needs to attain a perfor-
mance envelope and a level of vehicle control far beyond
what is possible with adaptive and semi-active systems.’

HEFTY POWER
The dampers’ e-motors aren’t
quite as powerful as the Ferrari
V12. But they’re not far off, with
liquid-cooled 48-volt three-
phase power to allow them to
control the car’s body.

MULTIMATIC’S
TRUEACTIVE
DAMPER: HOW
IT WORKS

SPOOL VALVES
Integrated into the damper unit – right at
the heart of it, in fact – are a pair of spool
valves, which allow for independent and
almost instantaneous adjustment of both
compression and rebound damping.

CONTROL UNIT
Each damper features a motor control
THREADED SHAFT
module wired into both the motor and
This is why Multimatic dubs its tech
the car’s ECU. The result is a hitherto
TrueActive. A train of gears transmits
impossible level of control over every
drive from the motor across to a ball
aspect of chassis behaviour, from ride
screw on a threaded shaft. Twirling the
quality to centre of gravity/ride height.
gears in either direction gives the car
active control of its suspension.

24 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023


D O E S IT WO R K ?
MAZDA’S CLEVER
BIG-MPG DIESEL
A new 3.3-litre straight-six diesel… in 2023?
It had better be a good one. By Tom Wiltshire
Not content with reviving the rotary engine,
Mazda’s trend-bucking ways continue with
the launch of an all-new diesel engine. An
inline-six, 3.3 litres in capacity, it sits in the
CX-60 line-up alongside a four-cylinder
plug-in hybrid.
The new e-SkyActiv D engine is tuned for
maximum economy and will be available in
the UK in the CX-60 (and forthcoming sev-
en-seat CX-80) in 197bhp rear-wheel-drive
and 251bhp all-wheel-drive forms.
There are three key elements to its effi-
ciency. First, the relatively large capacity: a
big, torquey engine is well suited to moving
a big car at lower engine loads, and can stay
in its ultra-lean-burn phase for longer.
Second, the combustion chamber: each is
in fact two egg-shaped chambers, optimised
to improve the mixing of fuel and air.
And third, an injection system dubbed
DCPCI, for Distribution-Controlled Par-
tially Premixed Compression Ignition,
which enables ultra-precise ignition timing
and keeps temperatures down. Most of the
time, it’s operating at a highly impressive 40
per cent thermal efficiency.
The CX-60’s e-SkyActiv D is also a mild
hybrid, capable of shutting off completely
while coasting or under light throttle, with a
48-volt boost available to help ease the load
on the engine.
26 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
A DERV DELIGHT
HOW IT WORKS
▲
BIG BY DESIGN
The e-SkyActiv D’s 3.3-litre
capacity isn’t just to brag – a
bigger engine with more torque
doesn’t have to work as hard
The result is that this diesel SUV returns
an official combined economy figure of
56.5mpg. We saw 59.5mpg on an economy
run, and a still-impressive 47mpg when
driving more spiritedly.
CO2 emissions, meanwhile, are 130g/km ▲
for the lower-powered engine. Not a patch E-BOOST ON TAP
on an equivalent PHEV, so this diesel’s un- The mild-hybrid system is
likely to be the darling of company car fleets. unobtrusive, providing more power
Private buyers, though, could benefit from when needed and letting the
great fuel economy. It should be well suited engine shut off under light loads
to towing, too, because of its strong torque.
What’s it like to drive? Reassuringly ordi-
nary. While the engine’s a tad clattery at low
revs, it smooths out when you’re on the
move – aided by the perfect balance of its
six-cylinder configuration – and proves a
much better match for Mazda’s dual-clutch
eight-speed transmission than the PHEV.
Full electrification may ultimately be un-
avoidable, but until then Mazda is commit-
ted to providing combustion engines as part
of the mix.
DOES IT WORK? ▲
Yes. Shame the CX-60 itself isn’t very A CLEANER BURN
special, because this is an interesting, The engine operates in an ultra-
efficient and pleasant engine. Diesel lean-burn state through a wide
may seem like an anachronism, but this rev range, helping achieve that
is one that makes sense in 2023. 56.5mpg WLTP figure
 BMW XM

Off the reservation

The first M-only SUV takes BMW’s performance
division way out of its comfort zone
Words Georg Kacher Photography Uwe Fischer

28 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 The
300-mile
test
NEW CAR MEETS REAL WORLD

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 29

 This vast SUV sticks out like a
visitor from another world –
despite being built here in the US

Confused
between the
XM and the iX?
Only one has
exhaust pipes

30 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 First drives 300 mile test

o ya know why I stopped you,

pardner?’ The voice framed
by a pair of dazzling Ray-Bans
and a brown stetson sounds
jovial, but the gun resting in
its waxy holster and the danc-
ing red and blue lights inside
the unmarked black pick-up speak a different language.
‘I suppose I was going a trifle fast?’ The smile bares a full
set of stacked ivories. The officer nods. ‘Yeah. And you
overtook a cop in the process. We don’t like that much.’
I’m shaking in my shoes, imagining all sorts of night-
marish scenarios. But before events take a Tarantino turn
for the worse, officer Mitchell breaks the spell, removes his
sunglasses in an elegant slo-mo gesture that would have
done Humphrey Bogart proud, sticks his head inside the
cabin and nods at the BMW’s flickering wall of screens.
‘Feel like giving me a quick tour of this digital circus
you’re dealing with?’
Happy to oblige, officer. And very relieved that a tell-
ing-off and some time spent at the Arizona roadside giving
a guided tour of the XM is as bad as it’s going to get. But it
really does take quite a while to explain everything that
BMW – or more specifically M division – has seen fit to
throw at its new SUV.
Inside and out this vast five-seat SUV, there’s a lot going
on. Parked next to the anonymous chariot of the law, the
dark blue XM sticks out like a visitor from another world,
despite being built here in the US, at BMW’s Spartanburg
plant. Its squared-off bow could have been shaped by a
moonlighting Peterbilt designer; the matt gold accents
would have done the late Gianni Versace proud. seekers across the nation, the remnants of this ancient Cabin is ace,
This car is, in no unclear terms, a love-hate monument east-west trunk road are now marked with yawning ex- especially in the
back, if not very
to excess in pressed steel, cast aluminium and glossy car- pansion joints, sheltered dips filled with pockets of sand spacious for
bonfibre. It’s a statement of unbridled power and grunt. and tumbleweed, and the odd ford fed by the winter’s last such a big car
Adore it or despise it, the XM won’t escape your radar. melting water. This is a paradise for bikers and truckers,
Under that flamboyant skin there’s a combination of but how will a 2.7-tonner fare along the rumble-strip
components available only in the XM, and the XM is straights and through the low-grip twisties? Well enough,
available only as an M division product. It’s on a version of although that extra layer of body fat does take its toll. The
the CLAR platform, but with modifications that make it tighter the bends, the steeper the climbs and the swifter
the widest BMW available, and almost as long as an X7. the changes of direction, the more obvious the effects of
It’s powered by a turbocharged 4.4-litre V8 with a plug- the mighty mass and momentum.
in hybrid unit, driving all four wheels via an eight-speed In contrast to many rivals, this BMW does without air
automatic transmission. A version will be used in the next springs, carbon-ceramic brakes and active aerodynamics.
M5. A later XM will be called Label Red, with the wick Instead, technical chief Dirk Häcker and his team opted
turned up to 738bhp and 737lb ft; it’s due to compete in for steel springs, adaptive dampers, adjustable anti-roll
this summer’s Pikes Peak hillclimb. But today, our loop bars, four-wheel steering and extra-wide tyres measuring
through Arizona goes big on boundless desert studded up to 23 inches in diameter.
with cacti and Joshua trees. As I drive through no man’s land with that virtual
First established when the gold rush lured fortune speeding ticket steadying my right foot, I mull over some ⊲

Pick-up: 0 miles 48 miles 109 miles

Love it? Hate it? It’s The oddball mix In Sport Plus and
a big, bold visual of V8 and EV manual, the forward
statement – one soundtracks can thrust is sometimes
that maybe makes be partly silenced staggered as revs,
the most sense in or enhanced by throttle commands
key target markets, speaker. Ample road and electric energy
which include the noise is available for take a moment to
US and China. free at all times. sort themselves out.

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 31

 iDrive lives
on in a
decluttered
cabin

4.3sec to
62mph, yes.
But where’s
the feel?

Or replace
them both
with a pick-
up truck

153 miles 201 miles 235 miles

The 3D moonscape Still sifting through The best EVs are
alcantara-lined the modes, settings plush and silent. The
roof that debuts on and programmes. best M cars are razor
the XM is framed Steering and sharp and radically
by dozens of brakes in Comfort rapid. The XM falls
multi-colour fibres. or Dynamic? A short a notch or two
Rules out a sunroof, question Porsche in both departments.
though. would never ask.

32 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023


It is, first and foremost, a
huge plug-in hybrid, not an
X5 on steroids or an SUV
sibling of the M5
of the super-SUVs that might be comparable to the XM.
The Lamborghini Urus, riding on the same size tyres, can
be harsher still; the Aston Martin DBX 707 feels more
compliant. The Audi Q8 RS is lighter and more chuckable,
and its brakes easier to modulate. The steering of the Por-
sche Cayenne Turbo GT is crisper, lighter and quicker, and
its performance is in a different league. The Maserati Le-
vante Trofeo sounds better and accelerates like greased
lightning but is all over the place when pushed. Only the
Bentley Bentayga PHEV, the Maybach version of the
Mercedes GLS and the Rolls-Royce Cullinan are dynami-
cally clearly inferior.
In fact, after mentally going all round the houses, the
XM’s main rivals may in fact be a pair of other BMW SUVs,
the X5 M Competition and the electric iX M60.
Our route takes us on to a native American reservation,
which welcomes visitors with a mighty casino and hotel
complex, an outlet mall and a vast trailer park – not quite
the stuff those Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse yarns were
spun from, but a handy opportunity to fill up the BMW’s
fuel tank, which is down to a quarter by noon.
Whether it’s visiting native American reservations or
watching professional buckaroos drive their cattle trains
across the great plains like back in the old days, the idea of
the Wild West underlies many of Arizona’s main attrac-
tions. Every big town has its own rodeo arena and horse
supply store, is surrounded by ranches and a slim belt of
irrigated farmland, and names its streets after heroes and
villains like Wyatt Earp and Jesse James.
Most of the locals who come forward to check out the
XM comment favourably on its mighty illuminated front
end, the knuckle-shaped contours, the self-conscious pro-
portions and the flamboyant livery. I love the looks of this
daredevil statement of overt opulence.
For a change, the best seats in the house are in the back.
Perfectly sculpted and lavishly upholstered, they curve
round at the outer edges and almost become one with the
heated door panels. They make it easy to get engrossed in
conversation, looking your fellow passenger in the eye,
with legs comfortably stretched out, a cushion in the back
and the massage pumps on high.
The dominant view for the driver is the tall, curved dis-
play which stretches across two thirds of the facia, and the
radically cleaned-up centre console. Gone are the coveted
340 miles 386 miles
Angled rear seats
are great, although
for such a big car
the cabin isn’t huge.
With the rear seats
up, the boot is no
bigger than the
5-series saloon’s.
First drives 300 mile test
pre-select buttons, the once easy-to-use air vents, the in- Wide tyres on
massive wheels
tuitive climate control knobs and the direct-access keys create great
for the heated and ventilated seats. The iDrive controller is bow waves
still there, but it now masterminds so many functions that
voice command has become a useful fallback system.
A host of different dynamic modes vie for the driver’s
attention. For a start there is Comfort, Sport and Sport
Plus. Next, you must choose from default Hybrid, Electric
and eControl (for recharging the battery on the fly). And
you can fine tune the engine response, shift speed, stabili-
ty control, damper calibration, three-step energy regener-
ation, digital sound processing and the exhaust note as
well as the brake and steering action, both of which can
assume a sportier or more comfort-orientated quality. But
on an M car shouldn’t these two key interfaces, having
been honed to a dynamically optimal state, be cast-in-
stone constants?
Now’s our chance to find out how well the XM handles,
as we’ve arrived in the foothills of the snow-capped Mc-
Dowell mountains, having circumnavigated the Phoenix
area for almost two hours on a grid of long and straight
B-roads sprinkled with random stop signs and the odd
roundabout at the entrance of generic prefab villages.
The highway narrows down to a byway, climbing
through a mixed bag of corners fast and slow. Potentially,
this sort of environment is just where the XM belongs. But
this M car is, first and foremost, a huge plug-in hybrid, not
a rebodied X5 M Competition on steroids or an SUV sib-
ling of the M5. Grip? No problem. Traction? Ditto. Road-
holding? Stacks of it. But handling and performance? Not
so clear-cut.
Redlined at a lofty 7200rpm, the revised 4.4-litre V8 de-
velops 456bhp and 479lb ft, available between 1600 and
5000rpm. The rorty combustion engine is partnered by an
194bhp electric motor good for an instant 207lb ft. In sync,
this adds up to 644bhp and 590lb ft. In theory, that’s ⊲
392 miles
Not badged X8 M as Someone will be
originally planned along to admire
but XM like that your car any second
highly unsuccessful now, Georg… It turns
Citroën, the newest more heads than the
M car seems Bentley Bentayga
destined to cause and even the Rolls-
confusion. Royce Cullinan.
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 33
 First drives 300 mile test

plenty. In reality, though, the weight penalty would have

spoilt the sport straight away had the M engineers not
wedged an intermediate gear between the e-motor and
the input shaft of the transmission. This artful device
briefly boosts the e-torque to 332lb ft, thereby providing
more take-off punch and extra full-throttle in-gear accel-
eration urge. But it struggles to deliver consistently: mid-
range pick-up can be tardy, the orchestration of ratios and
revs can be hesitant or brusque, and launch control is not
always wham-bang explosive.
Call it high-level moaning, but when the spec sheet
reads 644bhp, one expects a more brutal power and torque
delivery. Although the XM accelerates in 4.3sec from
0-62mph and will reach the 125mph mark exactly 10 sec-
onds later, the X5 M Competition does the job in an even
quicker 3.9sec – and it costs 22 grand less. Or if maximum
zero-emissions range is your priority, you could save more
like £80k by opting for the 483bhp X5 50e xDrive, which
advertises up to 64 pollution-free miles, 10 more than the
XM. The difference in acceleration is 0.5sec. Or the iX
M60: it matches the XM against the clock while boasting a
352-mile range. Second thoughts, anybody?
Heading from Prescott towards Flagstaff, the route
curls along a picturesque plateau before eventually turn-
ing right and down again, petering out close to Tortilla
Flat of John Steinbeck fame, and Apache Junction. The
roads are wider now and the turns tends to be faster, but
▲ what might have been smooth blacktop under Roosevelt
PLUS has over time turned into a pale and porous turf dotted
Beautifully crafted with cracks and crevices of random width and depth. The
cabin; abundant
power; 55 miles of XM never puts a foot wrong here.
e-running Its weight and the sticky XXL Pirellis provide unreal
quantities of magnetic roadholding, the active anti-sway
MINUS bars keep bodyroll nicely in check, and the steering is a to-
▼ tally reassuring if not wholly inspiring control mecha-
Overweight; not
very roomy; thirsty; nism. The strong brakes decelerate with aplomb time after
ride and handling time, and fading is an alien term to the all-steel apparatus.
lack sparkle The long wheelbase and the hefty weight neutralise to
an extent the negative effect of the wide 23-inchers. But
A LT E R N AT I V E S like the X5 M, its PHEV sister model is never going to
⊳⊲ qualify for the Golden Eiderdown trophy.
According to the WLTP norm, plug-in hybrids combine
the best of both worlds. In reality, however, the e-power
advantage vanishes as soon as the depleted battery needs
to be recharged en route again and again by the combus-
tion engine. In the case of our XM, the mpg numbers duly
deteriorate as soon as the V8 takes over and starts feeding
Bentley Bentayga the sizeable 25.7kWh energy pack, and it’s only thanks to
Hybrid officer Mitchell’s warning that the day’s average consump-
Bigger and more tion does not drop below the 15mpg mark.
luxurious, but still Outside Wickenburg, a 20-minute drive north of Glen-
not as heavy as XM
dale, the BMW meets two fans. Taking Maximus and
Speedy out for a ride, cowboy Euston Davis and his moth-
er-in-law Carol Birk are smitten by the XM’s metalcraft
and leatherwork. Although they run full-size pick-up
trucks for farm work and to pull their twin-axle horse
trailers, they say they don’t doubt that EVs are the future.
Even the M boys won’t dispute that, but since their bat-
Porsche Cayenne tery-powered supercar is still at least five years away, they
Turbo S E-Hybrid must plug the gap by beating the drum for this brawny
Smaller and 300kg
lighter, with half the PHEV, which has its plus points but is less compelling to
e-range but a useful drive than the X5 M Competition and nowhere near as
bit sportier green as the iX M60.

34 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 The zero-CO2 iX M60 matches
the XM against the stopwatch.
Second thoughts, anybody?

PRICE POWERTRAIN PERFORMANCE WEIGHT EFFICIENCY ON SALE R AT I N G

£148,060 25.7kWh battery, 644bhp @ 5400rpm, 2785kg 176.6-188.3mpg Now ★★★★★
4395cc turbo V8, 590lb ft @ 1600rpm, (official), 15mpg
Data e-motor, eight-speed 4.3sec 0-62mph, (tested),
auto, all-wheel drive 155mph (limited) 33-36g/km CO2

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 35

 The chassis felt like
it could round off
everything short of
an asteroid crater

Comfort is what
the RX does
best. In fact,
that’s pretty
much all it does

36 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 First drives

LEXUS RX

No worries, no hurry
Fifth generation of well-established SUV finally gets a PHEV version
The Mk5 RX is entering the ring swinging
with a host of clever technology, a fresh new
look and a choice of three hybrid power-
trains (including a sporty 366bhp for the THE FIRST HOUR
RX500h). Is that enough to remain competi- 6 minutes
tive, though, as so much has changed since What the hell is
the RX debuted in 1999? that bonging? Why
won’t it shut up?
The car we’re driving is the first ever plug-
in hybrid RX, using the same 2.5-litre 12 minutes
four-cylinder system used in the Toyota There’s a warning
RAV4, with an 18.1kWh battery and an elec- chime every time
the speed limit
tric motor on each axle. That gives it a maxi- Every version comes with a 14-inch screen changes?!
mum output of 304bhp, an electric range of
around 40 miles and all-wheel drive. could round off everything short of an aster- 30 minutes
It’s noisy when you
The RX is reasonably fast in a straight oid crater, even at motorway speeds. put your foot down.
line, although it trails key rivals like the Wind and tyre noise are also kept in check Still bonging at me,
Mercedes GLE 400e and BMW X5 xDrive and, when you’re pottering around in EV too
50e. Lexus says the 450h+ can sprint to mode, the powertrain is almost silent. 45 minutes
62mph in 6.5 seconds, which is 0.4 seconds We haven’t spent enough time in the RX Found it. Sub-menu
behind the Mercedes and 1.7 slower than the to make a call on its real-world fuel econo- on the touchscreen
BMW. But the RX isn’t set up for speed, so my, but it seems to mete out its battery pow- which, by the way,
is rather good
you don’t go looking for it. er intelligently. At the end of a 70-mile route,
After just half an hour behind the wheel, we still had a third of the battery left – and 57 minutes
you’ll be conditioned to drive more sensibly. the trip gauge said we’d been averaging an Hit a dip in the road
and the dampers
The RX never eggs you on to go faster. It impressive 99.9mpg. And once you’ve emp- nearly let the sump
reins you in to slow down. Prime example – tied the battery, it starts running like a par- hit the floor. Yikes
the engine is hitched to an e-CVT, so if you allel hybrid, with the engine topping up the
ask for maximum throttle the revs will soar battery so the car can still make some use of
unattractively skywards. electric power – and you’re not dragging
It’s heavy, too. The most generously around the dead weight of the battery and
equipped RX 450h+ weighs more than 2.2 motors. Like the RAV4, we expect it to re-
tonnes – and you can tell the chassis is hav- turn around 40mpg in this scenario.
ing a hard time managing that bulk. Drive The cabin’s stunning, especially if you
over a dip in the road and the RX will com- splash out on the range-topping Takumi
press into the tarmac like it’s just had a skip specification. The cream leather upholstery
full of cast iron dropped on its roof. and enormous panoramic sunroof make ▲
We reckon the springs are a little too soft the interior feel light and airy – and there’s PLUS
and the dampers don’t offer enough resist- loads of technology to keep you comfortable Comfortable
ance early on in their stroke to control the and entertained. interior; great
weight of the RX crashing down on them. LUKE WILKINSON infotainment;
Our Takumi-spec test car also came with refined
 
adaptive dampers, but switching them to First verdict MINUS
Sport mode didn’t make much difference.
▼
There’s a flipside, though. The RX is great Comfortable, refined, efficient and feels
Rivals are faster;
at filtering out sharp bumps. Even though suitably expensive. But for similar money suspension too
our car was fitted with the largest 21-inch there are rivals that do all this and more soft at times;
alloy wheels available, the chassis felt like it ★★★★★ expensive

PRICE POWERTRAIN PERFORMANCE WEIGHT EFFICIENCY ON SALE

£64,950 (RX 18.1kWh battery, 304bhp, 167lb ft @ 2240kg 235.4-256.8mpg, Now
450h+; range 2487cc four-cylinder 3600rpm, 6.5sec 40-43-mile EV
Data from £59,950) plus two e-motors, 0-62mph, 124mph range, 25-26g/
auto, all-wheel drive km CO2

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 37

 There’s only so much you
can do to make a 2.7-tonne
SUV dynamic, but it's still
a lesson in refinement

38 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 First drives

RO LL S- ROYCE B L ACK B A D G E CU LLI N A N

Goodwood’s GTI
The Cullinan’s sportier alter ego, for those who hate to say ‘when’
Who’d have thought Rolls-Royce would
have its own version of GTI, RS or Type R?
Of course, I’m being a tad reductive, but the
Black Badge variants echo the cars made by THE FIRST HOUR
proper performance divisions: a boost in 5 seconds
power, chassis tweaks, sportier detailing Good grief – it’s
(including carbonfibre trim inside) and a huge! Wouldn’t
want to be tailgated
more youthful image. It works; the average by one…
Black Badge buyer is younger than someone
buying a Mini these days.  2 minutes
What an interior,
The Cullinan Black Badge is an imperious though – the right
machine, and one that you just sink into. Its Closing that door requires zero effort mix between classic
attractions include very fine leathers, some and modern
wonderfully supportive seats and the mini- luxurious place to spend your time. Massag-
14 minutes
mising of anything likely to cause any sort ing armchairs, a digital TV tuner and your Oooh, the V12 has
of stress or strain. You don’t have to exert own champagne fridge ready for when you a bit of a fruity tune
any effort to close the doors, for instance, need to toast your latest successful business when you’re heavy
with the throttle –
beyond pressing a button. deal… it’s utterly gorgeous, and infinitely how uncouth
There’s only so much the engineers can customisable; Rolls says no two of its cars
do to make a 2.7-tonne SUV ‘dynamic’, are the same. Specify the ‘event’ seating and 39 minutes
however. The 29bhp and 37lb ft boost over you even have your own in-built pair of BMW’s iDrive
system the only un-
the regular Cullinan – achieved by modest chairs that pop out of the tailgate so you can Rolls-Royce bit you
tweaks to the same 6.75-litre turbocharged get a prime spot at the polo tournament. notice; all the tech
V12 petrol engine – is negligible when ap- Therein lies the crux. Black Badge or not, works well 
plied to something that feels like it has its the Cullinan remains the ultimate do-any- 56 minutes
own gravitational pull. The beefier brakes thing Rolls-Royce. Quick enough for keep- Fantastic road
(with redesigned ventilation for better cool- ing up with sports cars on most journeys, manners at a cruise,
but wobbles like
ing) could be beefier still, if you’re going to plush enough to be used as an exclusive lim- jelly when you drive
make use of that extra grunt. Even with ousine for that glitzy awards do, and capable with feeling
Black Badge tuning of the throttle response, of tackling the rougher terrain some hob-
brake pedal action and rear-wheeling steer- bies demand and being completely unfazed
ing, it’s still an immensely heavy SUV. while doing it all in style.
But like any Cullinan the Black Badge is a The Black Badge Cullinan’s upgrades
lesson in ultimate refinement that even the make it a little more fidgety on the road, and
latest Range Rover can only dream of. The it’s no quicker on paper than a regular one.
V12, for example, is near-silent on the move But if you have the budget, and you’re com-
(unless you poke it, prompting a tuneful fortable with spending it on a big, heavy
tenor note from the Black Badge-specific SUV, then it makes sense to go that little bit
exhaust), and the rolling ride comfort is al- further and get the most special version. ▲
most unparalleled. Almost; the air suspen- JAKE GROVES PLUS
sion and big wheels do struggle to eliminate Glorious
refinement; fast
all low-speed bumps, and if you throw it First verdict
into a corner at an awkward angle it’ll briefly
MINUS
jiggle like a recently-sat-on water bed. Smooth powertrain, a glorious interior, ▼
If you’re wealthy enough to have your 4x4 ability and a moodier image; but still Feels heavy;
own driver (we’re pretty sure you would be, staggeringly big, heavy and expensive unsettled
at this price) then the rear is one hell of a ★★★★★ low-speed ride

Dark chrome
and bespoke PRICE POWERTRAIN PERFORMANCE WEIGHT EFFICIENCY ON SALE
wheels are From £350,000 6749cc 48v 592bhp @ 5250rpm, 2690kg 17.0mpg, Now
Black Badge twin-turbo V12, 663lb ft @ 1750rpm, 377g/km CO2
specialities Data eight-speed auto, 5.2sec 0-62mph,
all-wheel drive 155mph (limited)

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 39


OV E R H E ATE D PR I C E S + H I R E - CA R H E AV E N + E - F U E L’ S G O LD
Letter
of the
month
Dusty glory
Ben Miller’s story on Morocco (March) made
me nostalgic. Having done a road trip in an
ancient Toyota Land Cruiser whose air-condi-
tioning had to be turned off to enable it to
climb any hill – and there’s a lot of those in the
Atlas mountains – I recall the joy of rounding a
bend in the Dades Gorges and seeing a Renault
4 in all its dusty glory.
But even more enjoyable is the spectacle of
finding yourself at the end of a long, hot day
arriving at a beautiful remote guest house with
a garden full of sunflowers, table set with silver
service in preparation for late arriving guests,
and from which you never want to leave.
Brandon Mack
Please can everyone stop going on about
Morocco? Ben’s story made me hugely
jealous, and now this. It’s almost five years
since I was last there, driving the Citroën
C5 Aircross for CAR, but feels like 50 as I
sit in the drizzly East Midlands. But you’re
right, of course. It’s a wonderful place in so
many ways, with a car culture that prizes
the fundamentals – freedom,
independence, quirky gearsticks – over
extreme performance. CO
40 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
Selective shortages
I was disappointed to hear about the
supply problems affecting JLR and
how this has impacted your Defend-
er 110 SE (Our Cars, March). I have
experienced similar problems with
my Discovery Sport, having cracked
the offside front coil spring before
Christmas. I was told by JLR I could
be waiting anywhere between two
and six months for a replacement
spring. I hear BMW is experiencing
similar issues.
I know the ongoing war in Europe
is affecting the supply of steel, but
surely big multinational companies
like JLR and BMW can find alterna-
tive suppliers to replenish their sup-
ply chains? JLR weren’t totally empty
handed – ‘Have you considered re-
placing your car, sir?’ Not likely…
Dr Matt Sutherland
Hotever
I found myself oddly indifferent by
the time I reached the verdict at the
end of your hot hatch Giant Test in
the March issue. ‘Odd’ because I re-
gard myself as very much a hot hatch
kind of person. But for me this group
represents everything I’m not so
keen on when it comes to hot hatch-
es: various permutations of too ex-
pensive, too heavy, too big, too many
driven wheels and too powerful.
What’s worked so well for me in
When hot
hatch prices
start at £35k,
something’s up
SPONSORED BY
hot hatches I’ve owned (Clio 182, Fi-
esta ST, Focus ST, Leon Mk3 Cupra)
is that they demand a lot from the
driver, to get the most from the rela-
tively modest power output and the
sometimes overworked chassis, but
they also offer regular hatchback
practicality. And the price has been
close to a regular hatch.  
The fact that Clio/Fiesta hot
hatches are a dying breed may be
down to lots of factors, but I fear
some of it is self inflicted, by which I
mean that too often we get excited by
a car having more power and more
tech than its predecessor, and we ig-
nore the fact that it will inevitably be
more expensive and heavier.
Still, at least it’s hot hatches rather
than hot saloons that have been my
preferred indulgence. The Type R is a
snip next to a C63.
Ian Wise
Smoke and mirrors
I see Akio Toyoda has announced
that he’s stepping aside as Toyota
boss. He’s been widely hailed as a car
guy, and credited with making the
GR Yaris happen. But I do wonder if
perhaps successor Koji Sato’s atten-
tion should be focused elsewhere.
The core Toyota line-up is dread-
fully dull. Having driven a few RAV4s
and Avensises and non-GR Yarises
and Aurises and Corollas, they’re
none of them very interesting. Relia-
ble and well made, I’m sure, but then
so are Kias and Hyundais, and they’re
generally much more interesting.
There’s a comparison to be made
with Volvo, now run by a gent who
goes out of his way to say he’s not a
car guy. Maybe Jim Rowan is exag-
gerating this for effect, but his focus
on maximising safety and minimis-
ing emissions, coupled with out-
standing design, feels much more in
tune with today than Toyoda’s rather
embarrassing racetrack antics.
Doug Poole
It’s still early days for Jim Rowan
at Volvo. The range he presides
over, like the corporate
philosophy, is largely inherited
from Håkan Samuelsson. But that
said, your point still stands, as
Samuelsson also never claimed
to be much of a car guy. CO
Follow that
I’ve been following the long-term
test of the Mustang Mach 1 with
some interest. I have been conduct-
ing my own long-term test of a Mus-
tang GT for almost five years now.
Mine is also in Triple Chrome Yellow
(as it was called in 2018) and is the
Shadow Edition, so has black ac-
cents. It looks fantastic.
It does have faults – the materials
in the cabin are hard plastic, the
panel fit isn’t great – but the noise is
just so intoxicating. The 5.0-litre V8
is just fabulous, and being naturally
aspirated it’s beautifully linear. Rev-
ving it out towards the redline in low
gears is such a joy (in the dry), and
then you hit 60 just after the first
gearchange and have to be sensible,
or risk your licence.
It’s very difficult to not spin the
wheels pulling out of a junction, even
in the dry, so you’re lucky to get 9000
miles out of a set of rear tyres. It was
originally fitted with P Zeroes, but
Included in the I’ve got Michelin Pilot Sport 4S tyres
Filth pack, or on now, and they’re much better in
available as
a standalone the wet.
option Ah, the wet. It’s much more excit-
ing in the wet, especially in the win-
ter months when the rubber is hard.
One other fault is driveline shunt,
which you can get when it’s just
started from cold. I use the Mustang
as my daily driver and get about
24mpg; the best I’ve seen is 30mpg
over a long cross-country trip. My
wife runs a BMW 335d Touring
which manages 40mpg and is essen-
tially just as fast as the Mustang, and
more practical in almost every way,
but I’d rather take the Mustang.
Occasionally I think about chang-
ing it. The BMW M240i appeals, as
does the Toyota GR Yaris. But noth-
ing this side of a supercar would have
such a sense of occasion.
Dr Chris Woodyatt
Not what it’s not
I’m glad you haven’t joined the herd
who have been highly critical of the
Ineos Grenadier (March issue) for
not being as luxurious and sophisti-
cated as the current Defender. For
JT’s Mach 1 in better or worse, that’s exactly what
its element:
straight road, Ineos didn’t want to emulate. Per-
dry surface sonally, I’ve always liked the idea of
old Defenders much more than the
reality, which all too often has
turned out to be rattly and noisy and
cold. If Ineos has managed to get the
good bits of old Defender (simple,
purposeful etc) but with better relia-
bility and a decent heater, that’ll do
me nicely.
Wilson Barnes
The mud? That’s extra
Very interesting article on the new
Grenadier. So much so I followed it
up on their build and order page –
£65 for locking wheel nuts and £500-
plus for any solid colour other than
‘standard’ on a £70,000 vehicle? I felt
like I was being mugged!
Philip Dowse
Zappy talk
I have been toying with the idea of
my next car being an EV, or at least a
plug-in hybrid, so I was interested in
the review of the Zap-Map app (Does
It Work?, March). It highlights the
difficulty of running an EV without a
driveway charger. 
I see that manufacturers are at-
tempting to ‘lock in’ their customers
with their own networks, which
surely cannot help matters in the fu-
ture. It’s like having petrol stations
only accepting certain payment
cards and having to pre-book a time
to fill up. Not really workable, is it?
James Beale
Who pays?
I appreciate Chris Sheldrake (Letters,
March) highlighting that deprecia-
tion is important to consider when
buying a classic Ferrari as well as the
cost of borrowing money. But what
about the price of replacement items?
I checked some against my 2016
BMW 435 xDrive. Windscreen and
front wing cost differences were a
factor of five. So it’s okay to be able ⊲
Have your say:
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MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 41
 Opinion
to buy and service these cars but
what happens when you need to re-
place non-service items? Oil is oil and
filters are filters so the price should
be similar but when a bumper is
£1350 against £249 for the BMW, im-
agine what a replacement engine
(used) would cost for a 575M.
I would much rather drive a V12
than a straight-six but when they go
wrong they do cost a lot to repair.
The depreciation of my lowly BMW
is also minimal at the moment.
And could I borrow your Ferrari,
Mr Sheldrake, please?
Steve Middleton
Boss of what exactly?
I enjoyed the interview with Beátrice
Foucher from DS (Inquisition,
March). But, having driven a Laguna
in period, I had no idea that Renault
had a quality control department in
the 1990s…
Nicholas Binns
Behind you
Phil McNamara’s wife (Our Cars,
January) is correct – it’s never okay to
tailgate on the road, especially in a
two-tonne behemoth which would
crush a supermini quicker than Phil
could say ‘collision detection system
warning’.
Now remind me – why do BMW
drivers get a bad reputation?  BMW M3 Estate (March) and Alpina
Richard Ward
Saur point
Re Gavin Green’s February column
about visiting the LA show: as an ex-
pat Brit who has lived in the US for
30-plus years, it is obvious that elec-
tric vehicles are not the answer to
many situations, such as towing or
driving across a couple of states. EVs
are part of the solution along with
carbon capture, synthetic fuels and
more efficient internal combustion.  structure is not there, and not 100
GM seems to agree with me since
it just announced development of a
42 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
Phil in search new, more efficient V8 for all those
of someone to trucks and SUVs that people seem to
drive far too
close to want to buy. Climeworks’ carbon
capture technology has been shown
to work, and new synthetic fuel
plants have been announced on the
windy south coast of Texas, near ex-
isting pipeline infrastructure.
The dinosaurs did not go com-
pletely extinct – they evolved as their
environment changed. Today we call
them birds. Combustion-engined
cars, and the infrastructure support-
ing them, will evolve as well and will
occupy an important place in the fu-
ture market.
Iain Gillott
Neither this nor that
I found your incisive reviews of the
B3 Estate (February) really helpful in
my quest to find a car with the best
blend of performance, comfort and
practicality. The winner? My Porsche
Macan S. My electric mobility scoot-
er lives in the boot – perhaps the ideal
two-car garage…
Dr David Parry
Hy hopes
I’m an offsetter and look set to re-
main so while the EV charging infra-
M3 Touring: it’s
no Macan, and per cent using renewable energy, and
nor is the B3 while range claims remain largely
made-up.
I was recently lent my first electric
car, an Audi e-Tron Sportback 50
Quattro, while my A3 (10-year-old 1.4
TFSI) was in for its MoT and oil
change. As much as I’d love an e-Tron
GT, which is a beautiful looking car, I
could offset my car for nearly 6000
years for the same money.
Sure, EVs are zero-emissions at the
point of use, which is much better for
everyone’s health. And offsetting
isn’t an excuse for bad climate behav-
iour either, but it helps.
I use carbonfootprint.com to cal-
culate my carbon output and as a re-
sult my household and business have
been net carbon neutral for the last
few years. Everyone should try it and
see where the big emitter parts of
their lifestyle are, rather than ran-
domly picking cars or aviation.
So, you’ll find me hiding under the
table with Mark Walton waiting for
the green hydrogen revolution.
Tim Robinson
Look out for a lot more about
hydrogen’s possible future
coming soon in CAR (but don’t
get your hopes up too high). CO
Sports cars? Niche
Having read Mike Chandler’s com-
ments on why Ford is the ‘greatest
car maker’ and not Porsche (Letters,
March) I must fully agree with him.
If you took Audi-Volkswagen as a
single entity it would probably come
a close second due to Audi introduc-
ing four-wheel drive to the masses
and the aerodynamics of the Audi
100 as well as of course the VW Golf
GTI, the Beetle and the camper van.
Ferrari, Aston, Porsche and Lam-
borghini make fantastic sports cars
but they can’t be classed as the great-
est car makers. Ford’s contribution
to the history of cars simply stands
out more than any other.
Michael Pagliaroli
Let’s call it Jogger Monthly
Sorry if I’m doubling up on points
made in recent months by various
letter writers and by Mark Walton in
Our Cars. But having recently had a
5
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EDITORIAL
Editor
Ben Miller
Group editor
Phil McNamara
Managing editor
Colin Overland
Deputy news editor
Jake Groves
test drive in a Dacia Jogger, I can to- If we stop That required visits to a couple of ga- New cars editor
Alan Taylor-Jones
tally see what all the fuss is about. saying it’s rages for repairs and replacements,
great, maybe Group digital editorial director
I was prepared to put up with it used prices will which would most likely be a very Tim Pollard
being a bit basic, considering how start to drop trying experience at home but in Digital editor
Curtis Moldrich
much car you get for the money. But Turkey was a wonderful opportunity Art director
it actually felt well built, and when I to enjoy local hospitality. Mal Bailey
Editors-at-large
drove it I was struck by the extent to And the B-Max was smelly and Chris Chilton, Mark Walton,
which Mark has been if anything dirty from the off, but proved to be Ben Barry, Ben Pulman
underselling its dynamic virtues. just what we needed for a family hol- Contributor-in-chief
Gavin Green
In the same way that the Skoda iday with loads of luggage. And be- European editor
Fabia and the Vauxhall Astra have cause it was dirty when we got it, we Georg Kacher
the basics right, so does the Jogger. didn’t feel at all bad about making it Contributing editors
Ben Oliver, Ben Whitworth,
I’m talking about those moments on even dirtier. Anthony ffrench-Constant,
a country lane or curving A-road Neil Wisdom Steve Moody, Sam Smith
when you can feel the car respond- F1 correspondent
Tom Clarkson
ing, its chassis and engine working Office manager
together harmoniously. INSTANT RE ACTIONS VIA FACEBOOK Leise Enright

Alfa’s 1000bhp Giulia EV

Production controller
The only thing stopping me buy- Andrew Stafford
ing one is the price. I know that may
sound odd, given that for some peo- ADVERTISING
ple Dacia is all about the price. But I Commercial director
Kelly Millis
don’t have £17,000 lying around, and Digital commercial director
I don’t like HP and PCP, so I’m wait- Jim Burton
ing for the current used-price mad- Key account manager
Dan Chapman
ness to abate. Account manager
Steve Chambers Claire Meade-Gore
Regional sales
Graham Roby
Drive it like you rented it Will be amazing to have my teenage Alfa dream
Lovely letter from Steve Laird in the back. PUBLISHING
March issue about his good fortune JOÃO COELHO BATALHA
Publisher
Rachael Beesley
in getting a Renault 5 hire car to at-
Marketing manager
tend a Ford meeting. That would be something. Go Alfa! Sarah Norman
It made me reminisce about some PETAR PAVLICIC
Direct marketing manager
Julie Spires
of the hire cars I’ve had in the past, in Direct marketing executive
particular a Suzuki Rhino in Moroc- So not a car for petrolheads any more?? Raheema Rahim
co, a Tofas Murat – a local Fiat 131 – in HOLLYWOODTRENEREN
MD, automotive group
Niall Clarkson
Turkey and a Ford B-Max in Spain. Chief financial officer
The Suzuki rattled as if it was on I look forward to comparing with my delicious IC Lisa Hayden
its last legs from the moment I got Giulia.
CEO, Bauer Publishing UK
Chris Duncan
the keys, but in fact proved to be a DAVID FEINBLOOM President, Bauer Global Publishing
trusty companion for two weeks, Jan Wachtel
and remarkably agile on some chal- The 2.5-tonne giant battery dragsters are
lenging roads. getting boring.
The Tofas suffered three punc- TRISTAN SKUPNIEWICZ
tures – no wonder, given the flinty
state of some of the road surfaces.

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 ‘No more Merc
estates? It’s
like Levi’s
making jackets,
baseball caps
and T-shirts –
but no jeans’
ust back from my first visit
to Australia in five years. Not
a lot of news from friends and
family. The most surprising was
from cousin Mark: Mercedes-Benz
no longer sells estates in Australia.
Mark, like me and my English brother-
in-law Steve, are long-standing owners of
Benz estates. But when Mark went to his Sydney dealer to enquire
about a new C, to replace his five-year-old car, he discovered that
Merc estates are now in as much demand in Australia as England
cricket jerseys. He was quickly ushered to the GLB and GLC and GLE
SUVs, the default choices for those denied a classic Benz estate… be-
fore wisely walking out.
Go onto the Benz Australia website and you are offered the choice
of sedans, SUVs, hatches, coupes, cabriolet/roadsters and people
movers. But no wagons, as the Aussies call estates. The most iconic
type of Merc is no longer available. It’s a bit like going onto a Levi’s
website and seeing jackets, baseball caps and T-shirts – but no jeans.
And it’s not just in Australia. In America, the only Benz wagon you
can buy is the E-Class, and sales of that dry up like a Death Valley
puddle. The next-gen E-Class, due at the end of this year, will spawn
the last big Mercedes estate – or so says Georg Kacher, who knows a
thing or two about new German cars. By 2030, Mercedes estates will
be extinct. Instead, we’ll see mostly different iterations of crossovers
and SUVs. This is not a segment where Mercedes has shown much
form. Can you name one class-leading or desirable Benz SUV or
crossover? Me neither. It’s like Rolex giving up on watches to make
clocks and timers.
Of course, the reason is that the world has fallen under the spell of
the SUV and its less muscular and less capable brother, the crossover.
Estates are going the way of the landaulette, speedster, shooting
brake and amphibious car.
This is a shame. A Mercedes estate is tough, comfortable, spacious
and practical. It drives like a proper car, not a high-riding SUV. It’s an
honest workhorse, not a big muscular show pony. There is no pre-
tence to being Ran Fiennes or Rambo.
Estates look like they are designed for the public road, not the Ru-
bicon Trail. They don’t carry bull bars or other weaponry. Extinction
44 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
Rebellion won’t deflate your tyres and call you rude names. Plus,
there is no estate car as ugly as a Bentley Bentayga, a BMW X7 or a
Rolls-Royce Cullinan.
A Mercedes is the ultimate estate. Only a Volvo gets close. (More
recently, I’ve also developed a fondness for Skoda estates.)
My first Benz estate was my favourite: a secondhand W124 1995
E220 powered by 2.2-litre four-cylinder engine. It came in trad Benz
silver with slightly garish zebrano wood trim, and had the optional
rear-facing third row of seats – the favoured in-car accommodation
for my two elder sons. It took us around Britain and Europe and nev-
er let us down.
It wasn’t fast or sporty, but it’s still the best car I’ve ever owned. I
loved its honesty: a high-quality spacious car that was cleanly styled,
the valedictory work of the great Bruno Sacco. After he retired as de-
sign director, Benz styling became more ostentatious. Sacco’s classi-
cally simple form language was lost in a sea of swirly me-too
BMW-chasing pretension.
The W124 was wonderfully over-engineered, like all Benzes of
that era. Subsequent Benz saloons and estates had less exacting
goals, to cut costs and compete with the Japanese.
We (stupidly) replaced the W124 with a W203 C-Class estate (the
worst Benz estate I’ve had), and then had a succession of (leased)
W204s and a W205 C-Classes. They were all good. My favourite was a
W204 powered by the brawny and effortless 3.0-litre turbodiesel.
My last Benz estate was an 18-reg W205, which went a few years
ago. The children have grown up and I no longer need a big car.
Illustration: Peter Strain
I’ll never buy another Benz estate. And, sadly, neither will cousin
Mark, brother-in-law Steve or – soon and sadly – anyone else.
Former CAR editor Gavin Green is a leading commentator on
automotive matters, and author of this month’s Giant Test
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 ‘Some car
parks are old
fashioned
but also
permanently
futuristic, all
at once’
sk any car journalist, I’d say we
all have an appreciation of a really
good car park. Why? Because we of-
ten find ourselves hanging around in
them at midnight. Bear with me, this isn’t
a column about dogging…
We spend a lot of time in multi-storey car
parks because all those concrete ramps and
posts create such a graphic, angular backdrop for a photo shoot, and
over the years I have spent many a freezing cold night on the eighth
floor of an NCP with the wind whistling up my trouser leg, wonder-
ing what time I’ll get home.
So I was interested to learn about a campaign to save Rupert Street
car park in Bristol the other day. Built in 1960, it was the first in Brit-
ain to have a continuous spiral ramp, and the Twentieth Century
Society – a charity that campaigns to save modern buildings – is try-
ing to protect it from demolition. ‘We think it should be listed,’ says
the charity’s director, Catherine Croft. ‘It’s a good example of an ab-
solutely pivotal building type from the 20th century.’
Amazingly, if the campaign is successful, Rupert Street would be-
come only the third car park in the UK to achieve listed status. The
other two are in Brewer Street in Soho, London, an art deco building
now partly converted into a ‘creative hub’; and Castle Terrace in Ed-
inburgh, a boring, four-floor affair that was listed simply because it
was Scotland’s first multi-storey.
Which seems crazy. Travelling around Britain, hanging around in
car parks, I’ve come across some amazing Brutalist buildings – ne-
glected, unloved, often smelling of wee, yes; but so stark and impres-
sive, and somehow old fashioned but also permanently futuristic, all
at once. There’s a danger all of these buildings will be knocked down
if we’re not careful, because no one loves concrete any more. The
Brutalist architecture of the 1960s seems so harsh and utilitarian
now, but these concrete buildings were designed with such optimism
for the new post-war world, a world where everyone would get on
and be equal, where there wouldn’t be any knife crime or drunk
blokes weeing in the stairwells. Hopeless really. But these buildings
are so distinctive and of their era, I hope the best ones are saved. And
that includes more car parks.
Like the incredible Lee Circle in Leicester. Opened in 1961 as the
46 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
Auto-Magic Car Park, this was a monument to the new automotive
age, when whole towns were reshaped for the car. A gigantic dou-
ble-helix of concrete, it had coin-operated barriers, making it the
first automated multi-storey in Europe; and a Tesco on the ground
floor, one of the first self-service supermarkets in Britain. Integrating
the supermarket and car park into one building was a revolution at
the time, and visitors were invited to ‘Park Your Car And Walk In!’ as
though that was somehow a miracle. I’ve been to Lee Circle and I ad-
mit it feels very run down and haunted now, and the chances of it
being saved are slim. A local councillor recently suggested: ‘It needs a
few sticks of dynamite,’ adding: ‘It’s hardly the Church of San Marco.’
My other recommendation is similarly unloved: the Glen Fern car
park in Bournemouth. Just to give you a bit of context, the local Civic
Society says: ‘It deserves to be replaced as soon as possible.’ Another
ringing endorsement. But the Glen Fern, which opened in 1969, is
unusual in that it had a 52-room ‘Roof Top Hotel’ on the top floor,
which from the outside looked like the Modernist home of the Tracy
family, perched on a cliff in Thunderbirds. The 1973 brochure for the
Roof Top boasted of the Outlook restaurant and cocktail bar, a sun
patio and even ‘television by previous arrangement at a nominal
charge.’ It was so glamorous and cool at the time; sadly, like so many
multi-storeys, the concrete turned dark grey, the hotel fell apart and
closed in the 1980s and nowadays the whole place stinks of wee.
I hope it’s saved, but when you’ve got the Bournemouth Civic Soci-
ety saying it has ‘long felt strongly that what arose on this site… was
probably the worst designed modern complex that was ever con-
Illustration: Peter Strain
structed in central Bournemouth,’ the chances aren’t good. As the
Twentieth Century Society points out, one day we’ll be sorry.
A hymn to whiffy Brutalist concrete car parks? That’s why we call
editor-at-large Mark Walton’s column The Incurable Enthusiast
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 Ferrari at Sebring

48 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 T H E
5 0 -Y E A R
I T C H
Ferrari return to top-flight endurance racing
in time to fight for the 100th anniversary Le
Mans win. We join the team at their first race
Words Ben Barry Photography Alex Tapley

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 49

 Ferrari at Sebring

Midlife crisis
takes many
forms. BB thinks
he’s a postman

he World Endurance Championship (WEC) and ‘surprise’ might’ve

become distant cousins in recent years. But as the sun sinks below
the horizon and the box-fresh Ferrari 499P nabs pole for the sea-
son-opening 1000 Miles of Sebring, it’s a genuine eyes-wide, mouth-
Ferrari crew open shocker – for us, for the new team, for fans on makeshift view-
combines GT
and F1 ing platforms behind us at the hairpin – and for the opposition,
veterans long-dominant Toyota among them.
Driver Antonio Fuoco cries after his 1min 45.067sec edges Bren-
don Hartley’s Toyota GR010 by two tenths, tension, adrenaline and
delight flooding out. Team boss Antonello Coletta punches a
thumbs-up at me outside the bustling team garage. Quite the way to
kick-off a comeback.
We’re in Florida to shadow Ferrari’s return to top-flight endurance
racing 50 years since it campaigned the 312P, as well as take the pulse
of a reinvigorated WEC ahead of Le Mans – 24-hour jewel in the
WEC’s crown celebrating its centenary this June.
Ferrari? Here because new Le Mans Hypercar (LMH) rules lower
costs for prototype racing versus the previous LMP1 category and al-
low scope for less homogeneous designs.
At 1030kg minimum and 671bhp max, LMH cars are substantially
heavier, less powerful and around 10 seconds slower over a Le Mans
lap than their LMP1 predecessors, cold facts that substantially un-
dersell the spectacle – witness Cadillac driver Alex Lynn’s predatory
overhauls of the Porsche 963 during the race as edge-of-seat proof.
The new rules also largely dovetail with America’s domestic IMSA
Please check
your soft drinks series, so while LMH is applicable Stateside, new top-tier IMSA race-
at the door cars are likewise eligible for WEC entries. Called LMDh (Le Mans
Daytona hybrid), their ‘spec’ carbonfibre chassis and hybrid systems
are the more affordable common building blocks on which teams
put their stamp.
LMDh runs to the same weight and power restrictions as LMH,
and for the first time Balance of Performance aims to level the play-
ing field across WEC’s premier class.
The rules were rolled out from 2021 but this year they’re coming on
boost. Porsche and Cadillac field LMDh cars, while Toyota, Peugeot,
Vanwall and Glickenhaus join Ferrari in LMH. That’s 11 top-flight
cars for the 1000 Miles of Sebring. In the 2024 season, BMW and
Lamborghini will be among those joining the LMDh runners.
For Ferrari, LMH was the only game in town. ‘It allows a manufac-
turer to develop each component, and that is essential for us,’ ⊲

50 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 As serious as
an F1 pit, but
with a lot
more doors

WAT C H T H E O N B O A R D S A N D Y O U ’ L L
H E A R T H E E -MO T O R S P O O L U P OV E R
119MPH LIKE A BOILING KETTLE

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 51

 W H I L E T H E D E S I G N I S N E W, F E R R A R I H A S
OPTED FOR CONTINUITY OF PERSONNEL

52 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023


Gearbox
problems hit
both Peugeots
Oreca cars
flew the flag
for LMP2
class
explains Ferdinando Cannizzo, boss of Ferrari GT track car develop-
ment. ‘This is our car, so basically we can optimise everything we
want – the chassis, the suspension – and transfer all the know-how
we have collected in GT racing and Formula 1, which was not possible
otherwise.’
I pore over the 499P in Ferrari’s garage, stretching long and low,
the red and yellow livery evocative of its 312P forbear. A clean-sheet
design that Ferrari began testing at Fiorano only in July, the 499P
(499cc per cylinder, Prototype) comprises a full carbonfibre mono-
coque and bodywork, a 3.0-litre twin-turbo V6 sending 671bhp to the
rear wheels, and an e-motor to chuck 268bhp at the front.
Electronics cap the combined total at 671bhp, and ensure all-wheel
drive operates only above 119mph so as not to disadvantage rear-
drive rivals. That leaves deployment restricted to three high-speed
corners at Sebring, where it’s least beneficial…
You soon lock into the 499P’s sonic signature on a busy track – all
turbo-heavy flatulence on acceleration and fizzy deceleration like a
robot powering down. Watch the onboards and you’ll hear the e-mo-
tor spool up over 119mph like a boiling kettle, the high-pitched whiz
weirdly disembodied from the V6’s cadence.
Niklas Nielsen was second to drive the new car on its roll-out.
‘There have been massive changes since then and there will be
something we can improve after this race,’ he tells CAR. ‘But look
how many years’ experience our competitors have with prototype
racing, especially Toyota, and other manufacturers have spent at
least one year developing the car, so what we’ve done in eight months
is really amazing.’
While the design is new, Ferrari has opted for continuity of per-
sonnel. It has built on the familiarity of its lengthy relationship with
independent outfit AF Corse, its partner for production-based GT
racing in the WEC, although the team is greatly expanded and ⊲
Ferrari at Sebring
THE HYPERCAR TEAMS
⊲ TOYOTA GAZOO RACING
Contesting Hypercar since ’21, it’s the team to beat
GR010 Hybrid Hypercar: 3.5-litre twin-turbo V6
makes 671bhp, plus 268bhp e-motor Drivers: Mike
Conway, Kamui Kobayashi, Jose Maria Lopez,
Sébastien Buemi, Brendon Hartley, Ryo Hirakawa
⊲ FERRARI AF CORSE
Taps vast experience from GT3 and F1
499P Hypercar: 3.0-litre twin-turbo V6 makes
671bhp, plus 268bhp e-motor Drivers: Antonio
Fuoco, Miguel Molina, Nicklas Nielsen, Alessandro
Pier Guidi, James Calado, Antonio Giovinazzi
⊲ CADILLAC RACING
In IMSA since ’17; rules have now eased WEC entry
and return to Le Mans after 20 years
V-LMDh: 5.5-litre naturally-aspirated V8 with spec
LMDh hybrid system Drivers: Earl Bamber, Alex
Lynn, Richard Westbrook
⊲ PORSCHE PENSKE MOTORSPORT
Nobody comes close to Porsche’s Le Mans record
963 LMDh: 4.6-litre twin-turbo V8 plus electric
motor generator Drivers: Kevin Estre, Andre
Lotterer, Laurens Vanthoor, Dane Cameron,
Michael Christensen, Frédéric Makowiecki
⊲ FLOYD VANWALL RACING TEAM
All-new outfit with a name evoking ’50s glory for
Stirling Moss and Tony Brooks
680 Hypercar: 4.5-litre naturally-aspirated V8, no
hybrid technology and rear-drive only Drivers: Tom
Dillmann, Esteban Guerrieri, Jacques Villeneuve
⊲ PEUGEOT TOTALENERGIES
New regs bring 2009 Le Mans winners back
9X8 Hypercar: 2.6-litre twin-turbo V6 powers the
rear wheels, electric motor generator for the front
Drivers: Paul di Resta, Mikkel Jensen, Jean-Eric
Vergne, Loic Duval, Gustavo Menezes, Nico Muller
⊲ GLICKENHAUS RACING
Two seasons’ Hypercar experience, finishing
behind Toyota and Alpine
Glickenhaus SCG 007 LMH Hypercar:
3.5-litre twin-turbo V8, rear-wheel drive
Drivers: Roman Dumas, Ryan Briscoe, Olivier Pla
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 53
Two-times
WEC champ
Mike Conway
took the win
strengthened, including some appointments from F1.
Drivers who have long delivered for Ferrari in GT racing but lack
top-level prototype experience dominate – Nielsen has risen through
the ranks from the Ferrari Challenge, joining Antonio Fuoco and
Miguel Molina in car number 50. Across the garage Alessandro Pier
Guidi and British driver James Calado pedal the 51, the latter suffer-
ing a worst-case-scenario in the pre-event Prologue.
‘It was cold tyres [tyre warmers are dubiously off-limits in the
WEC on environmental grounds], I was going easy, fourth gear, and I
got wheelspin,’ explains Calado. The subsequent loss of control put
him in the Turn 1 wall, and while the impact wasn’t huge, the chassis
was damaged – 51 gets a fresh one for the race.
Compared with his previous Ferrari GTE racer, Calado says the
499P is more comfortable (‘You’ve got your own seats [as opposed to
sharing, with foam inserts], it’s more of a laid-down position, we’ve
refined the details’), and highlights the huge number of settings to
change on the steering wheel (‘Almost F1 complexity, sometimes
corner-by-corner’) and the leap in both downforce and increased
performance thanks to the electric motor at the front. ‘The differ-
ence in performance is huge – probably 14 seconds per lap,’ he grins.
Friday morning, race day, and I find myself sharing a golf buggy
with former Formula 1 Alfa Romeo Racing driver and current Scu-
deria Ferrari reserve Antonio Giovinazzi – the better to navigate
Sebring’s vast concrete expanses and grab a little shade from 25ºC
54 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
Mirrorball
helmets?
They’ll be
all the rage
by June
temperatures that burn way hotter.
The Italian has driven in GT and LMP2 previously, is well versed in
hybrid systems thanks to F1 and Formula E drives, and joins team-
mate Calado in the 51. Only from his perspective the 499P is slower.
Giovinazzi notes the increase in weight by around 200kg versus F1, a
decrease in downforce and power and the fact he can take more kerb.
Crucially, though, it’s the mental approach that requires more adap-
tation than the car itself.
‘You drive knowing you will hand over to your team-mate, so you
want the best car for them, the tyres, everything. The out lap on cold
tyres with other cars around will be tricky, and the traffic of GT and
LMP2 is also quite tough – you need to be consistent and lose less
time than the others,’ says Giovinazzi. With all Ferrari’s LMH drivers
more accustomed to being overtaken in GT cars than passing them
in prototypes, this is a big potential weakness.
Cockpits shielded by silver sun shades, competitors line up on the
Ullman Straight for the pre-race grid walk, the huge Le Mans cente-
nary trophy dangled like a carrot at the end. Giovinazzi’s team-mate
Pier Guidi is taking the rolling start from fourth following a 1min
45.874sec quali time some eight tenths off its pole-sitting sibling.
Two Toyotas split the difference, the lone Cadillac lines up in sixth
(1min 46.082sec), the Porsches, Peugeots, Glickenhaus and Vanwall
increasingly distant in the low 47s to low 49s.
We dash down to Turn 1 ahead of the midday rolling start, a vast ⊲
 Ferrari at Sebring

Bumpy concrete
surface demands
top-notch car prep

THE HOME OF AMERICAN ENDURANCE RACING

Sebring International Raceway is
North America’s oldest permanent
‘road racing’ track (as opposed to
oval racing). It was established in
1950 between Orlando and Miami
on Hendricks Field, a USAF Heavy
Bomber training base named after
Laird Woodruff Hendricks, killed in
an RAF Flying Fortress crash (near
CAR’s current HQ) in 1941.
The circuit comprised 5.2 miles in
the early ’50s, but its 17 corners
now weave for 3.74 miles over flat
topography and rough concrete
surfaces.
Ralph Deshon and Fritz Koster
won Sebring’s inaugural race in
1950 driving a Crosley Hot Shot
borrowed from spectator Victor
Sharpe, and Sebring later became now run over the SuperSebring
the first US track to host a Formula 1 Friday and Saturday in March, with
race, in 1959 (Jack Brabham ran out some teams contesting both.
of fuel and got crowned world
champion after pushing his car over
the line).
But the track is best known as the
home of US endurance racing. It’s
hosted the Sebring 12 Hours since
1952, which also became the
inaugural FIA WEC race in 2012.
Since then, the 12 Hours has
been a staple of the
American IMSA calendar,
with the 1000 Miles of
Sebring (as featured
here) introduced
from 2019 for the
WEC. Both races

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 55

 Ferrari at Sebring

It’s Ferrari, so
it’s the best
INSIDE
gaffer tape in
the world FERRARI’S
HYPERCAR

CHASSIS
A clean-sheet carbonfibre
monocoque forms the
core of the 499P, with
double-wishbone
suspension all-round, the
front components
integrated into the
monocoque, those at the
rear integrated in the
gearbox casing.
ONE PEUGEOT ’S TRUNDLING
AROUND LO OKING A BIT LOST
ALMOST FROM THE OFF

expanse of the very same concrete laid for the original airfield in 1941,
as a distant but ever-increasing buzz rises from the pack nearing the
end of the formation lap. When the safety car pits, Fuoco leads them
flat out in the number 50 Ferrari – the cars visibly bite and grab at the
coarse surface, bumping around aggressively. The pace is intense
from the off, push, push, push.
I’m watching them disappear into the distance for a few laps when
a Ferrari 488 contesting the entry-level GTE Am class runs wide, lifts
the throttle and smacks a tyre wall backwards, a blur of sand, tyres
and rolling metal tossed high like it’s hit an IED.
Thankfully the driver’s okay, but the shunt brings out the safety
car and triggers a generally scrappy start to proceedings – one that
sees Ferrari squander its advantage generally. The pole-sitting car 50
receives a penalty for overtaking under safety-car conditions, an
error compounded by an infringement under refuelling.
But it’s Peugeot that’s having the real shocker, one car trundling
around looking a bit lost almost from the off on a day when they’ll
never be in contention. By the time things settle the Toyotas have re-
asserted themselves in the top two positions, with the Ferrari, Cadil-
lac and Porsche all potential podium finishers. The Glickenhaus and
a Peugeot have retired.
Time for a chat with Antonella Coletta, who’s in a modest little
prefab a far cry from F1 motorhomes. For the team boss, Sebring is all
about gaining experience and proving the 499P’s reliability on a
bumpy track that will not only stress the suspension, but also the
engine and gearbox, given how often slicks leave the surface and the
revs spike – Ferrari has tested here twice before as well as elsewhere
with a 24-hour simulation where ‘we had some problems’. The tar-
get? ‘The first target is to make it to the end – we have seen some
competitors have a difficult first weekend. We want to avoid that,’
says the 56-year-old. The second target? ‘A podium.’
When I check the timing boards at 5.10pm, Toyota are fully two
laps ahead when disaster strikes for the number 51 Ferrari – Pier
Guidi touches a GTE Am car at Turn 16, spins across the track and
smacks a Porsche 911 before coming to rest on the run-off. His left
rear tyre is deflated, rear bodywork scattered over the surface.
Mechanics swarm over the car in the pitlane after he limps a full
lap back round, the rear bodywork torn to naked carbonfibre like a ⊲

56 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 ENGINE DESIGN
3.0-litre twin-turbo V6 Ferrari’s Centro Stile led
with 120º vee is closely by Flavio Manzoni
related to Ferrari’s 296 contributed to the
GTB hybrid V6 supercar, if racecar’s styling, with the
with crucial engineering HYBRID SYSTE M carbonfibre bodywork PERFORMANCE
revisions. A stressed 900-volt hybrid battery is said to be in part inspired Engine delivers up to
member, it drives through packaged immediately by the recent Ferrari 671bhp to the rear wheels,
a seven-speed sequential behind driver, while an Daytona SP3 road car. with the e-motor sending
gearbox. electric motor (with up to 268hp to the fronts,
single-speed transmis- though technical regula-
sion) drives the front tions cap the combined
wheels, though only total at 671hp. Minimum
above 119mph (activation car weight of 1030kg too.
is lower in the wet).
Brake-by-wire carbon
brake system harvests
kinetic energy.

Ferrari #51 finished

seventh despite
mid-race prang

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 57

Ferrari
delighted
with podium
and pole

No brolly
required
at Sebring,
unlike Le Mans

58 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 Ferrari at Sebring

If you
don’t wear
sunscreen,
this happens

Rules discouraging Peugeot

heavy thirst don’t weirdly
apply to spectators distant at
Sebring

shark’s been at it. The 51 gets back on track but INTO THE knocked up not just makeshift viewing plat-
soon it’s wheeled into the team garage for a more forms but entire bar areas, the vibe seems over-
thorough investigation, over 20 precious min-
LAST HOUR, whelmingly good-natured despite – and perhaps
utes dragging by. THE SUN’S because of – the many discarded bottles and
Picture a badly drawn alligator head with open SOFTENED cans. It’s where we meet three grown men
jaws pointing left and you’ll grasp the Sebring FROM WHITE dressed as Holsteins – aka the Sebring Cows.
layout. We’ve stayed mostly in the lower jaw that ‘In 1993 someone dressed up as a cow and peo-
houses pits and paddock thus far, so we cross H O T T O WA R M ple kept giving them beer,’ explains a school
over a bridge into the mouth, then cross again to ORANGE teacher who’d prefer not to be named, ‘so they
explore Turns 7 to 13 – the nostril to the eye. said “this shit’s great, we’re all wearing cow suits
For an airfield circuit with no elevation, the next year”. The Herd was born.’ In a break with
race is far more watchable than expected – cars duelling through the protocol, the cows give us beer.
narrow sections between high kerbs is addictively edgy, and it’s a Into the last hour, the sun’s softened from white hot to warm or-
buzz watching them wind up from the hairpin at Turn 7 through the ange as it falls into the drivers’ eyeline just as the pace really intensi-
fast flicks of 8 and 9, flat out, total commitment as they trust in the fies. The Ferraris pound round in third and seventh, the Toyotas way
grip and downforce. out of reach up front, Cadillac still in with a shot at the podium.
This is also an incredibly evocative atmosphere. Jacked pick-up We’re standing at Turn 13, watching the cars flash by in a barrage of
trucks, RVs and stars-and-stripes flags are scattered through the pops, rumbles and futuristic fizzes, when a launch out of Cape
camping area, with a handful of slash pines and southern live oaks Canaveral streaks across the sky in the race’s closing stages. We’re so
draped with Spanish moss the only respite from searing sun. The busy soaking it all up that we lose track of what’s actually going on,
rich tang of flame-grilled meat hangs on a light breeze. but eventually fireworks pop in the sky and we learn Mike Conway
Ferrari’s faithful are out in force. F1 fan Franco Filice is attending has taken the win for Toyota, just two seconds ahead of team-mate
Sebring for the first time, drawn to see how his favourite team get on Brendon Hartley. Ferrari number 50 is two laps down but bags third,
with the 499P. Adam Fettarman has been coming here since he was chased to the flag by the lone Cadillac 10 seconds behind. The second
eight or so, and remembers watching the Ferrari 512 BB as a child. Ferrari is down in seventh.
‘Toyota just crushes the field, but Ferrari has done a good job and it’s Pole and a podium on the 499P’s debut is quite the marker, and the
been interesting to see them come back with so many other manu- opposition know it. ‘Today is just the start of the big race coming for
facturers, that’s exciting,’ he shouts over track traffic. A generational 2023,’ sums up Toyota’s Kamui Kobayashi post-race.
thing, he’s here with his son and one-time Ferrari-owning dad. The stars are certainly aligning for that Le Mans centenary this
When we head to the lairier Green Park area, where fans have summer.

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 59

 U S E D C A R S TA R S : P E T R O L v s E L E C T R I C

We humbly present 14 red hot

secondhand buys – whether
you’re ready to go electric or not
Words Chris Chilton Photography Charlie Magee

60 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

Used car stars: petrol vs electric

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 61

 FAST FUN FOR £30k A soulless, silent slab of automotive tofu versus a pure-blood,
ozone-zapping, testosterone-oozing M car? Damn right we’re

MUSK’S M serious. This buying used, petrol versus electric feature is full
of comparisons that would have seemed ludicrous a generation

CAR OR THE
ago (Hyundai vs Range Rover, anyone?), but who would have
thought even as recently as October 2015, when BMW took the
wraps off the first M2, that we’d be suggesting you might prefer

REAL DEAL?
Sure, you want a Model 3.
an electric family car instead, and that those reasons might have
nothing to do with the cash you’d save on running costs?
But eight years ago we hadn’t seen, let a lone driven, the Tesla
Model 3. Yes, the Model S had already proved that electric cars
could be stylish without looking sci-fi, smoke an M5 at the drop

But do you want an M2 more?

of a hat and come with an infotainment screen that makes
your nan’s TV looks small. But the Model 3 put all of that into a

TE S L A MODE L 3
Q U I CK , CO M F O RTA B LE,
EFFI CI ENT…

62 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023


smaller package with a smaller price tag that made it accessible
to people without an M5-sized budget. The electric age’s Model
T Ford, the Model 3 changed everything.
You can get into an early single-motor, Standard Range Model
3 from 2019 for less than £25k. But our £30k pot buys a faster,
longer-legged (around 350 miles officially, and the best part
of 300 miles in reality) dual-motor Long Range with one less
candle on its next cake. You could even stretch to the Model 3
Performance and its tastier 20-inch wheels and bonkers 3.2sec
0-60mph if you were willing to throw in a couple of grand extra,
and it might be a more appropriate comparison with the M2. But
the Long Range is more than fast enough to make you laugh out
loud and, as a sneaky roll-on drag race down a runway proves,
keep the BMW honest.
Used car stars: petrol vs electric
Given time and enough runway, the M2 will overhaul the
Tesla, and that journey through the rev range, combined with
the sound it makes, and the way that sound shifts like cloud
shapes on a windy day, will give the M car something the Tesla’s
more one-dimensional performance can’t match. Straight-six
engines are special like that. But the Model 3 eats it alive for
20-70mph urgency, which is exactly where you’ll benefit on the
road, and that’s presuming you’ve warmed the 3.0-litre six’s oil
through. The Model 3 is ready to leave the M2 trailing as soon
as you tug the door closed – assuming you can make the mental
leap and convince yourself it’s okay to go hard the moment you
leave your driveway.
The BMW you see here is the rare-groove, 444bhp M2 CS,
whose 4.2sec 0-62mph time matches the Long Range Model 3, ⊲
B MW M2
… B UT TH E 3 L ACKS
A STR A I G HT-S I X
One of these
two demands
metric tonnes
of cooling air
every second…
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 63
 Used car stars: petrol vs electric
but whose £68k-£72k used price busts our
budget twice over. An M2 Competition,
THEY LOOK LIKE
on the other hand, is definitely on the THE MAKINGS
menu and delivers 90 per cent of the fun
with at least 10 percent more comfort.
OF A PERFECT
The CS is a great car – to be honest T WO - CAR
it had us with the gold wheels – but it GAR AGE – BUT
WE’VE ONLY
didn’t constitute as great a leap over the
Competition as that car did over the
original M2. ONE SPACE …
The Comp landed in 2018, bringing with
it a milder version of the M4’s S55 twin-
turbo straight-six that made 405bhp and 406lb ft of torque, up
from 365bhp and 343lb ft for the original M2 and its less special
single-turbo N55 six. And once again you could pair it with
automatic or manual transmission. A bigger pair of conjoined
kidneys and a sexier set of 19-inch cross-spoke alloy wheels
helped set the newer car apart on the outside, while inside there
was a new hybrid digital/analogue instrument cluster, M4-style
drive-mode button and a red starter button.
There’s no starter button, red or otherwise, inside the
Model 3. There’s not much of anything at all, just a plain
steering wheel (oddly thick-rimmed, like the M2’s) and a tablet
touchscreen floating above the centre console. No sports seats,
no performance branding, nothing to suggest how rapid the
Model 3 is, or that it’s actually pretty good fun on twisty roads
too. Time and again we’ve flung the Model 3 into Giant Tests
with a plethora of new EVs. And time and again Elon’s compact
saloon has come out on top.
64 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
Both? Failing
that, we’d go
M2 now and
Model 3 next
That said, hustling a Model 3 requires
a bit of a mindset shift. After the heft
and brawn and precision of the track-
developed M2, the Tesla feels insubstantial
and more than a little synthetic. The
steering is light, and light on feel, but it
snaps the nose smartly into corners and
the body control is usefully strong. And
unlike the M2, which slithers around
with surprisingly little provocation, the
Tesla is planted enough that you can push
your right foot to the boards whatever
the weather. Sounds dull but in reality the Model 3’s usable
performance is hugely compelling. Overtakes and rapid traffic-
light getaways are falling-off-a-log easy.
By contrast the BMW still feels like an old-school performance
car that you need to be a bit handy to get the best out of. The
M2 is harsh, unrefined and edgy. But it’s more exciting to look
at and to drive. They look like the makings of a perfect two-
car garage – but with only one space available you could make a
really compelling case for either.
Picking the BMW, though, would mean settling for an older
car. While our notional £30k budget would net us a 2020 Model
3 Long Range with 40,000 miles, the same cash would only fund
a 2017 first-generation M2. If you can find another £3000 you
unlock the superior M2 Competition, but also the supercar-
baiting Model 3 Performance. Our take? Enjoy effervescent cars
like the M2 while you still can; there’s plenty of time for Tesla
ownership later.
 THE £24K VW DILEMMA In 1987 CAR’s late sister mag, Supercar Classics, slapped a ’73 911
Carrera RS on the cover with the headline ‘Porsche should still

THE
make this car’. We’re getting the urge to do something similar
after driving the Mk7.5 Golf GTI.
You know that feeling when something is just right? That’s

TOUGHEST
the Mk7 and facelifted 7.5 GTI. Visually and dynamically they
give away nothing meaningful to the latest Mk8, but deliver it

ACT TO
without the unnecessary complications of the new car and its
infuriating touch-sensitive steering-wheel buttons and fiddly
navigation system.

FOLLOW
VW’s conservative styling means they’ve barely dated visually,
and neither has the driving experience. Sure, a Civic Type R is
faster. But there’s a great duality to the GTI’s character. It’s
smooth and effortless when you need it to be and taut and
VW’s ID. 3 would have agile when the red mist descends, particularly with the 227bhp
(up 10bhp) output, bigger brakes and LSD that came with the
been fine – had VW never optional Performance Pack.

built the Mk7.5 Golf GTI

Will we be pining for the OG ID. 3 five years from now?
Probably not. The interior quality is disappointing for a VW
and the nav system a letdown, though both have been addressed
with a minor facelift this year.
No, the ID. 3 wasn’t the second coming. But it is a solid family
EV that’s good to drive, pretty zippy (7.3sec to 62mph) in 201bhp
form and has a decent range (reckon on getting 220 miles) even
with the regular 58kWh battery. For £24k it looks great value,
but then that cash – and ours – would buy an awful lot of GTI. ⊲

V W GOLF GTI
V W I D. 3
… B UT W E’ R E H AV I N G
TH E PEO PLE’ S
TOO M UCH FU N
C A R PLUG S I N …
TO C A R E

THE GTI’S EFFORTLESS WHEN YOU

NEED IT TO BE AND TAUT AND AGILE
WHEN THE RED MIST DESCENDS

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 65

 HYUN DAI ION IQ 5
ELEC TR I C , B I G O N
DES IG N , B I G …

More slashes and

creases than the
Origami Olympiad
(which is an
actual event)

66 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 Used car stars: petrol vs electric

£33K FUNKY FUTURISM

STYLE WITH
SUBSTANCE
Hyundai Ioniq 5 or Range Rover
Velar? Either way, you turn heads

If God is in the detail, then there must have been a certain

R ANG E ROVE R VE L AR
… B UT TELL US YOU DO N ’ T
FA N C Y A V EL A R
THE 5 FEELS LIKE
amount of divinity floating around when Hyundai styled the
Ioniq 5. Two years on from launch it’s still one of the most
distinctive cars, EV or otherwise, money can buy. Those Lancia
Delta-reboot looks have kept prices firm but you can now get a
lightly used example with barely any miles on the clock for six
grand off what they were new.
Okay, for that you won’t get the mightiest 301bhp dual-motor
version for your £33,000 – but there’s little wrong with the
single-motor, rear-drive Ioniq 5, even with just 168bhp and the
puniest 58kWh battery. First off, it can haul itself to 62mph in
8.5sec and cover around 200 miles between top-ups (the official
figure’s 238). That may not sound very impressive but remember
Hyundai blessed the 5 with 350kW charging, which allows for a
10-80 per cent charge in a whisker over 17 minutes, thanks to its
800-volt architecture.
There’s nothing German sports car-like about the Ioniq
5’s featherweight steering and brakes. But it’s an incredibly
calming car to drive and a real anxiety-killer – something you
can put down to a combination of those effortless controls,
mostly supple ride (it can struggle in town) and an interior
that’s as great to use as it is to look at. From its twin-12.3-inch
screens that don’t skimp on tech to the tasteful mix of materials
and finishes, it feels like a breath of fresh air beside its stale and
sober German rivals. The super-sized family hatch also offers
acres of space and the walk-through footwell is both fun and
genuinely useful.
And despite the crossover/SUV tag, a big hatchback is what
the Ioniq 5 really us. If you’re hellbent on the tennis-umpire
driving position with your concept-car styling you need the
Range Rover Velar. Land Rover’s six-year-old Macan rival has
just been facelifted. But looking at the original, with its flush-fit
handles and twin-screen interior, it’s hard to see the need.
Prices kick off in the late twenties for the earliest examples
with a fairly gutless 178bhp D180 diesel. But we could stretch to
a 237bhp D240 or maybe a 247bhp D250 petrol without busting
our self-imposed £33k limit. Take a good drive before you buy,
though. Big wheels look great but can spoil the ride on non-air-
sprung models. And remember that the very first cars didn’t get

A BREATH OF Apple CarPlay.

The Velar even comes with some genuine off-road ability,
FRESH AIR BESIDE despite doing without its bigger brother’s low-ratio box. Throw
ITS STALE AND on some grippier all-terrain tyres and, thanks to Land Rover’s
Terrain Response traction-enhancing wizardry, the Velar will
SOBER RIVALS go far further off road than you ever imagined and even wade
up to 600mm. Not that most people will. The Velar is an urban
style statement, but does it have more style than the Ioniq? We’ll
let you decide that one. ⊲

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 67

 Remember how we said the Golf GTI just felt right? The Abarth
RETRO FUN FOR £22K
595 plays by different rules. You sit too high, there’s no reach

THE CUTEST
adjustment on the steering column, the front wheels fight like
street dogs and the ride is so crude it makes the smoothest road
feel like the corrugated rooftop of a Colombian barrio.

FIGHT IN
Sounds like a disaster, then. But get the turbocharged 1.4-litre
motor past 3000rpm and the Abarth 595 absolutely flies, though

HISTORY
the extreme sensation of speed might have something to do
with the pure Group N rally car soundtrack, or the fact its tiny
footprint turns even the narrowest of roads into a playground.
We promise you you’ll be smiling, even if it’s against your better
judgement.
It’s Abarth’s 595 versus It’s impossible not to smile just walking up to the 595. Fifteen

Honda’s dinky E years after we first saw an Abarth-ised version of the retro 500,
and eight years on from the introduction of the even more

HON DA E
SU PER M A R I O’ S
SU PER M I N I

The Abarth
makes so
much noise
it’s fortunate
the Honda
makes none

68 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023


cartoon-like 595, that jutting front bumper with its gaping air
intake still looks naughty.
Navigating the numerous spec and trim changes during
the Abarth’s life is like trying to pop between the two Koreas
without losing a leg. But this thing only costs £23k-£26k new
so £22k buys you a pre-registered 2022 car in either higher-spec
Turismo trim with just 10 miles on the clock and the 163bhp
engine, or wilder 177bhp Competizione trim and 5000 miles.
But if you want something more zen-like, the same money
buys Honda’s gorgeous E. And not just the base E, but the
Advance, which gets a bump from 134bhp to 152bhp and extra
equipment including heated seats and steering wheel and self-
parking. The bigger motor’s 8.0sec 0-62mph time isn’t quite as
punchy as the base Abarth’s 7.3sec effort, but the real difference
is how smoothly it’s delivered. The E’s big downside is its meagre
GET THE TURBOCHARGED
1.4 - LITRE MOTOR PAST 3000RPM
AND THE 595 ABSOLUTELY FLIES
Used car stars: petrol vs electric
134-mile range – and that’s official… In reality you’ll be looking
for a plug by 100 miles, though no one buying the Honda – or
the bone-shaking Abarth, for the matter – is doing so with plans
to trudge up and down motorways.
In town the E’s tighter turning circle, one-pedal option and
superior driving position make it a better ally than the 595, but
what really seals the deal is the interior. Both cars are short on
space, though the Honda is easily the roomier of the two, and
its incredible full-width digital dashboard and camera-based
door mirrors will ensure the passengers have as much fun as
the person behind the wheel. That much digital real estate can
seem intimidating at first glance, but it’s really simple to use
with clear tiles for different functions. And if you find it a bit
busy you can even turn it into a digital aquarium. At almost £35k
new, the E isn’t cheap. But at £22k it’s impossible to resist. ⊲
ABARTH 595
S H OU LD N ’ T
WO R K . DO ES
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 69
 £30K PREMIUM SUVS Audi played it strangely cool with its first ever electric car. The
ambiguously named e-Tron – retrospectively rebadged Q8

BECAUSE
e-Tron – looked too much like a Q5, we thought. Where was
the sizzle of all those super e-Tron concepts? But as we found
out when we lived with one for over six months, it’s a real

YOU’RE
grower. The elegant interior is whisper quiet and crammed with
technology, including dual screens for navigation and climate

WORTH IT
and a third for instrument duties. And some, including the
example we’ve got here today, were the first production cars to
get camera-based door mirrors.
The Stelvio and e-Tron don’t look wildly different on the

Will you go Audi e-Tron

outside, but jump from the driver’s seat of the Audi to the same
position in the Alfa and it feels like some Avis rep has handed
or Alfa Stelvio? you the keys to a cheap Chrysler at LAX, circa 2014. The Stelvio’s
layout, its retro-look hooded dials, easily accessible climate

AUD I E -TRON
B I G , E A SY
ELEC TR I C LI V I N G …

WHATEVER KIND OF
COMBUSTION YOU
GO FOR YOU’LL GET
THE SAME AGILE
ALFA CHASSIS

70 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023


controls and great seats score points. But the cheap plastics
spoil your enjoyment and its premium aspirations, as does an
infotainment screen so small you’d need fighter-pilot vision to
read it. And that’s before we’ve fired the diesel up. Yes, a diesel,
because perky as the 197bhp and 276bhp 2.0-litre petrol turbo
fours are, some of us still appreciate the 40mpg economy and
450-mile touring range that only a diesel delivers.
The only diesel option in Alfa’s current Stelvio line-up is
a 207bhp 2.2 that will haul the X3-sized SUV to 62mph in a
respectable 6.6sec. But for a while there was also a 177bhp
version (later upgraded to 187bhp) available for base cars, but it’ll
cost you a second at the lights. Going diesel will also restrict your
buying options because most new buyers went for petrol power.
But whatever kind of combustion you go for you’ll get the same
agile chassis that delivers a slightly harsh ride on bigger wheels
Used car stars: petrol vs electric
but rewards with flat cornering and sports car-quick steering.
The e-Tron also came with a couple of different power options
that were a result of different battery sizes. The e-Tron 50’s
64.7kWh pack gave 308bhp and 398lb ft plus a fairly miserable
200-ish miles of range, while the 55’s upgrade to 83.6kWh
delivers up to 402bhp in boost mode and gives around 252
official miles, but more like 200 in real use.
For £30k-£35k you’re going to struggle to find any 55s, and
even the 50s will probably be restricted to lower-spec Technik
and Sport trims. But you’ll be able to take your pick of high-spec
Stelvios, including post-2020 cars with their slightly classier
interior, upgraded infotainment system and super-handy Apple
CarPlay. The Audi’s unquestionably the more premium product
but that zen-like refinement definitely comes with some
comprises. ⊲
ALFA ROM EO STE LVIO
…O R A WA LK O N
TH E W I LD S I D E
One soothes.
The Alfa sizzles
– even with
diesel power
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 71
 Used car stars: petrol vs electric

YOUR
USED
EV FAQS
Going
secondhand
and electric?
Read this first

⊲ Do I want range, efficiency or
charging speed?
Range is a big fuel tank, efficiency a
lean-running engine and charging
speed the equivalent of how quickly
you can pump in petrol. All three
would be nice but with EVs there are
choices to be made, and it pays to be
honest about the kind of driving you
do. If your world makes the one on
the Truman Show look big the Honda
E’s 100-mile range will be fine, and so
will its ‘slow’ 50kW charge rate. But
charge rates might be a problem with
bigger batteries if you do a stack of
miles and don’t want to spend hours
at service stations. The Ioniq 5 and ID.
3 both offer decent ranges, but the
800-volt Hyundai charges faster.
⊲ Will I save on running costs if I
go electric?
Petrol prices have fallen and – as we
know all too well – electricity prices
has risen, but if you charge at home
on a cheap EV-friendly tariff at night,
rather than use pricey motorway fast
chargers, you’ll almost certainly still
save money running an EV. You’ll also
– for now – pay no road tax or
London congestion charge, although
that may well change. EV road tax is
slated to be introduced in 2025.
⊲ How much is a wallbox?
This depends on your home’s
electrical set-up and how rapidly you
want to charge. Figure on £800-
£1000 for a 7kW point (some three
times quicker than a three-pin plug),
but speedy 22kW versions require
three-phase electricity and can cost
thousands.
⊲ Won’t a secondhand electric car
have a half-dead battery – what
reassurances are there?
Many EVs have a five- or eight-year
warranty guaranteeing the battery will
deliver 70 per cent of its original
charge until 100,000 miles. After that,
Whip the body
off and they’re
all big Tamiya
buggies
you’re on your own, though
specialists offer battery health reports
if you’re really worried.
⊲ Which is the safer place to put
your money, electric or petrol?
Electric vehicles used to have terrible
residuals but as a rule the newer ones
depreciate more slowly than petrol
equivalents, helped by the long
waiting lists for new EVs. You can be
reasonably confident there will be
significant demand for pre-owned
versions of today’s electric cars,
whereas until recently the rate of
technological development was so
rapid, and the future so uncertain, that
we expected minimal demand for old
EVs. As ever, though, go for the
newest version you can afford.

72 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 Until hell freezes over and Peugeot makes another GTI-badged
£20k RUNABOUTS
supermini, the electric e-208 is as rapid as small Pugs get. Zero

JUST NIPPING
to 62mph in 8.1sec means it’s no faster on paper than a 35-year-
old 205, but snap the throttle open at any speed and feel the
134bhp motor’s 195lb ft smoothly usher you towards the horizon

DOWN THE
and you’d swear otherwise.
The e-208 isn’t exactly GTI fun, but what is fun, anyway? By

SHOPS
any rational measure the Suzuki Jimny is a terrible road car.
Four turns lock-to-lock steering, limited grip, a jiggly ride, poor
legroom and a heap of tyre, wind and mechanical noise makes
it a far more tiring car to drive than the e-208. But despite the

Glide through the urban

classic-car dynamics it’s perversely entertaining trying to hustle
the Jimny along, and the 100bhp 1.5-litre naturally-aspirated
gridlock… but in Pug’s engine has real enthusiasm for the job even if the stopwatch
says it takes over 12 seconds to reach 62mph.
best-selling e-208 or Space is tight – and even tighter since Suzuki was forced to

Suzuki’s mini Defender?

re-homologate it as a two-seat van in 2021 – but most buyers use
them as two-seater dog shuttles anyway. Others know there’s
nothing else to touch it off road and actually make use of the
low-ratio all-wheel drive. Us? We’re just suckers for its honesty
and sense of fun. The cult of Jimny means you’ll have to be quick
to nab anything around the £20k bottom end for used versions,
but the brilliant e-208’s popularity as a fleet car means you’re
spoilt for choice. ⊲

SUZUKI J I M NY
R E TRO 4x4 FU N
F O R £ 20 k

PE UG EOT E -20 8
TH E M O D ER N 205 GTI
IS … TH IS

WE’RE JUST SUCKERS FOR THE

JIMNY’S HONEST Y AND SENSE OF FUN

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 73

 Porsche is a perennial thorn in the BMW M8’s side, but in most
SUPER-SALOON THRILLS
comparisons it’s the 911 doing the insistent spiking. This time

IGNORE
it’s the Taycan, a far more appropriate foil. Pitted against a 911
the M8 coupe feels too big and too heavy; it’s fast and capable
across country, but it’s a GT with fangs, not a lightweight sports

HEAD, GO
car with a luxury lining.
Lined up against the Taycan, though, the M8 makes far more

HEART
sense. Okay, maybe not financial sense; its 23mpg real-world
thirst and £520 road tax is going to leave a bigger dent in your
wallet than the electric Taycan’s charge costs and zero-rate tax
will. But we’re not going to get bogged down in those numbers.
We’re interested in whether you might buy an EV on merit
Used BMW M8 or Porsche and not just because your accountant says it’s a smart move.

Taycan? You win either way Unfortunately for the M8, the Taycan ticks both boxes.
The Taycan was introduced in 2019, the same year as the M8

B MW M 8
TH E FI RST OW N ER ’ S
LOSS IS YOU R G A I N

74 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023


(and only a year after the base 8-series) but the Porsche looks a
good half decade fresher inside and out. The Porsche has slick
screens where the BMW has tiny old-fashioned buttons. Both
cars feel like coupes from the front seat but the Taycan has
proper four-seat accommodation and the two-door M8’s back
seats are barely more useful than a 911’s.
The obvious answer to that is the M8 Gran Coupe. Prices
start at the same £77k, which buys you a 20k-mile 2020 car
powered by the same M5-derived, 617bhp, bi-turbo V8 hooked
up to a transmission that can switch from four- to two-wheel
drive at the push of a button. But you also get a more handsome
four-door coupe body and genuine space for four. It’s easily the
pick of the M8 range.
But what could you pick up from the Taycan line-up for
that £77k? Nothing near the top of the performance range,
A R E A R- D R I V E ELEC TR I C
THE ENTRY- LEVEL REAR - DRIVE
TAYCAN IS LIGHTER THAN THE 4S,
PURER AND HAS BETTER R ANGE
Used car stars: petrol vs electric
that’s for sure. A base Taycan with the usefully bigger 83.7kWh
Performance Plus battery; maybe a 4S. There’s no shame in
either. While the 751bhp Turbo S’s ability to rip to 62mph in
less than 3.0sec and lap the ’Ring in 7min 33sec might grab the
headlines, the 4S’s still hefty 563bhp dominates the driving
experience less and makes for a more rounded, still exciting
package.
The entry-level rear-wheel-drive car we’ve got here today
is slower again (469bhp, 5.4sec versus 4.0sec) but it’s also
lighter, purer, has a better range and lets you spend more
time appreciating other strengths including its great steering
and chassis balance. But maybe you want the powertrain to
dominate, brighten your day and make an absolute din – and we
totally get that. If that’s the case the M8 is your bestie. But we’d
take the Porsche from this pair-up.
Feeling
brave? Then
Porsche’s
Frozen Berry
paint awaits
PORSCH E TAYCAN
9 11 F O R £ 7 7k !
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 75
 Lamborghini Revuelto

76 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 Chances are this is
it: Lamborghini’s last
ever V12 supercar.
Can the Revuelto
draw a remarkable
dynasty to a suitably
remarkable close?
Words Georg Kacher Photography Olgun Kordal

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 77

 t’s dark in the windowless design department of Lamborghini's
Sant’Agata factory. There’s a buzz of anticipation as we await the un-
veiling of the Revuelto, the car that replaces the Aventador. We know
it’s going to be a hybrid, but we also know it’s going to be a V12 – a
bloodline Lamborghini wouldn’t dare sully with a car that was any-
thing less than brilliant.
The question isn’t whether it's going to be brilliant. The question is
exactly how that brilliance will be achieved, and how the competing
demands of power, regulations, weight, aerodynamics, packaging
and design will be met.
The babble of excited speculation is hushed by the arrival of chief
executive Stephan Winkelmann – always reassuringly composed,
always a twinkle in his eye.
‘This,’ he says, ‘is the most extreme Lamborghini production car
ever, and as such it marks an important step on the way to the brand’s
zero-emission future. Compliant with the group’s commitment to
zero-emission mobility, we are going to electrify [as opposed to make
fully electric] our entire model range next year [with the arrival of the
PHEV Urus]. By 2025, CO2 emissions will be down 50 per cent, with a
further 30 per cent reduction to follow in 2028. The upcoming fourth
model range will of course be fully electric, and ultimately that’s also
the way to go for Urus and future sports cars.’
And before we have time to start fretting about full electric, boof!
Swivelling spotlights converge on the freshly uncovered car, stun-
ning in bright orange, accompanied by a deafening multi-speaker
roar. The V12 engine’s blipped once, twice, three times, sending
shockwaves smashing through the auditorium.

Hybrid and
cleaner. But
Greta’s still not
going to be
down with it

78 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023


Chief technical officer Rouven Mohr takes to the stage. And like
Winkelmann, he says all the right things. ‘Now you have a rough idea
what this awesome engine sounds like. But of course it’s the driving
experience that puts this car into a different orbit. For a start, the Re-
vuelto feels 300 kilos lighter than it is, it is even more chuckable than
a Huracan STO, and the electric torque vectoring system lifts the
handling through tight corners to a whole new level.’ (We’ll see. Sim-
ilar set-ups on the NSX Honda and Ferrari SF90 left us cold.)
The third key player is design chief Mitja Borkert, who is fast
sneaking up on all-time greats like Flavio Manzoni: ‘We went
through 17 designs before arriving at this definitive sculpture.’ On
first impressions, the result was worth the pain along the way.
 
THE NEW LOOK: BOLDER AND SMOOTHER
The look of the Revuelto is much cleaner than its extremely in-your-
face predecessor. Gone is the head-turning rear wing on stilts, along
with most of the busy flicks and flares, the loud nostrils and NACA
ducts and all that ostentatious glitter. Instead, the surfaces are now
bolder yet smoother with more muscular radii at the rear, an even
lower front end sporting a low-riding V-shaped bonnet and a pair of
hectagonal high-mounted exhausts.
More familiar is the single-piece clamshell behind the roof, cover-
ing engine, transmission and suspension. The lights, front and rear,
follow recent tradition. The strong motif of the Y-shaped LED head-
lamps reappears as instrument panel divider, animated indicator el-
ement, tail-light graphic and cutline pattern.
No styling feature of this more aerodynamic, more spacious and
Lamborghini Revuelto
easier-to-operate chunk of rolling sculpture happened by chance, is
an afterthought, or looks like a compromise made in a rush.
‘After a week on the Nardo test track,’ says Borkert, ‘we changed
the position and the thickness of the A-posts because we wanted
better turn-in visibility. The first outings in heavy traffic made it
clear that we needed a bigger rear window, which subsequently dou-
bled in size.’ The same ‘learning by doing’ approach also honed the
steering wheel, which carries everything you need while driving
within easy fingertip reach.
Key aerodynamic features include an integrated rear wing, a chis-
elled front splitter, the sharp trailing edge of the roof, the brake cool-
ing ducts and the wheelhouse vents. Together, they improve the
overall aerodynamic efficiency (downforce with low drag) by 61 per
cent over the Aventador, while at the same time boosting the com-
bined front and rear downforce by 66 per cent.
 
THE NEW CHASSIS: LIGHTER, STIFFER, BIGGER
The part-carbon tub is 10 per cent lighter than the Aventador’s chas-
sis and 25 per cent more torsionally rigid, with a front subframe in
forged composites (cuts of carbonfibre soaked in resin – a technique
it’s been using since 2008) rather than the conventional aluminium.
The rear subframe, which cradles the entire drivetrain assembly, is
fabricated from high-strength aluminium in the form of hollow
castings. Overall weight is down by 10 per cent or 188kg.
Suspension is pretty straight bat: double wishbones complement-
ed by coil springs and adjustable dampers. The tyres are up one size
to 21-inch front and 22-inch rear. Other upgrades include notably ⊲
THE V12 ENGINE SENDS
SHOCKWAVES SMASHING
THROUGH THE AUDITORIUM
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 79
 Lamborghini Revuelto

Funky drive
mode knobs
on the wheel
feel serious

fatter anti-roll bars all round, a 10 per cent quicker action to the THE ME N BE HIND THE REVUE LTO
steering rack and beefed-up carbon-ceramic brakes. In addition to
larger-diameter but slightly slimmer discs, Lambo’s fitted massive ROUVEN MOHR
10-piston front calipers (up from six) and rotors with an innovative CHIEF TECHNICAL OFFICER
friction layer for extra initial bite, more stamina at high speed and Some feared Mohr would take Lambo
more immediate responses at low temperatures – and when there is in a more mainstream, less emotional
a lot of water on the road. direction. It’s fair to say that hasn’t happened. He
These chassis changes weren’t made on a whim, obviously. They debuted with the scorching Urus Performante, and
were essential because of the hybrid powertrain, which was in turn now this – a 1001bhp V12… The path to full electric
essential because Lamborghini has now embarked on a voyage of will not be a dull one.
electrification. The mid-mounted V12 engine, fundamentally famil-
iar from the Aventador, has been rotated 180º to put the new gearbox
at the back. The space in front of the engine is now occupied by the MITJA BORKERT
modest 3.8kWh battery (far smaller than the batteries in both Ferra- HEAD OF DESIGN
ri’s 296 GTB and McLaren’s Artura), which occupies the tunnel be- The ex-Porsche man has been with
tween the seats. The tunnel no longer needs to maintain a physical Lamborghini for seven years, during
connection to the front wheels; they have an electric motor each, and which time sales have got bigger, colours have got
there’s a third at the back. brighter and the wings have got wilder. But the new
  car, like his Urus, has a cleaner, simpler look – while
THE NEW POWERTRAIN: BEYOND 1000BHP still being jaw-dropping and distinctively Lambo.
At 218kg, the 6.5-litre naturally-aspirated engine is the lightest V12
ever conceived by Lamborghini – and also is the last of its kind. Red- STEPHAN WINKELMANN
lined at 9500rpm, it puts out 814bhp at 9250rpm without the e-mo- CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER
tors taking things to the next level. A higher compression ratio, a re- He tried leaving. There was an
designed ram-style intake manifold, optimised combustion interlude at Audi Sport, then Bugatti.
chambers and a new exhaust system (less back-pressure, mainly) are But of course he came back to Lamborghini,
other significant improvements. starting his second spell in charge in late 2020. He
‘Developing an electrified high-performance engine is a new and has to be there because he embodies the brand:
quite different ball game,’ says a beaming CTO. ‘But it was worth it, clever, flamboyant, powerful and entirely European.
because the result gives you all the kick in the butt you could ask for,
plus ultra-sharp handling, tenacious grip and a truly emotional ⊲

80 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 Composite front
crash structure (we
know, it’s a horrible
thought) is a first

THE LIGHTEST
LAMBORGHINI V12 EVER –
AND THE LAST OF ITS KIND

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 81

 HOW THEY HYBRIDISED
How Lamborghini, Ferrari and McLaren grudgingly plugged in

LAMBORGHINI
CEO Stephan Winkelmann, now on his
second stint at Lamborghini, appears
about as keen on electrification as
he does on the idea of giving up his
excellent suits and shoes for some
baggy GAP khakis and an old pair of
New Balance. The Urus – as obvious
a candidate for hybridisation as you’re
ever likely to see – is still waiting for its
PHEV, and the supercapacitor Sian was
a token gesture. The Revuelto, with its
3.8kWh battery and three motors, is the
dawn of Lambo’s electric age.

The Revuelto’s
FERRARI rear e-motor
Way back, there was the LaFerrari. and gearbox
The lightly hybridised V12 was utterly unit in all its
mesmerising and suggested that glory
e-boosting hypercars might not be
a terrible idea. But the SF90 that
followed, a turbo V8 plug-in hybrid
with a Revuelto-style three-motor
arrangement, remains a curious device.
All-wheel drive, it’s brutally quick. But
it’s also aloof and without a shred of
storage space. V6 296 GTB (right) – a
PHEV too, but rear-drive and with a
single e-motor – fixed both issues.

Artura and MCLAREN

296 both use
wide-angle Like Maranello, Woking (maybe it has a
V6s with ring to it if you’re Italian?) experimented
compact axial- with high-performance hybridisation
flux motors (the fabulous P1) only to then leave the
(the round red tech well alone for a few years while
bit, left)
it worked out its next move. Far less
expensive than the 296 and a more
rounded car, the Artura’s powertrain
is remarkably similar to the Ferrari’s.
A compact V6 with widely-splayed
cylinder banks is boosted by a 7.4kWh
battery (twice the capacity of the
Revuelto’s) and a punchy motor (below).

82 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023


user experience. On top of all that, the Revuelto relays a unique
lightness, smoothness and playfulness only a high-end power hybrid
can create.’
The front e-motors are oil-cooled axial-flux units. Each drives one
front wheel, when required, the outputs being carefully calibrated to
maximise traction in all conditions. The rear e-motor, positioned on
the new gearbox, is a compact 148bhp unit which acts as booster,
doubles up as starter motor and generator, regenerates energy under
braking and feeds stabilising torque to the rear wheels when re-
quired. On slippery surfaces, electric all-wheel-drive reverse is the
rule, whereas on dry surfaces reverse motion is provided exclusively
by the front motors.
Made by Dana/Graziano to Lamborghini’s design, the eight-speed
dual-clutch transmission promises to be way more friendly than the
Aventador’s theatrical but clunky single-clutch idiosyncrasy.
With the battery fully charged, the DNA drive mode selector
locked in launch control and the bespoke Bridgestone Potenza tyres
properly warmed up, the Revuelto can reportedly launch 0-62mph in
2.5sec. Yep, two-point-five seconds.
Mohr says: ‘At this extreme level, half a second makes a big differ-
ence. Another highlight is the maximum speed of over 217mph –
that’s seriously fast. Just as impressive is the truly explosive punch
you will experience between 100mph and 180mph [such a handy
Lamborghini Revuelto
YOU’LL BE LUCKY TO
COVER 10 MILES ON
ELECTRIC POWER ALONE
real-world performance metric…]. While the extra ratio provides
longer legs on the motorway, the more closely staggered lower gears
generate tangibly more low-range urge.’
Fuel consumption? They’re not saying. ‘The mission of this car is
not to save the planet. Instead, it is more of a rocketship on wheels
which makes the driver feel like a fighter pilot.’
 
MODES: MORE THAN EVER
There are three overall powertrain settings: Recharge (for when you
want to put charge into the battery), Hybrid (electric assistance will
supplement the V12, but the V12 will also keep the battery topped up)
and Performance. There are four drive modes, also tweaking the
chassis and aero: Città (city), Strada, Sport and Corsa.
In Città, power is limited to 178bhp. In Strada, maximum output
climbs sharply to 874bhp. Not enough grunt? Then dial in Sport and
relish up to 895bhp of combined forward thrust backed up by a rorti-
er exhaust note and an even faster shift action. Only the combina-
tion of Performance and Corsa pulls out all the stops and yields the
full 1001bhp and a potential 1161lb ft of torque: the V12 peaks at 535lb
ft, each front e-motor can bring 259lb ft and the rear unit 111lb ft.
Cittàn and Strada can be combined with Recharge or Hybrid.
Sport and Corsa work with all three powertrain settings: Recharge,
Hybrid and Performance. You can also dial in Corsa ESC Off with ⊲
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 83
 Lamborghini Revuelto

WATCH
THE VIDEO!
HEAD TO THE CAR
MAGAZINE
YOUTUBE
CHANNEL
It’s not
for saving
the world,
apparently

Recharge, Hybrid and Performance. That makes 13 combinations,

and spans everything from 1001bhp beast to front-drive EV.
The Revuelto’s electric-only capability is essentially for placating
neighbours; you’ll be lucky to get 10 miles without the engine having
to join in. Charging the tiny battery at home takes about half an
hour. On the move, using a combination of engine and regenerative
braking, you should be able to do it in about six minutes. A quick blast
it is, then… The Revuelto’s algorithms work to prevent the battery
ever running completely flat.
 
INSIDE THE REVUELTO: MORE SPACE, MORE TECH
The wheelbase of 2799mm is 79mm longer than before, which con-
tributes to an 84mm increase in legroom. There’s also more bag
space behind the seats, aided by swivelling the V12 around. Head-
room has also increased, by 26mm.
These changes make all the difference to a tall driver. At the same
time the slimmer centre console grants extra leg clearance, the con-
cave door panels provide more shoulder and elbow room and the no-
toriously challenging three-quarter rear visibility is aided by the
larger second side window and the lower fins. Also new are the digital
secondary instrument panel in front of the passenger, which I like to
think of as the fear-o-meter. There’s a welcome pair of cupholders
and a useful storage and charging cubicle for two smartphones. The
boot up front can accommodate two cabin cases.
The scissor door pops up with a lascivious spring-loaded ooze, in-
viting you to settle in the thinly padded, power-operated but other-
wise conventional driving seat. The red starter button has moved
from the centre stack to the steering wheel, where it is mirrored by
the thumbwheel used for selecting driving modes.
Asked why there is no hyperscreen but three relatively small mon-
itors measuring 12.3, 8.4 and 9.1 inches in diameter, spread evenly
across the dashboard, the chief designer is matter-of-fact: ‘Because
we’re not in the touchscreen or the entertainment business. Since
this car is a supertool for professionals, our mission was reduce to the
max, not subject the pilot to information overload.’
 
A FITTING END TO A MIGHTY DYNASTY?
Lamborghini doesn’t need saving – sales have been booming, and
profits too. But it does need to prepare for the fast-approaching elec-
tric future.
Deliveries of the fastest-ever Lamborghini start late this year. De-
spite the steep price tag, the waiting list stretches already way into
2026. And expect it to be joined by a convertible version.
There will soon be a hybrid version of the Urus, and the late-2024
replacement for the Huracan will also be a hybrid (it’s also set to use a Surely the
angle at
much-modified version of the Revuelto tub). Beyond that, all-electric which it was
Lamborghinis beckon, and the V12 will have to go. But not yet. Right conceived?
now, it’s raging gloriously against the dying of the light.

84 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 LAMBORGHINI REVUELTO
P R I C E From £450,000 (est)
P O W E R T R A I N 3.8kWh battery,
6498cc 48v V12 plus three e-motors,
PHEV, eight-speed dual-clutch auto,
all-wheel drive
P E R F O R M A N C E 1001bhp @
9250rpm, 1161lb ft @ 6750rpm,
2.5sec 0-62mph, 217mph
E F F I C I E N C Y n/a
W E I G H T 1437kg (tbc)
O N S A L E Now

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 85

Giant
test

AT
THE DEFINITIVE VERDICT

THE

86 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 PEUGEOT 408 I KIA EV6 I CUPRA FORMENTOR

CROSS

ROADS
Bring more punctuation! We’re testing the bodystyle-fluid
new Peugeot 408 against similarly genre-busting rivals
from Cupra and Kia, as petrol meets hybrid meets EV
Words Gavin Green Photography Charlie Magee

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 87

 Giant test: Peugeot 408 vs rivals
he SUV just keeps on evolving and
multiplying. We now have SUV
coupes (never mind they invariably
have four doors, not two); we have
SUV fastbacks (more or less a big
hatchback on stilts); there are luxury
SUVs; and there’s the increasingly
popular sports SUV (a tautology as
well as an oxymoron: utility vehicles
may be brutishly fast but they can
never be sporty). Plus, there are end-
less crossovers – SUVs that looks less
like armoured personnel carriers and
more inflated hatchbacks, with just a hint of 4x4 tough-guy padding.
And now we have a new Peugeot 408 that, says its maker, is a
‘new breed of car’. In as much as it can be pigeonholed at all, it is an
SUV/estate/crossover/hatchback/coupe/fastback. In essence, it’s a
low-roofed SUV with the styling swagger of a sports estate. Its design
has more in common with a sports Jaguar than an SUV Jeep.
It’s also unusually lengthy of bonnet and long of tail, to highlight
its streamlined style. Yet it has SUV space, SUV body armour and
elevated ground clearance – but not the commanding second-storey
view afforded by most big SUVs.
So it’s a bit of an outlier. It doesn’t even have Peugeot’s traditional
‘double 0’ SUV nomenclature. Yet if we look around our big and dis-
parate car market, it’s not hard to find like-minded rivals – such as
Cupra’s ‘SUV coupe’ Formentor.
The Formentor is Cupra’s first stand-alone model (as opposed to a
tarted-up Seat). Many people will have no more idea about the For-
mentor name than they do about Cupra. But the hardcore cyclist in
me knows it's a peninsula and tough climb in northern Majorca (I’ve
cycled up it, to the historic lighthouse at the tip of the peninsula). As
an SUV coupe, the Cupra Formentor is lower and more stylish than
your average 4x4, and most iterations – including our test car’s plug-
in hybrid powertrain – offer better than average performance, too.
Our final protagonist makes no claims to being an SUV. Rather,
the Kia EV6 is an electric crossover, a recent Giant Test winner
(against Ford Mustang Mach-E and Volkswagen ID. 4) and one of our
favourite EVs. Its dimensions are very similar to the 408’s – almost
identical length and width, albeit with much shorter overhangs –
and it’s just a few inches higher.
Like the Peugeot, the EV6 is a striking looking car: if Kia tagged it
an electric fastback SUV, few would demur. Its price, as tested, is very
similar to the Cupra’s, and its performance – 0-62mph in 7.3sec – is
almost identical.
What gives this confrontation some added spice is that the three
protagonists use different powertrains. The 408 is available with two
408 lacks rivals’
pace but shines
in other ways
88 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
different PHEV units, and a conventional 1.2-litre petrol. An electric
version comes next year. We’ve chosen the 1.2. It may be the least
powerful 408 and the slowest on paper. But experience has shown it’s
the most fun to drive and the Allure Premium version comes with a
very decent spec.
The Formentor is also available as a non-hybrid, front-drive model,
and the normal 1.5-litre TSI 150 is one of our favourite versions. To-
day, we’ve plumped for the top-spec e-Hybrid, the 245. Its 1.4 petrol
engine and supplementary e-motor have a combined output of
242bhp. The Cupra brand prioritises performance and sportiness,
and if you want a Formentor plug-in hybrid, then it gets no faster or
sportier than this: 0-62mph is covered in 7.0 seconds.
So it’s combustion engine versus PHEV versus EV, as well as Peuge-
ot versus Cupra versus Kia, and fastback SUV versus coupe SUV ver-
sus crossover.
We start in the Peugeot. It’s a head-turner, from its distinctive
bluff Peugeot nose complete with ‘fang shaped’ (Peugeot’s words)
front light signature to its ‘three clawed’ (and again) rear lights. Peu-
geot even refers to the aero appendages at the top of the rear pillars as
‘cat’s ears’. (You can see the feline styling theme.) It’s long and stream-
lined but fussy around the rear. Handsome? Not to my eyes. It tries
just a bit too hard to be contrarian, but at least it looks different.
Inside it is largely familiar to anyone acquainted with the 308
hatch – and that’s no bad thing. The dashboard is the same: angular,
sharp edged, nicely finished and furnished, and complete with a
handsome and easy-to-use 10-inch centre touchscreen. There’s Peu-
geot’s small steering wheel, over which the instruments peek. The
upside is sharper and more alert steering. The downside is partially
sighted instrumentation. It’s a big car and feels it. The rear seems to
end a long way back and visibility behind you isn’t good. At least
there’s a rear parking camera.
The 1.2 triple doesn’t deliver sparkling performance – 0-62mph in
10.4sec is easily the slowest figure here. Yet it’s perfectly adequate and
as long as you don’t mind rowing through the gears and revving the
tuneful little engine, it can motor along nicely.
Our meeting point is the Peak District, one of England’s famed
beauty spots, and great for driving. It was England’s first national
park, 555 square miles of brown-and-green patchwork uplands,
crisscrossed by some of this island’s best driving roads. Manchester,
Derby and Sheffield are all close, but our Grand Day Out is on a
Monday in late winter, and the hope is that the tourists from nearby
cities will stay away. Apart from some ramblers and cyclists, they do.
The Peak District – famous as a setting for Pride and Prejudice, Last
of the Summer Wine and Wordsworth poetry – is about four hours
and 200 miles north of London, so the evening before our early-
morning rendezvous I drive up the M1, destination the Huntsman
Inn just outside Holmfirth. On the M1, the 408 impresses with its ⊲
Touch-sensitive
buttons in 408
work just fine
THE 408 MAY THINK IT’S AN
OUTLIER, BUT IT’S NOT HARD
TO FIND LIKE-MINDED RIVALS

Saloons and
estates currently
out of favour.
Hence… this

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 89

408’s a lot like
a 308 inside,
and a useful
bit roomier

90 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 Giant test: Peugeot 408 vs rivals

THE EV6 ISN’T WELL SUITED TO

AN EARLY RENDEZVOUS THAT
INVOLVES LONG DISTANCES

Clean lines
of the EV6
continue to
turn heads
Hybrid
promises more
than it delivers
easy-going gait, its comfort and refinement. Apple CarPlay connects
seamlessly, the touchscreen works well and looks good, and so do the
touch-sensitive keys underneath for the various menus. The seat af-
fords no aches after four hours of sitting, punctuated only by a quick
stop after the sat-nav (two hours in) urges me to take a break.
A quick look behind the driver reveals a cavernous back seat with
legroom to spare, and a huge boot (choose the PHEV, and the hybrid
battery pack raises the floor, reducing boot height). There’s nothing
clever about the rear seats – they fold conventionally 60:40, and nor
do they slide or recline. Headroom is fine for six-foot me, but tight for
anyone taller. I arrive in a relaxed frame of mind to find the Hunts-
man Inn full of Sunday diners, enjoying roasts and red wine.
Next day, fog clings to the moorland. I edge gingerly through the
mist to our meeting point, near Holme Moss summit, 1719ft high,
the border of West Yorkshire and Derbyshire, and home of the high-
est transmission station in England.
Jake Groves turns up in the Formentor after his early start from
Peterborough, 122 miles distant. Despite starting his PHEV journey
with a full charge and using the built-in sat-nav to best manage the
battery, he reports a disappointing fuel figure of 41.8mpg to Holme
Moss. The non-hybrid Peugeot is averaging better (41.3). By the end of
the day, the Cupra’s mpg has dipped to 36.3. (Officially, the e-Hybrid
245 Formentor is supposed to average 176.6-188.3mpg, once again
showing how nonsensical PHEV official fuel figures are – unless you
do short journeys and always start with a full charge. Real-world
electric-only range is about 25 miles: officially it’s 34.)
Martin Fitz-Gibbons has drawn the short straw: he’s in the
pure-electric Kia. Now, as we shall see, there’s not much wrong with
the EV6. But there’s plenty wrong with an early rendezvous that in-
volves long distances and an electric car.
He has to stop and charge, but fortunately the InstaVolt charging
station in Sheffield is working fine and after 34.36kWh is delivered in
44 minutes (cost: £25.77), Martin is on his merry way. Mind you, the
claimed 120kW charger is delivering its juice at well under half its
potential. Why do EV public charging stations so frequently disap-
point? And, of course, if Martin had been in the 408 he would have
been in and out with a full tank (and almost 500 miles of range) in
five minutes. You do sometimes wonder which is the new tech…
I’ll be honest, at this stage of our Giant Test and its Battle of the
Powertrains I am prepared to give premature victory to the good
old-fashioned combustion contender; fast to refuel and better mpg
than the PHEV.
We climb down off that Pennine peak and the fog clears. The Peak
District opens up into sun-kissed gentle folding hills of tawny brown
and wintry green hues. I swap into the Formentor. It is a pleasant
change after the good but rather anodyne-driving Peugeot.
The Cupra feels like a sports hatch. Nice chunky perforated leath-
er-rimmed steering wheel, low seating for an SUV, driving position
just-so – including perfect alignment of steering wheel and pedals
(the Kia’s are noticeably askew). Classy sporty cabin, a notch above ⊲

▼
PR E - F LI G HT B R I E F I N G I PE U G E OT 4 0 8

⊲ Why is it here?
Another attempt to reinvent
and add spice to the SUV/
crossover, the 408 is long,
low and lithe – at least by
SUV standards. It’s intended
to look new while ticking the
traditional Peugeot boxes –
roomy, comfortable riding,
good to drive, and practical.
Peugeot claims it’s a new
type of car. Think of it as part
sports estate and part SUV,
and you get the picture.
⊲ Any clever stuff?
The stand-out novelty is the
head-turning style and its
unusual dimensions:
stretched bonnet and long
flowing fastback tail. Tech
includes Peugeot’s familiar
i-Cockpit, with a clear and
intuitive 10-inch touchscreen
and small steering wheel, for
added agility. There’s also
adaptive cruise control, night
vision – warning of animals,
pedestrians or cyclists – and
long-range (75-metre) blind
spot monitoring.
 
⊲ Which version is this?
We could have chosen one of
two plug-in hybrid units, but
we’ve plumped for the
nicest-to-drive 408: the
conventional turbo petrol-
powered 1.2L, in mid-range
Allure Premium spec. It’s also
the best-value 408. If
company car tax is important,
the plug-in hybrids – with
their unrealistically high
official mpg figures and
unrealistically low official
CO2 figures – might make
financial sense.

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 91

 Latest evolution
of the Peugeot
nose: very
angry indeed

Hints of SUV,
but without
handling-
harming top-
heaviness

92 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 Giant test: Peugeot 408 vs rivals

THE FORMENTOR FEELS LIKE A

SPORTS CAR AFTER THE GOOD
BUT ANODYNE PEUGEOT

the 408, although let’s not forget it’s a higher-spec model. Excellent
thigh-hugging sports seats, and comfortable too. The best here. I like
the copper trim highlights, a Cupra signature. Otherwise the trim is
coal-hole VW Group black, and that’s fine by me. A good day to
The Cupra brand may be new, but it feels like a properly mature leave the Ariel
at home
product – as well it might, given the platform (shared with the Golf
and Seat Ateca, among others) is several years old. Steering is reassur-
ingly alert and body control is more composed than on the longer
408. The ride errs on the side of firm, which is great for sweeping over
moorland roads. On such surfaces, the Cupra has the best, and most
entertaining, chassis here. On the motorway, it’s better to go by 408.
The Cupra’s ride jolts, even in its softest chassis setting.
Push the button at the bottom of the steering wheel and scroll
through the powertrain and chassis settings. Normal is best for most
uses, Cupra (the sportiest) too harsh for pockmarked UK B-roads.
The engine growls menacingly in Cupra mode, as an artificial
five-cylinder engine note is piped through the (four-cylinder car’s)
speakers. It’s an entertaining drive for a 1.7-tonne SUV, by some
margin the most enjoyable car of this bunch for winding and undu- Slick screens
lating Peak District roads. good; stowage
space great
There are two significant caveats. The PHEV powertrain cycles
smoothly between petrol and electric modes when driven gently or
around town. But push on and it becomes indecisive. This is a com-
mon PHEV malady in spirited driving, as the electronic brain tries to Steering wheels are for steering – not for reconfiguring the dash, an-
balance battery versus piston power. The upshot is a jerky drive and swering the phone or for firming the dampers. McLaren is one of the
poor throttle response. few car makers to understand this. Anyway, the Formentor is espe-
Much of the fun of driving evaporates if the powertrain does not cially bad, with a steering-wheel button arrangement that baffles
precisely follow your throttle pedal commands. You feel detached this old motoring journalist and equally baffles young Jake Groves.
from the driving experience. On the PHEV Formentor, the throttle Unambitious tasks, like switching on the speed limiter, can be a sev-
pedal is not your driving friend. eral-step process, notes Jake. The infotainment is less intuitive than
PHEVs can also suffer from mushy brake feel, and in this area the the 408’s and takes some practice. Elsewhere in the cabin, we find
Cupra isn’t bad. Pedal feel is firm, although more feel would still be good rear seat and boot space, although it’s less commodious than
welcome. There’s decent power, though. Use e-boost – floor it, and the longer 408 (or the EV6).
the e-motor gives you everything it’s got – and the acceleration is I was looking forward to driving an EV6 again. I last drove one in
surprisingly brisk. It feels like more than 242bhp. So, if driving enjoy- the summer of ’22. The EV6 GT-Line S was one of the best cars I
ment is a priority, go for a non-hybrid Formentor, which also means a drove all year and, along with the spectacularly styled Audi e-Tron
useful weight saving, and that boosts agility. GT, the best EV. I prefer the cheaper Air RWD version, as tested: its
The other big frustration is all those buttons on the steering wheel. handling balance is sweeter than the all-wheel-drive GT-Line, it’s a ⊲

▼
PR E - F LI G HT B R I E F I N G I CU PR A FO R M E NTO R

⊲ Why is it here? ⊲ Any clever stuff? ⊲ Which version is this?

The Peugeot may straddle
car segments, but the
nearest conventional class is
the SUV coupe, where one of
the very best is the Cupra
Formentor. Like many current
Cupras, the Formentor offers
a surprisingly engaging drive.
Performance is good too,
especially in the top-end
242bhp hybrid (as tested)
and 306bhp 2.0-litre petrol
versions.
In keeping with its sports
character, the Formentor has
a twin-clutch DSG gearbox
rather than a conventional
automatic. It’s a well spec’d
car and includes adjustable
dampers ranging from
Comfort to hardcore Cupra
– which also artificially pipes
in, via the speakers, exhaust
howl from a five-cylinder
engine. The voice control of
the operating system is
woken up by hollering ‘hola,
hola’. It may help improve
your Spanish but, as with
most voice systems, it’s a bit
hit and miss.
There’s a big range of
Formentors, from 1.5-litre TSI
(sweet to drive, if not terribly
fast), to max-attack 306bhp
four-wheel-drive 2.0 turbo.
We’ve chosen the sportiest
plug-hybrid, the e-Hybrid
245, in upper-spec VZ2
guise. It uses the familiar 1.4
VW group petrol engine, and
supplementary electric
motor, for a combined power
output of 242bhp.

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 93

 Giant test: Peugeot 408 vs rivals
Cupra’s seats
excellent and
driving position
the most sporty
⊲ Why is it here?
It may not think of itself as an
SUV coupe, but the EV6’s
proportions are very similar
to both the Formentor and,
even more so, the 408. It’s
also sportier than its
platform-sharing Hyundai
Ioniq 5 sister car – firmer of
suspension and sharper to
steer. Plus, like its rivals here,
the EV6 is a striking looking
car, and lower than the
crossover norm.
94 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
Dual-clutch
transmission
does the Cupra
few favours
▼
PR E - F LI G HT B R I E F I N G I K I A E V6
⊲ Any clever stuff?
The EV6 is one of the most
advanced electric cars on
sale, and one of our favourite
EVs. Of special note is its
800-volt architecture, a
technology also found on the
Porsche Taycan. The
advantages are manifold,
from faster charging to
lighter cabling and less heat
build-up. Using a 350kW
charger, you boost the
77.4kWh battery from 10 to
AFTER THE FORMENTOR AND
408, THE EV6 FEELS LIKE YOU’VE
STEPPED A DECADE FORWARD
little lighter, and it’s better value. Its lower power output (single
e-motor, not dual motor) is neither here nor there, and there is a
modest boost to its range.
It’s a fine-looking car, at least to my eyes. Cleanly styled (unlike the
408), ultra-modern, head turning: a new breed of car, and it looks it.
It is of course a bespoke EV (Kia’s first), without all the compromises
that plague EVs that start life as combustion cars. (Such as the Niro
EV and Soul EV, and the upcoming e-408.)
It’s easily the most spacious inside and has the highest quality inte-
rior. The seats are handsome, comfortable and slightly spongy. The
cabin is classy, seemingly minimalist (though in fact buzzing with
gadgets) and practical – including a huge storage bin under the float-
ing centre console. There are two curved 12.3-inch screens, for digital
dials (in front of the driver) and the central infotainment touch-
screen. Touch-sensitive toggles below the screen allow easy adjust-
ment of heating, ventilation and audio.
After the 408 and the Formentor, you step into the EV6 and feel
you’ve stepped a decade forward.
It’s not as communicative as the Formentor on the snaking Peak
District roads, and you don’t buy an EV6 for driving fun. The steering
– by a rather retro padded oval-rimmed wheel – doesn’t talk to you
like the Cupra’s, and it’s not as pointy as the 408’s. It steers without
feel but does so smoothly and predictably.
The chassis doesn’t telegraph the road’s bumps and yumps as
richly as the communicative Cupra, but nor does it float like the
softly sprung 408. Rather, it smothers bumps with its bulk (like all
EVs, the Kia is heavy at a smidgen under two tonnes), its chassis
competence and its rather balloon-like tyres. It’s more like an express
train than a plaything as it silently charges over the moors. It also
feels – like most new-breed EVs – pretty damn fast. It accelerates
smoothly and briskly, with distinctive jet-engine-like whine, and it
just keeps charging as the e-motor spins ever higher. Select Sport
mode, and it gets keener and more hyperactive. Normal mode is,
however, just fine.
The EV6 is sharper and sportier than the sister Hyundai Ioniq 5 –
but it’s hardly a sporting car. Rather, it’s quiet, comfortable, fast and
relaxed as it powers over the roof of England. Okay, it could be more
fun, but there really isn’t much not to like. ⊲
version, our favourite EV6. It
handles more sweetly, with
more rear-drive bias, than the
pricier and posher all-wheel-
drive GT-Line models.
There’s less power – 226bhp
versus 321 for the twin-motor
version. Performance,
however, is perfectly
80 per cent in just 18 minutes adequate – 0-62mph in
– usefully quicker than most. 7.3sec. The upside is a longer
  range – 328 miles (the official
⊲ Which version is this? combined figure) is one of
It’s the basic rear-drive Air the best in class.
 Cupra at its
best when
driving gets
more dynamic

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 95

 Giant test: Peugeot 408 vs rivals

PEUGEOT 408 & RIVALS THE DETAILS

PEUGEOT KIA CUPRA
408 EV6 FORMENTOR

AFFORDABILIT Y

WE SAY... £32,175 (1.2L Allure Premium)
The Peugeot is the (£32,890 as tested)
most affordable Representative PCP £672 (36
and this 1.2 Allure payments), £4k deposit, 10k
Premium is the miles per year, 8.9% APR
best 408 to drive Typical approved-used value
n/a (too new)
£45,245 (Air) £42,525 (e-Hybrid 245 VZ2)
(£45,245 as tested) (£43,120 as tested)
Representative PCP £760 Representative PCP £530 (35
(37 payments), £4.5k deposit, payments), £8.5k deposit, 10k
10k miles per year, 4.32% APR miles per year, 8.2% APR
Typical approved-used value Typical approved-used value
£43k (10k miles)  £36k (10k miles)

POWERTRAIN

WE SAY... Powertrain 1199cc 12v turbo Engine 77.4kWh battery, Engine 12.8kWh battery,
Electric vs PHEV three-cylinder single e-motor 1395cc turbo four plus e-motor
vs petrol… a battle Transmission Eight-speed Transmission Single-speed, Transmission Seven-speed
of the powertrains automatic, front-wheel drive rear-wheel drive DSG, front-wheel drive

PERFORMANCE

WE SAY... Power 128bhp @ 5500rpm Power 226bhp Power 242bhp @ 5000rpm

Cupra is sportiest Torque 171lb ft @ 1750rpm Torque 258lb ft Torque 295lb ft @ 1550rpm
all-round, with Top speed 130mph Top speed 114mph Top speed 130mph
quickest 0-62 time 0-62mph 10.4sec 0-62mph 7.3sec 0-62mph 7.0sec

B O D Y/ C H A S S I S

WE SAY... Structure Steel Structure Steel Structure Steel

Kia and Peugeot Weight 1392kg Weight 1985kg Weight 1701kg
very similar in Suspension MacPherson strut Suspension MacPherson struts Suspension MacPherson strut
length and width. front, twist-beam axle rear front, multi-link rear front, multi-link rear
Cupra the smallest, Length/width/height Length/width/height Length/width/height
and feels it 4687mm/1848/1478mm 4680/1880/1550mm 4450mm/1839/1510mm
Boot capacity 536 litres Boot capacity 490 litres Boot capacity 345 litres
(+ 52-litre frunk)
EFFICIENCY

WE SAY... Official consumption Official consumption 3.76 Official consumption

Long-distance 41.0-48.1mpg miles per kWh 176.6-188.3mpg
driving and – Tested consumption 41.3mpg Tested consumption 3.2 miles Tested consumption 36.3mpg
surprise, surprise Official range 550 miles per kWh Official range n/a
– the PHEV Tested range 473 miles Official range 328 miles Tested range 345 miles
disappoints Emissions 136g/km CO2 Tested range 290 miles Emissions 33g/km CO2
Emissions 0g/km CO2

96 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023


FINAL RECKONING
LET’S GO
ALL THE
WAY
The decision to award last place was much tougher
than deciding a winner. To be frank, neither the Cu-
pra nor the Peugeot deserves the wooden spoon.
They’re both good cars, and both have their appeal.
If you want a car to ply the motorway, city to city,
the 408 is the best car here. It’s more composed and
relaxing than the firmer-riding Formentor. And its
quick splash-and-dash petrol refuelling gives it a clear
practicality advantage over the Kia (although the EV6
is even quieter and more refined, and by slow-refuel-
ling EV standards it can charge lightning fast).
On the other hand, the Cupra is the sportiest car
here. It has the best chassis, seats and steering, espe-
cially noticeable on the Peak District’s challenging
roads. Its PHEV powertrain also delivers decent
punch. Alas, its jerkiness and iffy throttle response
relegate it down our rankings. Its DSG gearbox – more
At face value,
kindred spirits.
On the road,
clear differences
efficient than an auto, but often jumpier – probably
doesn’t help. For driving enjoyment, we’d suggest a 1st
non-PHEV Formentor.
So the Peugeot narrowly takes silver from the Cu- KIA EV6
pra. It’s an eye-catching car, spacious and comfortable. Great style inside and
Its SUV/crossover genes may – finally – persuade Brit- out, good to drive and
ish buyers to love a big Peugeot again. It’s also pleasant top tech. A generation
to drive, has a nice interior, and is reasonably agile for ahead of these rivals
a big car. Its overall fuel economy on test was also bet- ★★★★★
ter than the hybrid Cupra’s – no real surprise to us on
2nd
a test of well over 400 miles, but certainly contrary to
the green gospel.
The Kia is a class apart. It’s the most strikingly
styled, has the most spacious and comfortable interi- PEUGEOT 408
or, and the best cabin design and furnishings. It’s fast Roomy, comfortable,
and has much more pleasing throttle response than striking to the eye and
the PHEV Cupra: smooth, instant torque and rapid. good to drive. A
Like all EVs it’s too weighed down by its batteries to quirky and appealing
offer the agility necessary for truly responsive driving. SUV alternative
Yet it’s still very satisfying to drive. It’s beautifully ★★★★★
composed, even on challenging roads. It’s eerily quiet,
3rd
the smooth and silent mile eater. Its speedy silence
brings a smile. Floor it, especially from low speed, and
your smile will get even broader.
It’s also one of the world’s best EVs, another sign CUPRA FORMENTOR
that – of all the oily car makers – it is the Koreans who Top-notch SUV coupe
best challenge dominant Tesla. Its realistic 300-mile that’s good to drive.
range appeals, its fast charging another bonus. It also Let down by its
feels like you’re driving the future, not the past. And indecisive PHEV
there’s something very satisfying about that. ★★★★★
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 97
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 MISSION
CREEP
How did the M2 get to be so heavy
and expensive? And does that stop
it being M division’s most fun car?
Words Ben Barry

100 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

New BMW M2 driven

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 101

Auto 0.2sec
quicker than
manual, but
both live for
the bends

his should be M2 heaven. I’m heading

into the hills on Route 89A in Arizona,
and the desert landscape is giving way
to evergreens standing proud of
fast-thawing snowfall, residual salt
wisping over bone-dry roads that trace
the mountainous topography. Big on
corners, low on straights, it’s the kind
of road the M2 is built for.
Or at least the old one was. I’m in the longer, heavier new version,
and have spent a morning finding that it has excellent straight-line
stability at speed. But now, in the hills, I’m relieved and astonished at
how reactive the front end feels, jinking left and right to tiny steering
adjustments like it’s trying to wrong-foot its own reflection – the ra-
tio’s carried over, the wheelbase some 5cm longer, but it feels more
alert, and backs that up with way more front-end bite.
Select Sport and there’s a little more chop to the ride, but ‘consist-
ent’ is the more appropriate adjective – the M2 settles out of com-
pressions like a gymnast nailing a perfect landing, and the steering is
so pure and free of kickback that you can commit to a line with total
confidence. Given similar stick, the previous M2 felt clumsier.
It all goads you to dig into the throttle early. When you do, the rear
end stands to attention like a drill sergeant reporting for duty – the
diff tightening, alert to the throttle and ready to be driven hard while
you work against monster traction. It feels a more playful, nimbler
M3. I’d have guessed it was much lighter.
Carbon
But it’s not. The new G87-generation M2 is 11cm longer, 150kg
buckets heavier and some £15k costlier than its predecessor at £66,430 (or
are extras £65,885 for the paddleshift auto). It’s an important car for BMW, as
the previous one was both M’s most affordable car and its best seller,
shifting almost 60,000 units over a seven-year run.

102 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023


It arrives at exactly the same time as a dia- THE M2 SETTLES
metrically opposed M product, the XM, a
monstrous plug-in hybrid SUV, which you OUT OF
can read about in First Drives. The M2, by COMPRESSIONS
contrast, is a rear-drive sports coupe that
evokes the original M3, then asks that you
L I K E A G Y M N A S T hardware
pay £545 extra for a manual gearbox. NAILING A
First impressions say it looks like Lego PERFECT
Technic made a model of the previous one,
but I do warm to the bold design, although
LANDING
the rear is very angle sensitive. Beyond that it
feels really mature, which probably isn’t on your M2 bingo card if
you’ve driven the at times thuggish previous model.
You sit pretty low in a cabin that feels broader than a 33mm in-
crease in overall width suggests, ensconced in comfortable M Sport
seats whose pillowy bolsters grip you snugly about the middle. Your
legs are dead ahead, the leather steering wheel nice to squeeze if
something of a chubber, the M2’s driving position easy to bend to
anatomical peculiarities. (The rear seats force six-footers to crouch
like Gollum, though a 5cm increase in wheelbase does give you more
room than before, plus the boot’s very generous.)  M3 rubber under its arches). The Michelin Pilot Sport 4S tyres we’re
Overall quality feels high, with BMW’s Curved Display infotain-
ment system the centre of attention, amping up the slick, modernist
feel. It’s your gateway to a light-years more configurable M2 than
we’ve previously known – steering, dampers, throttle, brakes, ESC…
all of it can be tweaked from here, plus there’s 10-stage traction con- the M2 handles.
trol, even software to rate your drifts. Thankfully preferences can be
stored in the M1 and M2 red missile launchers on the steering wheel.
Press the little red starter button and you wake a double-turbo six 11kg. Shame that’s a drop in the ocean when the M2 weighs 150kg
that purrs through quad exhaust outlets, smooth and warm like vel-
vet straight from the tumbler. The 3.0-litre unit makes 454bhp –
New BMW M2 driven
Slightly
roomier, but
still tight in the
back for adults
49bhp up on the last M2, 49bhp shy of the latest M3/M4 twins – with
torque unchanged at 406lb ft. Depress the clutch, slot first gear – yep,
manual – and we’re away. Highway 17 cuts through parched scrub-
land with endless vistas, the speed limit 75mph but everyone’s crack-
ing on – even a Ford Super Duty towing a trailer full of cattle drafts
me – so I leave the M2 in sixth, dip into easy torque reserves and it
surges with that small car/big engine pep. Whoosh.
The last M2 felt quite raw, with a choppier ride on fixed dampers
and a decent fizz of road noise, but this replacement is full of doughy
compliance on adaptive dampers in Comfort mode, snuffs out extra-
neous noise and elevates the underplayed if gorgeously smooth
straight-six tone higher in the mix (BMW does a lairier exhaust with
triple outlets like a space shuttle if you want more attitude).
This car’s so stable that when I briefly release the steering through
a long corner, it holds its line, self-centring naturally if only gently.
No, it’s not big on feel, but it’s pure, consistent and – in Sport mode –
nicely weighted. The current M3 and M4 exude a similar calm.
Quite a different character, then, for
BMW’s ‘funnest’ model, but the formula is a
straight lift from both its predecessor and
the 2011 1-series M that set this ball in motion
– namely M3/M4 drivetrain and suspension
shoehorned in a more compact,
more affordable sports coupe. Though be-
coming longer than an early-’00s E46 M3 and
increasing in price by around £15k does make
it significantly less compact and affordable
than before.
Over lunch in Prescott, project leader
Markus Schröder explains the new S58 engine is identical to the M3
and M4, if detuned to 454bhp by a calibration change, and that the
guiding principle was always relative simplicity – all-wheel drive was
never on the radar, the manual option never off it, he says.
There’s the same hand-me-down logic for this M2 as the previous
model, including a damper tune lifted from the M3 Touring, but this
time the parts-bin commonality extends to the same rubber, same
compound as the M3/M4 Competition, with 275-section 19s on the
front and 285-section 20s for the rear (the last M2 couldn’t squeeze
driving on are standard, though sticky Cup 2s are also available.
A web of bracing strait-jackets the engine much like the larger M
model, and there’s all-new bracing in the body sides next to the rear
suspension turrets. Schröder credits this as being pivotal to the way
UK-spec cars get a carbonfibre roof – an M2 first, and one that
saves 6kg. Optional (less comfortable) carbon buckets save a further
more than its predecessor at 1700kg, basically matching the signifi-
cantly larger M4. This means power-to-weight barely improves ⊲
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 103
 BMW M2
P R I C E £66,430 (£65,885 auto)
P O W E R T R A I N 2993cc 24v
twin-turbo six-cylinder, six-speed
manual, rear-wheel drive
P E R F O R M A N C E 454bhp @
6250rpm, 406lb ft @ 2650rpm,
4.3sec 0-62mph, 155mph (limited)
W E I G H T 1700kg
E F F I C I E N C Y 27.7-29.1mpg,
218-231g/km CO2
★★★★★

104 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 New BMW M2 driven

Auto’s fine,
but manual
gives the full M
WATCH experience
THE VIDEO!
HEAD TO THE CAR
MAGAZINE
YOUTUBE
CHANNEL

SOME OF THE R AW
HONESTY AND
CO M PAC TN E S S O F TH E
OLD CAR IS GONE

over the last M2 – even if this is still healthy performance.

Lunch wolfed, I head into the mountains to see if there’s more to
the M2 than just big-car sophistication. As the road climbs up into
the snowline, meltwater occasionally streaking over the dry surface,
six-piston brakes whiffing a little if still doing the business, it be-
comes clear the answer is ‘yes’.
If performance felt ho-hum in a straight line, a twistier road like
this reveals a surplus, and brings into sharp focus what a leap this S58
engine is over the old S55. Drive quickly and you’ll instinctively want
to hold out for higher revs rather than short shift, the turbo delivery
building into something closer to the old M feeling.
No question the auto is the more accomplished and versatile part-
ner here, with silky manners in town and crisp shifts when you’re
clicking at the paddles, but I’m fond of the manual.
It’s no benchmark for slickness, and in traffic you’ll need a deft
touch if you’re to avoid making a hash of it, as the clutch is reasonably
meaty, with a relatively high biting point, and the shift demands a
positive action. But that’s part of the art and up here, away from the
stop and the start, it all clicks – positive clutch, tight throw, pedal
placement by people who heel-and-toe their way the supermarket.
(Plus there’s an auto throttle-blip function to spare your blushes.)
Piece it all together and you squeeze the brake and blip the throttle
on the downchange, roll the M2 hard into a corner, then smear lines
over the surface on the way out (love the thundery trill when you
snap shut the throttle, too). I just wish this otherwise excellent en-
gine was more responsive below 3000rpm – it takes longer to wake
up the M2’s playful balance than I’d like.
I can gripe, but the fact is I really enjoyed driving the M2, certainly
more so than the previous F87 model. Some of the raw honesty and
compactness of that car is gone, and the new one weighs and costs
too much, but the G87 is the more polished and better resolved ma-
chine – exciting and incredibly capable when you’re driving for fun,
surprisingly refined and sophisticated when you just want miles to
melt away. It’d make an awesome daily driver, plus there’s a load of
capacity to crank up the pace and the sense of connection on those
inevitable even hotter models.
A lot’s new – In an era where it must share a stage with a plug-in hybrid SUV, the
but so much
is the same or new M2 feels like a more grown-up version of a reassuringly familiar
even better formula, an evolution at a time of radical reinvention. I’ll take mine
with the manual gearbox, please.

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 105

minibus/SUV/car/van that’s smaller inside than outside. By Ben Pulman

H E LLO V W MULTIVAN + GOODBYE FORD MUSTANG MACH 1

& L AN D ROVE R DE FE N DE R + AUD I E -TRON GT G ETS A WALLBOX

106 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 Enter the
un-Tardis
A minibus/SUV/car/van that’s smaller
inside than outside. By Ben Pulman
VW Multivan Style
1.4 eHybrid
Month 1
The story so far
VW helps the MPV live on,
masquerading as a van
+ Big
- Is it really that big?
Logbook
Price £59,035 (£63,979 as
tested) Performance 13kWh
battery, 1395cc turbocharged
four-cylinder plus e-motor, PHEV,
215bhp, 9.0sec 0-62mph,
120mph Efficiency 156.9mpg
(official), 86.6mpg (tested), 41g/
km CO2 Energy cost 12.0p per
mile Miles this month 97
Total miles 4754
No one could be more excited
about the arrival of the VW
Multivan into the Pulman
household than our two-year-
old son, whose favourite toy is a
two-tone Duplo camper van
that is pushed ceaselessly
around his playroom. The fact a
full-size equivalent now sits
outside on our driveway has
blown his little mind. Con-
versely, no one could be less ex-
cited about the arrival of the
Multivan into our household
than my wife, who with utter
dismay questions why we have
a two-tone single-decker bus.
Myself? The arrival of the
Multivan seemingly promises a
wealth of health, fitness and
Room for seven… if
Jordan Butters
they leave most of lifestyle opportunities: I could
their gear behind put my bike in it, or my paddle-
board, then go places and do
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 107
Hello
things. Then again, I might not.
I barely use my bike, and the
paddleboard is inflatable and
fits in a big backpack – and so in
truth hasn’t been awaiting the
arrival of a van before it can
swing into action.
But the space!
What space? The Multivan
comes with seven seats as
standard, and with them all in
place, the boot (stacked to the
roof) is 469 litres. Want more
luggage capacity? The seats
don’t fold into the floor. Instead
they must be lifted out and
stored somewhere. Meaning
the space I gain in the Multivan
is lost somewhere else inside my
own house.
This then is the conundrum
of the VW Multivan. Compli-
cated somewhat by the fact it’s a
replacement for the Caravelle,
which was based on the Trans-
porter van, and yet it’s now
based on VW’s MQB passenger
car platform. Which makes it
closer in spirit to the defunct
Sharan MPV. So, looks like a
van, hopefully drives like a car,
and offers the practicality of…?
Before we jump to conclu-
sions, we need to zoom in on
the spec of our Multivan. You
can choose from Life or Style
variants, which begin at £43,720
and £55,510 respectively. The
difference is down to a starting
point of a 1.5-litre petrol engine
and 16-inch wheels on the Life,
versus the Style that comes as
standard with a 2.0 TDI and
inch-bigger wheels. It also gains
keyless entry, electric sliding
side doors, an electric tailgate,
an upgraded infotainment sys-
tem, 30 ambient lighting colour
choices, three-zone climate
control, heated front seats, a ⊲
 LIFE OR ST YLE
Multivan prices start at £43,720,
but our Style model immediately
hikes that to £55,510, albeit by
PLUG - IN POWE RTR AIN throwing in everything from
Electrified 1.4-litre petrol is the electric sliding side doors to
priciest powertrain option, but on matrix LED headlights.
paper offers the most performance
and the least emissions.
T W O -T O N E PA I N T
There’s a lot of van to paint, so
even the single-colour metallic
paints are £930. The two
two-tone options are £2700;
aside from our silver and
orange, you can spec
black and burgundy.

No, not the

electric one. No,
not the electric
one. And repeat…

heated windscreen, matrix

LED headlights, Park Assist,
and puddle lights.
Ours is a little pricier still, as
this Style model has something
else courtesy of the MQB plat-
form: a hybrid powertrain.
It’s only a 148bhp/184lb ft
1.4-litre turbocharged petrol
four, but with a 85kW motor
providing an electric boost the
total system output is 215bhp
and 258lb ft.
The 10.4kWh (net) battery
gives an electric-only range of
about 30 miles, which means it
should be enough for the
twice-daily school run before
fully recharging itself every
night within our off-peak tariff.
It’s certainly conceivable that
there will be Multivan eHybrid
owners whose petrol engines
only fire into life twice a year
when the family go on big trips,
and everything else is local and
electric. Maybe.
The downside of opting for
the hybrid version is that, before
anyone is aboard, this Multivan
weighs nearly 2.2 tonnes and
0-62mph takes nine whole sec-
onds. Car-like, you say?
And the fuel tank is a mere 45
litres, so coming to the Multi-
van after life with a diesel Land
Rover Defender that would al-
ways do over 500 miles before
needing a fill, I’m either going to
be plugging in every night or
potentially filling up with pet-
rol quite often.
Beyond the extensive list of
standard equipment on the
Style model, and the eHybrid
powertrain, our Multivan has a
few other standalone options.
There’s a retractable towbar
The hybrid Multivan weighs
nearly 2.2 tonnes and 0-62 takes
nine seconds. Car-like, you say?
with electric release for £900, a
vast panoramic sunroof for
£1050, and an upgrade to the
Discover Pro navigation (for
£294) that adds gesture control,
doubles the media storage to
64GB, and allows the simulta-
neous display of the navigation
map on the digital dials and
navigation screen.   course, and to the VW ID. Buzz,
Finally, there’s the Mono Sil-
ver and Energetic Orange exte-
rior (which also adds the Raven
Black and Sand two-tone inte-
rior upholstery) for a significant
£2700. All in, that makes for a
total of £63,979. Which is quite
a lot, and this Multivan does
without the fancy Harman
Kardon audio, big wheels, adap-
tive dampers, leather-trimmed
heated or cooled seats, or the
optional Long body which adds
200mm to the rear overhang
for £1350.
We’ll compare our van-cum-
car to a Multivan Long in due
which for all its retro camper-
van cues might not be as practi-
cal as it seems.
But importantly, the sum-
mer’s ahead, and we’ve got two
small kids who no longer need
naps in the middle of the day.
Let’s go forth and adventure!

108 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 Our Cars

Because it’s thereabouts Voyage of

If a Defender is Mount Everest, our Skoda Kodiaq vRS is at discovery
least Mount Snowdon. And very nice too. By Mark Walton

2 M O U N TA I N E X C I T E M E N T
The Kodiaq RS is impressive on this
3 A N D D I D T H O S E F E E T… ? kind of sweeping A-road. It’s really
The Pen-y-Gwryd Hotel (aka the just a big 4x4 hot hatch – body control
PyG) at the foot of Snowdon (aka Yr is great, the steering is accurate and
Wyddfa), where Hillary and Tenzing it’s plenty fast.
1 D E F E AT I N G T H E D E F A U LT
trained before going to climb Mount
Every time you get in the vRS it starts
Everest (aka Chomolungma) in 1953.
in Normal mode, with an irritating
background exhaust grumble. Every
4 single journey, I start by switching it to
3 2
the near-silent Comfort mode instead.
5

6 1

Skoda Kodiaq vRS2.0

TSI 245ps DSG 4x4
Month 6

4 ARGH! THE CROWDS! The story so far

View from the top. Snowdon is crazy A loop through Snowdonia to
climb Snowdon brings out the
busy these days, with around 550,000 best in the Skoda
visitors a year, almost double the 6 A MINI ADVE NTURE + Quick and confident, it makes
number a decade ago. If you’re not We drive back to the PyG via rapid progress cross-country
there by 9am, the car parks are full. Beddgelert to create a loop. Forget - It’s so bland, if I close my eyes I
can’t remember what it looks like
the North Coast 500, this is the
Snowdonia 70. But let’s not publicise
Logbook
it – the locals will kill me.
Price £47,690 (£52,585 as
tested) Performance 1984cc
5 H O S E S AT T H E R E A DY turbocharged four-cylinder,
242bhp, 6.6sec 0-62mph,
We meet Pingu, a filthy Snowdonia- 144mph Efficiency 31.7mpg
born ‘Sheepdoodle’. Thankfully the (official), 29.0mpg (tested),
Kodiaq is kitted out with lots of dog 202g/km CO2 Energy cost 23.0p
per mile Miles this month 1172
accessories, including the rubber boot Total miles 8545
mat (£83). What I need is a 12v plug-in
Skoda hair dryer.

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 109


Mild mannered,
softly spoken
James Taylor…
also a pyscho
Gone in a cloud of smoke
Goodbye And just like that, the Mustang Mach 1 departs the CAR fleet (and
destroys its rear tyres). Missing it already. By James Taylor
Over 11 months and 11,000
miles, the novelty never wore
off. Whatever sadnesses or joys
life has brought, the Mach 1 has
always made me smile.
A rumbly V8 and a larger-
than-life character are both big
parts of its appeal, but there’s a
very adept car beneath it all.
Long-distance comfort; cul-
tured road manners; surprising
practicality; dynamically re-
warding. The Mustang has a
reputation for being a bit of a
blunt instrument but I love the
Mach 1’s steering, suspension
and balance, even if it does need
a careful hand in the wet.
You’ll struggle to buy an un-
used Mach 1, as the next-gener-
ation Mustang is imminent.
Much to my own surprise, I’ve
been trying to do some dodgy
man-maths that will justify
making Ford an offer to buy
this very car – I’m really dread-
110 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
ing its departure that much.
Despite my best efforts, I just
can’t make it add up.
But it was a tough decision,
and not a straightforward head
vs heart dispute, as there is
plenty about the Mustang that
is perfectly rational and sensi-
ble. Issues with our test car have
been few and far between: a flat
battery in a tyre-pressure moni-
tor; Apple CarPlay stopped
playing ball; it needed an early
oil change; and the bare metal
areas of the brakes have sported
unsightly corrosion from the
moment the car arrived with
8066 miles on the clock.
Then again, I’m glad I didn’t
need to pay for replacement
tyres, having bid farewell to
both car and its rear Michelins
by testing the burnout-enabling
Line Lock function for the first
and last time.
I’ve been more than lucky to
A rumbly V8 and larger-than-
life character are both big
parts of its appeal, but not all
run some remarkable long-
term test cars during my time at
CAR – but of all of them, this is
my favourite. (Favourite main-
stream-ish road car, at least: I’ve
an even deeper bond with the
Radical SR1 racing car I ran for a
season in 2016 and the Ginetta
G40 I used on road and track in
2015, but they’re of a narrower
niche than the Mustang.)
This report is a goodbye both
to the Mustang and from me, as
I’m moving on after being in-
volved in a neat 100 issues (if my
aforementioned dodgy arith-
metic is right).
It’s been a privilege to write
for you and to drive so many
cars that are more than metal
and rubber.
Count the cost
Price new £59,705 Part exchange
£42,337 Cost per mile 25.2p Cost
per mile including depreciation
£1.84
Jordan Butters
Ford Mustang
Mach 1
Month 11
The story so far
Big car with a big character
and big, burbly V8. James is a
big fan
+ Engine; gearbox; handling;
the sheer joy of ‘owning’ and
driving the thing
- Not everyone’s a fan; big (but
wieldy) on UK roads; sub 300-
mile range between fills
Logbook
Price £56,955 (£59,705 as
tested) Performance 5038cc
V8, 454bhp, 4.8sec 0-62mph,
166mph Efficiency 22.8mpg
(official), 19.7mpg (tested),
284g/km CO2 Energy cost
37.2p per mile Miles this
month 1413 Total miles 19,012 

The generation game
Kids still love Lambos. By Tim Pollard
Pore over issues of CAR from
the 1970s and ’80s and you’ll
find a rich seam of supercar
drive stories, as our predeces-
sors took outrageous exotica on
far-flung road trips. A recurring
element was the reportage of
the public meeting the outra-
geous heroes of yesteryear.
Rewind to January 1978.
Lamborghini had just released
an even wilder Countach, the S.
Mazda CX-60 2.5
Homura
Month 4
The story so far
The screen went black, mood
soon followed suit
+ Providing reliable transport
again
- After, that is, a laptop-assisted
jump start
Logbook
Price £48,170 (£52,020 as tested)
Performance 17.8kWh battery,
2488cc four-cylinder plus
e-motor, PHEV, 323bhp, 5.8sec
0-62mph, 124mph Efficiency
188.3mpg (official), 39.5mpg
(tested), 33g/km CO2 Energy
cost 20.0p per mile Miles this
month 1405 Total miles 7231
Geometry class
is outside today
Editor Mel Nichols experienced
its cornering prowess at
184mph, but it was the beguil-
ing cover image of this low-
slung spaceship surrounded by
11 local boys that caught my eye.
Which got me thinking…
Fast-forward 45 years and
here we are in a Northampton-
shire playground to see how the
public react to our contempo-
rary Huracan Evo. It’s impossi-
Blankety
blank
No laughing matter.
By Chris Chilton
And with the simple push of a
button, the CX-60 roared to
life. But that wasn’t the car’s
starter button, it was a button
on the laptop belonging to the
recovery driver I’d called to my
house to resuscitate a tempo-
rarily dead Mazda.
The problem began with a
blank digital instrument clus-
ter. The car fired up one morn-
ing but the 12.3-inch gauge pack
stayed in bed. I had no idea how
much petrol or charge I had, but
I could at least use the head-up
display’s speedo. Everything
else seemed normal.
bly low and yellow and I think it
looks every inch as outrageous
as its famous brethren. A gaggle
of kids are drawn to it, like
moths to a flame, cooing, point-
ing and giggling aplenty.
Does the next generation still
lust after supercars? Has the
genre run out of road? Judging
by our impromptu vox pop,
Lamborghini still has shock-
and-awe sewn up. ‘What an ex-
traordinary car,’ trills Millie
Hall, 16. ‘I’m glad cars like this
exist – you don’t often see them
and it’s always a surprise when
you do. I’m not sure it’s great for
the environment, though…’
The important test of excit-
ing three-year-old twins is
passed with flying colours.
Marnie and Wilson Holroyd
are pleased as punch to sit in the
low-slung driver’s seat. Their
beaming smiles as they play-
steer the alcantara wheel tell
me all I need to know.
This is what supercars are
about: indulging childhood
fantasies, realising our dreams
of the open road and unlimited
performance, leaving behind
the worries and drudgery of
Two days in, the instrument
cluster still hadn’t woken up, so
I made a mental note to book
the car into a dealer. But on the
morning of day three, the entire
car was dead, so clearly the
problem had escalated and I
was no longer able to put off
dealing with it. Or rather, get-
ting someone else to deal with
it. I used Mazda’s breakdown
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 111
Our Cars
everyday reality.
On this evidence, the Hura-
can is Grade A front cover mate-
rial. The spirit of the supercar
burns bright.
@TimPollardCars
Lamborghini
Huracan Evo
Month 3
The story so far
We think the V10 Lambo is
cool. But what about the next
generation?
+ The kids in our vox pop dig it
as much as we do
- Let’s not talk about the
Huracan’s carbon footprint
Logbook
Price £165,656 (£216,806 as
tested) Performance 5204cc
V10, 631bhp, 2.9sec 0-62mph,
202mph Efficiency 20.6mpg
(official), 18.8mpg (tested) 332g/
km CO2 Energy cost 42.9p per
mile Miles this month 708
Total miles 4706
app to tell them ‘my MX-30’ was
busted because, bizarrely, the
CX-60 isn’t even listed yet.
The recovery chap reckoned
the instrument fault had grad-
ually drained the battery. It’s
not happened again, but will it?
I hope this nagging doubt
doesn’t spoil my appreciation of
what had been a most agreeable
car to live with.
When the big
hammer fails,
go laptop
 Wallboxing. Clever?
When you go electric you must also go wallbox. Really? By Ben Miller
Audi e-Tron GT
Month 4
The story so far
The more affordable of Audi’s
two-car e-Tron GT range, with us
for six months
+ Style; speed; colour; badge;
range; refinement
- It’s not a Taycan but that’s no
longer bothering us – this is a
deeply capable and charismatic
car in its own right
Logbook
Price £83,285 (£93,575 as
tested) Performance 93.4kWh
battery, e-motor, 523bhp, 5.4sec
0-62mph, 152.2mph Efficiency
2.89-2.93 miles per kWh (official),
2.6 (tested) Range 282-286 miles
(official), 228 miles (tested)
Energy cost 12.0p per mile Miles
this month 978 Total miles 3460
112 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
Going our for a bike ride? Then trous. In fact, it’s been fine. than wallboxing. My car use is
you must wear lycra running to Yes, it’s slow. But it’s also easy. mostly local and short range
a total outfit cost of circa £1500, I have off-street parking and a and, when it does run to longer,
preferably with the word garage, the door of which fits so cell-sapping missions, they’re
‘Rapha’ monogrammed in sev- poorly in the frame that the fat very rarely back-to-back. Only
eral places about your cable can pass underneath with once across those three cars
wind-cheating person – one the garage closed and locked. and several thousand miles
simply cannot road cycle in And when you schedule charg- have I found myself wishing I
normal clothes, it seems. And ing via the car, three-pin charg- could add more juice more
by the same token one cannot ing is no more or less expensive quickly.
walk in the countryside with-
out first putting on five North
Face fleeces and a pair of boots
The same hive-mind think-
ing also insists that, as night
follows day, so buying an EV
must lead to the installation of
a wallbox.
I’m not so sure. In the last
couple of years I’ve run a Mini
Electric (six weeks), a Polestar 2
(three months) and this Audi
e-Tron GT (four months and PlugMeIn man
counting), relying on home too polite to
point out 308
charging via a three-pin plug,
isn’t electric
and it’s been far from disas-
 Our Cars

Dedicated
fusebox handy
for re-setting
the wallbox

Like having Six-metrre

your own cable means I
cheaper petrol can park any
pump old way

The Pro can hit up the e-Tron GT
with 18 miles of range per hour,
versus six on the three-pin plug
But thinking perhaps that
you can’t miss what you’ve nev-
er had, I’ve taken the plunge
with an Indra wallbox (indra.
co.uk). A British company with
Gulf Oil among its stakehold-
ers, Indra announced over £20
million in fresh funding earlier
this year, helped by its commit-
ment to developing and trial-
ling bi-directional charging.
(That’s the height of Muskian
sophistication, of course, in
which your EV works for you by
acting as an energy store for the
grid, drawing power when do-
ing so is cheap and sending it
back, potentially profitably,
when demand is high.)
Indra’s 7.4kW Smart Pro
wallbox costs £1149 with a
six-metre cable, the longest
available, and I opted for instal-
lation by specialist PlugMeIn
(plugmein-ev.co.uk). It claims
nationwide coverage and ‘has-
sle-free’ wallbox installation
within 10 days.
And hassle-free it was. First
up is a site visit and pre-installa-
tion survey, lasting little more
than an hour. Mine was classed
as a standard installation,
which speeds things up and,
once the approval letter was
back from the National Grid
(the application was handled by
PlugMeIn) an installation date
swiftly followed. The job itself
took a couple of hours, and by
lunchtime the Smart Pro was
on the wall, neatly wired in (the
unit has its own dedicated fuse-
box next to our main one).
Game-changer? I wouldn’t go
that far, but wallbox life is win-
ning me over. It’s faster than
mains charging, naturally. In
freezing temperatures, with the
battery stone cold and no
pre-conditioning, the Pro can
hit up the e-Tron GT with 18 or
so miles of range per hour, ver-
sus six miles per hour on the
three-pin plug. This, together
with the Audi’s sniper-like re-
maining range indicator, has
given me the confidence to roll
onto the driveway with nothing
left in the ‘tank’. It’s also put an
end to taking on big slugs of ex-
pensive charge at motorway
services on the way home ‘just
in case’, massively improving
my energy cost per mile.
Being able to track the energy
I’m pumping into the Audi is
also useful, and the ability to
disable the car’s charging timer
and set/adjust it from the Indra
app (the wallbox is on the home
wi-fi) feels neater. The ’box is
also tidier than running the
Audi-supplied cable from the
garage, plus I don’t now need to
pack that away for journeys re-
quiring a top-up at other peo-
ple’s houses – it can stay clean
and dry in the boot.
Finally, being able to remote-
ly override the timer and fire up
charging (sexily dubbed ‘Boost’
on the app) when plans change
feels like a useful thing waiting
for its chance to shine. But it
saddens me to report that to
date my life’s simply proved too
routine and insufficiently inter-
esting to give it a whirl. Sorry
about that.

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 113


We had our
doubts. Now
they’re gone
There will be flood
Goodbye If it’s a big, tough SUV you really want, the British
icon still takes some beating. By Ben Pulman
I came to it a cynic, but have
been utterly converted.
For the first week, I felt guilty,
lumbering about in this huge
truck that cost more to fill up
twice than our electric Skoda
Enyaq took to run for six
months. And towards the end
of the loan, as it waded through
January’s floods, there was the
nagging irony that the perfect
car for such conditions was
probably helping cause them.
But taken in isolation, the
Defender is fabulous.
The boxy shape is a boon for
space, with none of the ‘coupe’
nonsense that afflicts German
rivals, and it’s bluff in all the
right places without being an
in-your-face BMW X7.
Some elements did flip be-
tween being fantastic and frus-
trating, like the side-hinged
tailgate that means a Lurch like
me never need duck to access
114 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
the boot, yet it’s heavy to open
and no good if someone parks
within five feet. Ditto the digi-
tal rear-view mirror: the view
leapfrogs the spare wheel, but
you can’t see what your children
are up to without turning it off.
Inside, it’s one of the few
modern cars that retains
enough buttons to be usable,
with the air-con and heated
seats controlled with actual di-
als. Everything else works
through the infotainment
screen, and the JLR system had
none of the lag or connection
issues that befell our old Skoda’s
VW Group tech.
Out and about it was equally
awesome, its air suspension,
chassis strength and optional
off-road tyres shrugging off
whatever potholes or rough
roads Hampshire had to throw
at it. Anything else feels frail af-
ter the Defender.
The boxy shape is a boon for
space, with none of the coupe
nonsense that afflicts some rivals
A rare blemish: some wind
noise around the A-pillars and
mirrors at motorway speeds.
But there’s very little else to
fault about it. And 500 miles per
tank is useful.
We (rightly) never went any-
where near a city in it, and dy- Land Rover Defender
110 SE
namically it’s no Cayenne, but I
Month 8
never found myself wanting it
to be faster or more agile. The story so far
Life where we live is slower –
Time with Land Rover’s ‘reborn’
and muddier or sandier de- icon comes to an end
pending whether we head + Utilitarian; usable; almost
north or south – so with a boot unimpeachable
made from hard plastic, we just - Space needed for the
chucked filthy wellies, dirty side-hinged boot
prams, damp wetsuits and
Logbook
sandy buckets and spades in the
back and got on with life. Price £64,035 (£78,360 as
tested) Performance 2997cc
twin-turbodiesel six-cylinder,
245bhp, 8.3sec 0-62mph,
Count the cost
117mph Efficiency 30.8mpg
Price new £78,360 Part (official), 28.9mpg (tested),
Olgun Kordal
exchange £57,145 Cost per mile 241g/km CO2 Energy cost
28.4p Cost per mile including 28.4p per mile Miles this
depreciation £1.30 month 2193 Total miles 20,789

Why can’t all
EVs do this?
There’s plenty of design intelli-
gence packed into the XC40.
The deep and wide door bins
that are fabric-lined to prevent
on-the-go rattles. The hinged
floor in the boot that folds to
create a snug storage area to
prevent shopping bags empty-
ing their contents. The illumi-
nated charging socket. The
grippers on the charging pad
that lock your phone in place.
Everything functions and
operates the way you’d want it
to, which some other car mak-
ers seem to struggle with.
Easily my favourite feature is
the lidded cable storage unit
beneath the bonnet. Sounds
logical, but many EVs have no
bespoke storage for cables, re-
sulting in a permanent tangle
cluttering up the boot.
BEN WHITWORTH
Volvo XC40 Twin AWD
Ultimate
Month 2
The story so far
Mix of design intelligence and
pace is proving deeply attractive
+ Composed, versatile, smart
and rapid
- Still battling with that £60k
price tag
Logbook
Price £60,300 (£61,550 as
tested) Performance 78kWh
battery, e-motor, 402bhp, 4.9sec
0-62mph, 112mph Efficiency 2.6
miles per kWh (official) 2.3
(tested), 0g/km CO2 Range 270
(official), 200 (tested) Energy
cost 14.5p per mile Miles this
month 756 Total miles 1207
The iX as M
car: discuss
I drive past Munich Legends in
Ashdown Forest a couple of
times each week in the iX M60,
and wonder if my car will win
showroom space there in 20
years’ time, where the Batmo-
biles and E30 M3s now stand.
Yes, it has 611bhp and is the M
division’s second-ever EV, but
after a couple of months I’m not
relating to it as an M car at all.
The performance is titanic but
academic on greasy winter
roads in a 2.6-tonne SUV. And
while the steering is more en-
gaging and alert than in most
EVs, I’m aware of how hard the
stability algorithm is working
to keep that mass in check, with
the very occasional cautionary
slip as it momentarily fails to.
More Munich laggard than
legend, for now at least.
BEN OLIVER
BMW iX
M60
Month 3
The story so far
First electric SUV from M division
shows its class but also its mass
+ Ride and refinement hugely
impressive
- Fails to rise above the sum of
its parts on cost and weight
Logbook
Price £116,000 (£120,000 as
tested) Performance 105kWh
battery, twin e-motors, 611bhp,
3.8sec 0-62mph, 155mph
Efficiency 2.8 miles per kWh
(claimed), 2.6 tested, 0g/km CO2
Range 348 (official), 250 (tested)
Energy cost 13.1p per mile Miles
this month 1202 Total miles 6811
In the C of
tranquility
The surface of the moon is pre-
sumably smoother than the
Northamptonshire B-road loop
where we assess Europe’s Car of
the Year contenders. After a day
in the stiff Renault Austral, the
bouncy Kia Niro and others, for
comparison I whipped the C5 X
over its bumps, potholes and
camber changes. In the softest
Comfort mode, the X did the
best job at suppressing crashing
wheels, jarring rebounds and
clonking noises. And despite
the softness, longitudinal body
control was absolutely fine.
Outside the Silverstone Mu-
seum, a passer-by asked if the
C5 X lived up to its hydropneu-
matic forebears. Definitely
worth a test drive, I told him:
after all, it made a brutal test
route into a sea of tranquility.
PHIL MCNAMARA
Citroën C5 X Hybrid
225 Shine Plus
Month 2
The story so far
Latest in a long line of Citroëns
promising high levels of comfort
+ Comfy ride – much better than
many cars tested on the same
rough roads; decent economy
- Terrible app; drab interior
Logbook
Price £40,210 (£43,310 as tested)
Performance 12.4kWh battery,
1598cc four-cylinder plus
e-motor, PHEV, 222bhp, 7.9sec
0-62mph, 145mph Efficiency
186.2mpg (official), 84.5mpg
(tested), 30g/km CO2 Energy
cost 13.0p per mile Miles this
month 962 Total miles 8572
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 115
Our Cars
Sorry (not
sorry)
I’d like to use Our Cars this
month to apologise to some of
the other road users I’ve embar-
rassed. The Cupra’s 0-30mph
performance has become quite
addictive, and it’s resulted in
some dents to the esteem of
some pretty exotic machinery.
To the Golf GTI with the af-
termarket mudflaps and 4D
plate: I didn’t mean to leave you
behind – and I hope your
friends in the back will forget
about it eventually. To the
Yamaha R6 in Dartford: I’m
sorry about that too – and will
admit your bike sounds much
more interesting than my car.
And what about the Lotus
Evora joining the M11? I’m sorry,
but it was over as soon as my
finger accidentally pressed the
‘Cupra’ button…
CURTIS MOLDRICH
Cupra Born 77kWh
230PS V3
Month 7
The story so far
Cupra’s first pure EV, here in its
most powerful form
+ Classy and roomy
hot-hatch performance
- Handling can’t quite match a
true hot hatch
Logbook
Price £41,975 (£42,460 as tested)
Performance 77kWh battery,
e-motor, 228bhp, 7.0sec
0-62mph, 99mph Efficiency
3.5-3.9 miles per kWh (official),
3.2 miles (tested), 0g/km CO2
Range 340 (official), 225 (tested)
Energy cost 7.8p per mile Miles
this month 962 Total 6046
 Our Cars
BB heroically
pushing on
through the
feel barrier
Needs more tingle
It only feels alive at speed. By Ben Barry
The noun ‘feel’ is all bundled up
in what makes a car so appeal-
ing or otherwise to drive – but
boy is it a tricky thing to define
(who’d make a career of that?),
never mind engineer.
Feel is what’s missing from
the Golf R Estate. Drive around
at a sensible sort of pace and
there’s no tingle through the
steering, no soulful engine
note, no zesty sort of pep from
Peugeot 308 Allure
Premium PT130 EAT8
Month 5
The story so far
Our 308 goes on a tour of
CAR staffers
+ Two more of the team
convinced
- I need to try and get the
key back now…
Logbook
Price £28,130 (£28,130 as tested)
Performance 1199cc
turbocharged three-cylinder,
129bhp, 9.7sec 0-62mph,
130mph Efficiency 49.6mpg
(official), 38.1mpg (tested), 129g/
km CO2 Energy cost 18.0p per
mile Miles this month 523
Total miles 9640
116 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
the powertrain. In fact what
most says ‘performance car’ is
that the R’s ride isn’t very good
(though plenty of performance
cars do ride well) and that the
bucket seats are superb (al-
though set too high).
This is a shame, because the
R can be rewarding and exciting
to drive, but only when you
drive it really fast does it start to
click. There’s more than
Peanut
gallery
I knew I was right.
By Jake Groves
This month I’ve barely been in
the 308, but it’s come in handy
for managing editor Colin
Overland and editor Ben Miller.
So I’m handing the mic over to
them, just this once.
‘I’d driven a diesel Astra not
long before this and the petrol
308’s range of 400 miles seems a
bit weedy in comparison,’ says
Overland. ‘But it’s remarkably
similar to drive – both of them
are proper conventional cars in
look and feel, but with a good
chunk of 2023 about the execu-
tion. And everyone I’ve talked
to likes the colour.
enough power, accurate steer-
ing, good body control and
monster grip from its all-wheel
drive; I just want more fizz.
Also this month, some
thoughts on another kind of
feel, this time as a verb and how
you ‘feel’ for the Golf’s controls
while driving. The infotain-
ment stuff is well documented
(heater controls invisible in the
dark, for instance) but the gear
shifter and surrounding but-
tons leave room for improve-
ment too.
The shifter is stubby because
it’s shift-by-wire and not physi-
cally connected. I dislike these
because you can’t push them
over to the left to engage manu-
al, instead you pull back (just as
you do to select Drive) and have
to double-check on the dash
that you’ve selected the correct
mode. Only last time I did that,
I pulled the quite similar hand-
brake – for the first time in
thousands of miles, admittedly,
but I did it – briefly locking the
rear wheels. The Park button
and Stop/Start button are also
too similar and too close to-
gether. I often turn the Golf off
‘I also think the current itera-
tion of i-Cockpit works really
well; press what you think is the
right button and it invariably
turns out to be the right button
– there’s no confusion.’
Miller, meanwhile, praises
the driving experience: ‘The
ride and handling balance is
suitably Peugeot – keen with-
out being daft. The brake pedal
when I mean to put it in Park.
So whether it’s driving dy-
namics or controls, noun or
verb, the R could do better
when it comes to feel.
@IamBenBarry
Volkswagen Golf R
Estate
Month 6
The story so far
The estate version of the
current Golf R
+ Longer wheelbase and more
space than the hatch
- Let’s see how we get on with
that notorious infotainment
Logbook
Price £45,070 (£48,715 as
tested) Performance 1984cc
turbocharged four-cylinder,
316bhp, 4.9sec 0-62mph,
155mph Efficiency 36.0mpg
(official), 30.1mpg (tested), 178g/
km C02 Energy cost 23.0p per
mile Miles this month 1886
Total miles 12,153
is a little snatchy, though. And I
agree about i-Cockpit: it’s such
an awesome driving position,
and I love the clocks, steering
wheel and seat.’
There you have it, then. A
well sorted family hatch that
steers well, looks great and isn’t
utterly infuriating to live with.
Just like I’ve been saying…
@_jakegroves
Enjoy it while
you can, Jake
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 H OW D O E S N E W
G B U WO R K?
Constantly updated,
new GBU highlights
the best cars in every
class, based on CAR’s
in-depth road
testing

The Good, the Bad & the Ugly: The Top 5s

TOP 5 BEST FAMILY HATCHES

GIANT
TEST
Worth using a pic WINNER

BMW 1-SERIES

THE GOOD: Premium and practical;

now available in two spicy versions
THE BAD: Said spicy models, the
ti and M135i, aren’t quite as much a
step up in fun as you’d hope
THE UGLY: Can BMW spot a good-
looking car, let alone design one?
1-series stands
out from an THE ONE TO BUY: 1.5-litre 118i M
impressive
crowd Sport at £31k/£400pcm; all-wheel-
drive M135i super-hatch tops £41k

GIANT
TEST
WINNER

VOLKSWAGEN MAZDA HONDA FORD

GOLF 3 CIVIC eHEV FOCUS
THE GOOD: Brain-out THE GOOD: Pretty, THE GOOD: Roomier THE GOOD: Ford still
default choice still a non-turbo alternative (if bigger) than ever, knows how to make
solid all-rounder; ride, definitely listens to and standard-fit hybrid the mundane hatch
visibility, roominess indie music; fun drive is well sorted shake a tail feather
THE BAD: Seat Leon THE BAD: Having to THE BAD: Blobby, THE BAD: Strangely
a very similar package explain why. Every. forgettable design mean-spirited
for a lower price Single. Time dashboard places
THE UGLY: Hardly everything just out of
THE UGLY: Getting THE UGLY: Being a car to inspire and reach on purpose
caught publicly raging humiliated for torque enthral
at the infotainment by base-spec diesels THE UGLY: Interior’s
system (and steep hills) THE ONE TO BUY: overriding ambience
No typical entry-level of cheapness
THE ONE TO BUY: 1.5 THE ONE TO BUY: model, and 2.0-litre
TSI 150 at £300pcm or Kit-packed 2.0 hybrid the only engine, THE ONE TO BUY:
£27k; roomy estate is Skyactiv-X SE-L Lux is so you’re looking at 1.0-litre 125 Titanium is
also great value £26k/£350pcm £33k/£350pcm keen and posh(ish)

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 TOP 5 BEST HOT HATCHES
Regular Civic
is a good car;
Type R is quite
exceptional

H O N DA C I V I C T Y PE R

THE GOOD: Feel, feedback, focus:

a phenomenal full-size hot hatch
THE BAD: It costs an equally full-
size £47k. Hot hatches are no longer
a performance bargain (and are
now a dying breed)
THE UGLY: That it’ll probably be the
last of its kind. Good job it’s one of
the best
THE ONE TO BUY: There’s just the
one model. Expect to pay around
£500 on a PCP with an £11k deposit

GROUP GIANT
TEST TEST
WINNER WINNER

TOYOTA FO R D AU D I M E RCE D E S -AM G

G R YAR I S F I E STA ST RS3 A 45 S
THE GOOD: Toyota’s THE GOOD: Most tail- THE GOOD: As fun to THE GOOD: Rapid
made the kind of rally- happy Ford since the drive as it is fast, in any pace, rabid character;
replica homologation Mk2 Escort. A little tike weather. Five cylinders a bomb of an engine;
special we thought of a car drift mode’s a gas
was gone forever THE BAD: A Golf-
THE BAD: Interior by based hatch (or small THE BAD:
THE BAD: Road noise Little Tikes saloon) that costs over Information-overload
like a death-metal gig. 50 grand interior; always-
Bring earplugs THE UGLY: Double- on edginess can
vision-inducing ride THE UGLY: Shunty be wearying for
THE UGLY: Good luck comfort gets boring gearbox turns passengers
getting your hands fast when you’re not passengers into
on a new one; supply on a great road nodding dogs around THE UGLY: A
seriously limited town; ‘Torque Rear’ (ie hatchback that costs
THE ONE TO BUY: drift mode) feels a bit 60 grand – you really
THE ONE TO BUY: Only version now is odd – best tried on the have to want one
Opt for the Circuit the five-door ST-3, track, not the road
pack for locking which includes the THE ONE TO BUY:
differentials, from excellent Performance THE ONE TO BUY: Only the A45 S version
£35k. No sat-nav, pack (with Quaife Saloon looks slick but in the UK, at £63k. The
though. Luckily there’s limited-slip diff) – £27k five-door Sportback is milder £46k A35 isn’t
CarPlay very well spent more usable as exciting

A CUT-PRICE TYPE R? I With the Civic now nearly £50k, the very fine Hyundai i30 N delivers
around 90 per cent of the thrills for about £13k less. It’s not in such short supply, either

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 The Good, the Bad & the Ugly

TOP 5 BEST SMALL HATCHES

GROUP BIG GROUP
TEST FUN TEST
WINNER WINNER

PEUGEOT FORD RENAULT VOLKSWAGEN SEAT

208 FIESTA CLIO UP IBIZA
THE GOOD: Style; THE GOOD: Magic THE GOOD: THE GOOD: THE GOOD: All
big-car character; handling; sales- Renault’s given Getting on a bit, but the best bits of the
knockout interior; smash popularity its baby hatch a just so good at what VW Polo, with more
EV version available not by accident beautiful interior... it does style for less money
THE BAD: So-so THE BAD: Not the THE BAD: ...but THE BAD: Pricey for THE BAD: Not as
handling; a squash comfiest of cars; didn’t bother a city car; resembles much fun to drive as
for adult rear-seat interior has a whiff changing the a milk carton on its a Fiesta; not as posh
passengers of Fisher-Price outside from the side; badge’s silly inside as a Polo
about it last-generation Clio. exclamation mark
THE UGLY: Still handsome, THE UGLY:
Dumping the wheel THE UGLY: The though THE UGLY: Now Infotainment system
in your lap like a TV ugly crying we’ll only available with a can be frustratingly
dinner to see the be doing when it THE UGLY: E-Tech wheezy 1.0-litre faffy to use
dials clearly ends production, Hybrid unpleasantly
imminently thrashy THE ONE TO THE ONE TO BUY:
THE ONE TO BUY: BUY: Starts at Entry-level cars feel
Range from £20k, THE ONE TO BUY: THE ONE TO BUY: £14k/£190pcm. Or a bit austere; go for
but get the 100bhp 1.0-litre EcoBoost a TCe 90 petrol you could get a an FR Edition trim
petrol at just under good fit for most, at manual – expect to secondhand Up GTI with the punchy TSI
£23k/£300pcm around £270pcm pay £220pcm for the same cash 110 engine

TOP 5 BEST SUVs

PCM (per calendar month) figures are typical prices for PCP (personal contract purchase) deals available at the time of writing. For guidance only
GIANT GIANT GIANT
TEST TEST TEST
WINNER WINNER WINNER

L A N D ROV E R PO RSCH E A STO N M E RC E D E S A LPI NA

DEFENDER M ACA N M A RTI N D BX G-CLASS XD3
THE GOOD: All- THE GOOD: THE GOOD: THE GOOD: Truly THE GOOD: Is this
new reboot brings Handles better than Glorious noise; epic off-road; retro the best four-wheel-
untold dynamic any other SUV. And masterful balance; styling will age well/ drive all-rounder
improvements on some hot hatches rear-axle bias is already aged money can buy?
road and off it
THE BAD: Hardly THE BAD: Fiddly THE BAD: Side- THE BAD: Its heart
THE BAD: Second- an original choice and outdated Merc opening boot door yearns for the
row access is a pain – but then there’s infotainment drags a nuisance at the autobahn, and you
in the 90; expensive good reason for that the cabin down; supermarket; un- can only give it the
‘The name’s Bond, green image A1(M)
THE UGLY: THE UGLY: People Dadbod Bond’
Alternatives to the might think you’ve THE UGLY: THE UGLY:
white steel wheels bought the four-pot THE UGLY: How Influencers will Cleaning those
are offered. Why? (still a good car) you’ll feel when you scratch your bonnet wheels on the
meet someone with taking selfies weekend. All
THE ONE TO BUY: THE ONE TO BUY: the 707 version weekend
Range spans 90, The £69k 434bhp THE ONE TO BUY:
110 and 130 bodies. Macan GTS is the THE ONE TO BUY: AMG V8 G63 if you THE ONE TO BUY:
Heart says petrol sportiest but £57k Just get the DBX play up front or on One version, many
V8, head/wallet say 375bhp Macan S is 707. Megabucks but the wing; G400 for options, potential
diesel-six D250 90 the sweet spot worth it for 697bhp the back four £80,000 total

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 125

 THE BONUS FIVE
ALTERNATIVE OFF-ROADERS
Don’t fancy a Landy but want to go mud-plugging? Here’s how
FORD RANGER
RAPTOR (NEW)
THE GOOD: Unbelieveable
off-road pace, especially with V6
THE BAD: Not exactly wieldy
THE UGLY: Petrol V6’s economy
doesn’t bear thinking about
THE ONE TO BUY: A 2.0-litre
diesel is available; buy the V6
JEEP WRANGLER
(USED)
THE GOOD: Iconic looks;
unstoppable off the beaten track
THE BAD: Awful on it
THE UGLY: Nowhere to put your
left foot
THE ONE TO BUY: Diesel has
more palatable running costs
INEOS GRENADIER
(NEW)
THE GOOD: Arguably more
Defender than the current Landy
THE BAD: Which means it’s much
better off the road than on
THE UGLY: Currently feels
unfinished in places
THE ONE TO BUY: The petrol
MITSUBISHI PAJERO
EVO (USED)
THE GOOD: A Dakar
homologation special
THE BAD: Not actually that quick
any more
THE UGLY: Not an official import
THE ONE TO BUY: The auto – it’s
the ’box the racers used
ARIEL NOMAD (NEW)
THE GOOD: Silly sideways fun
THE BAD: No four-wheel drive
for low-speed stuff
THE UGLY: The clean-up
operation after every adventure
THE ONE TO BUY:
Supercharged version feels like
overkill; the winch does not
126 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023
‘THE FULL
EXPERIENCE’
JEEP JL WRANGLER
OWNER
GEOFF JONES
> ‘It was this or a Tesla,
with my heart
over-ruling my head.
I’ve done 30k miles
and don’t regret a
single minute. It’s not
frugal, but my petrol is
quick off the mark,
good off-road and I
enjoy it on-road, too. I
went for the five-door,
which has proved
practical, while the
one-touch electric roof
makes for faff-free
open-air motoring.’
‘CHANGE THE
TYRES’
> ‘The original BF
Goodrich Mud
Terrains didn’t have
any grip in the wet,
making braking an
issue. I’ve swapped
them for Radar
off-road tyres which
are much quieter,
equally good off-road
and superb in the wet.’
‘IT EATS
WINDSCREENS’
> ‘Servicing is cheap
and we’ve had a
fantastic experience
with Motorvogue, our
local dealer, but we
did have some issues
with the start/stop
system. This was a
problem with the
second 12-volt battery.
The upright
windscreen also
attracts stone damage
like nothing else.’
Live axles and a
ladder-frame
chassis
distinctly
old-
school

TOP 5 BEST SPORTS CARS
GIANT GIANT
TEST TEST
WINNER WINNER
AR I E L
ATO M
THE GOOD: A
beautiful object as
well as a thrilling
drive. Think of it as
a modernised Lotus
Seven crossed with a
high-end sports bike
THE BAD: You’ll need
bike-style wet-weather
wear if it’s raining. And
over £40k – this is
an expensive toy, if a
captivating one
THE UGLY: Borderline
terrifying at times
THE ONE TO BUY:
Do you really need
the 350bhp power
upgrade option?
MX-5 GETS A TICKLE I Mazda’s updated the timeless, ageless MX-5. New Homura
top-spec version gets Brembo brakes and BBS wheels, from a previous special edition
The Good, the Bad & the Ugly
GIANT
TEST
WINNER
PO RSCH E 9 11
THE GOOD: Style, like 911s,
never goes out of fashion
THE BAD: Even the base
Carrera costs more than £89k;
road noise up to 11
THE UGLY: To some, it’s now
more comfy GT than sports car;
canny options list pushes you to
spend more
Can’t afford a
new 911? THE ONE TO BUY: Carrera S
Approved used
starts at £40k manual gets the Sports Chrono
pack as standard… but it’s £103k
PORSCHE 718 LOTUS ALPI N E
CAYMAN/BOXSTER EMIRA A11 0
THE GOOD: Sublime THE GOOD: The first THE GOOD: The
handling; surprising new Lotus in years perfectly formed
practicality is fantastically well antidote to a world
resolved. Usable, of excess. A modern
THE BAD: Less classic in every sense
desirable and thrilling of the term
characterful than
an Alpine; such an THE BAD: Harder THE BAD: Hard work
obvious choice it’s work to live with than a on a long journey;
almost boring Cayman nowhere to put
anything in the cabin
THE UGLY: Flat-four THE UGLY: The last
versions sound like a petrol Lotus – just as THE UGLY: Who put
VW Beetle in a duet the company gets the the handbrake switch
with Eeyore financial stability to next to the window
build on its brilliance buttons?
THE ONE TO BUY:
THE ONE TO BUY:
Hardcore GT4 RS the THE ONE TO BUY:
A110 S adds poise to
most thrilling drive but Could be the imminent the handling for £62k
flat-six GTS 4.0 is a sub-£60k four-cylinder but the £51k base A110
cut-price GT4 at £69k turbo version is all you need
MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 127
 TOP 5 SUB-£500pcm PHEVs
GIANT GIANT
TEST TEST
WINNER WINNER

PEUGEOT VOLKSWAGEN S KO DA FORD KUGA MINI

308 GOLF GTE SU PE R B i V PHEV COU NTRY M A N
THE GOOD: THE GOOD: Hey, THE GOOD: Usual THE GOOD: Kit; THE GOOD:
Bravely avant-garde it’s like a Golf GTI Superb strengths space; impressive Rapid (0-62mph
design; decent fuel with better mpg and (roomy, quality 34-mile range in EV in 6.2sec); quality
economy; different lower emissions! cabin) and good EV mode interior; made in the
range UK?
THE BAD: What’s THE BAD: It’s like a THE BAD: Firm
with Peugeot’s Golf GTI without the THE BAD: Costs ride on sport THE BAD: Er,
jousting-shield traction or sparkle and weighs more suspension; limited no, it’s made in
badge redesign? than non-hybrid trim options for the Netherlands;
THE UGLY: versions PHEV versions no fast-charge
THE UGLY: Interior Mechanically similar capability
layout looks fab but Skoda Octavia vRS THE UGLY: Well, THE UGLY: Looks
can be a stressfest PHEV is stronger on ugly’s a bit harsh, more bloated hatch THE UGLY: There’s
to use in day-to-day value but it’s not exactly than SUV; not a new and improved
driving catwalk material Puma-grade fun version just around
THE ONE TO BUY: the corner
THE ONE TO BUY: Only one trim, and THE ONE TO BUY: THE ONE TO BUY:
Starts at £340pcm it’s nearly £500pcm Fully loaded SE L is Loaded ST-Line THE ONE TO BUY:
for the 180. The 225 with a hefty deposit £495pcm/£42k (or Edition is available Base Classic trim on
isn’t worth the extra and no options £40k for the hatch) from £480pcm budget at £490pcm

TOP 5 £500pcm+ PHEVs

GIANT GIANT
TEST BIG TEST
WINNER SELLER WINNER

BMW PORSCHE BMW MERCEDES- VOLVO

X5 4 5 e
THE GOOD:
Massive official
EV range; horizon-
eating performance
THE BAD: Hybrid
hardware cuts into
boot space to the
tune of 150 litres; no
seven-seat option
THE UGLY: Not
much longer for
this world; a facelift
brings even more
power in the 50e
THE ONE TO BUY:
50e listed at
£80k/£970pcm,
more than 45e
CAYENNE 33 0e BENZ C300e XC90
THE GOOD: THE GOOD: Goes THE GOOD: THE GOOD: A true
Handling; driver sub-six to 62mph Stunning interior seven-seater; recent
focus; choice and up to 41 electric borrows from battery upgrade
of body styles; miles on a charge S-Class with giant upped e-range to
0-62mph in 5.0sec portrait screen; 43 miles (on paper)
THE BAD: Engine is incredible 62-mile
THE BAD: Bigger slightly coarse; plain range does too THE BAD: About
battery from 2021 330i is less heavy, to be replaced by
but EV range is still more fun THE BAD: Beats the EX90 (though that
a poor 25-27 miles tax man but can’t could bring run-out
THE UGLY: Hybrid beat BMW 330e in offers at dealers)
THE UGLY: Stingy kit eats into boot the bends
spec: add £2k for space so regular 3s THE UGLY: Old,
adaptive cruise and are roomier THE UGLY: That heavy, too big for
lane assist pesky BMW also most car parks
THE ONE TO BUY: beats it in the boot-
THE ONE TO BUY: Choice of saloon or space stakes THE ONE TO BUY:
If you value the U in estate. Handsome, Recharge T8 gives
SUV, steer clear of vaguely affordable THE ONE TO BUY: 455bhp. Watch out
the coupe – even if 330e M Sport Go for an estate in for terrifyingly steep
it is a great steer Touring is £600pcm AMG Line trim option prices

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 The Good, the Bad & the Ugly

TOP 5 BEST SUPERCARS

We remember
when plug-in
hybrid meant
Vauxhall Ampera

F E R R A R I 2 9 6 GTB

THE GOOD: Timeless styling

and a driving experience as
good as any of Maranello’s finest
THE BAD: You need reflexes
like a fighter pilot to drive it as
fast as it can go
THE UGLY: Touch-sensitive
steering-wheel pads make the
interface borderline unusable
THE ONE TO BUY: Fiorano pack
is £25k+ overkill away from the
track; keep your 296 road-spec

GIANT GIANT NEW

TEST TEST ENTRY
WINNER WINNER

PORSCHE McLAREN MCLAREN FERRARI

911 GT3 720S A RTU R A SF90 STRADALE
THE GOOD: Spine- THE GOOD: A game- THE GOOD: THE GOOD:
tingling sound; changing supercar, Wonderfully usable on Fascinating tech,
9000rpm redline; total from its sinuous any road and still truly long-distance cruising
immersion design language to its thrilling on the right ability, warp-speed
otherworldly pace road (and on track, too) pace and traction
THE BAD: Nothing to
see here THE BAD: Almost too THE BAD: Takes THE BAD: Plug-in
fast for the road proper miles to get to hybrid hardware takes
THE UGLY: Getting know it well enough up luggage space,
on the waiting list THE UGLY: Reputation for it to reveal its leaving just enough
to actually buy one. for fragile reliability strengths; can leave room for a toothbrush
Like winning both you cold at first and change of socks
The X Factor and The THE ONE TO BUY:
Apprentice Since there’s so much THE UGLY: Continual THE UGLY: Getting
strength in the chassis, delays due to tighter beaten away from the
THE ONE TO BUY: the Spyder gives quality control lights in e-mode
PDK nice for traffic away little dynamically
jams and lap records. and adds open-air THE ONE TO BUY: THE ONE TO BUY:
But come on – it’s got intensity. Hardcore Just the one model Choose between
to be a manual. We’ll 765LT evolution is at the moment, from fixed-head coupe and
take ours in wingless incredible but too £189k; expect Spider open-top Aperta. Both
Touring spec, please intense on most roads and LT to follow are wonderful

A NEW ERA FOR LAMBO I We might be seeing plenty of high-power electric supercars, but
Lamborghini’s Aventador replacement sticks with a V12, albeit with plug-in hybrid assistance

MAY 2023 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 129

 OUR REIGNING CLASS KINGS
Buying a car? Check it’s one of our top picks
THIS MONTH’S WINNERS AT A GL ANCE…

BEST B EST BEST BEST

SU B - £ 50 0 pcm P H E V £ 50 0 pcm+ PH E V SPORTS CAR SUPERCAR
P E U G E OT 3 0 8 BMW X5 45e PORSCHE 911 F E R R A R I 2 9 6 GTB
Design makes you look twice; Smooth, soothing, practical, If the GT3’s too hardcore, the Plugging in hasn’t meant
actually worth a second look and rapid too Carrera is anything but losing the magic. Far from it

B E S T S U V/C R O S S OV E R BEST BEST B E S T H OT

L A N D R OV E R S M A L L H ATC H FA M I LY H ATC H H ATC H
DEFENDER P E U G E OT 2 0 8 BMW 1-SERIES H O N DA C I V I C T Y P E R
Doesn’t ruin the original’s Premium-car feel and interior Yes, it’s gone front-wheel Pricey, it’s true, but feels
legacy. Adds lifestyle appeal style in a teeny, chic package drive. Still fun, now has space special enough to justify it

… AND THE REST OF OUR FAVOURITES

B E S T LU X U RY C A R BEST GT BEST SPORTS BEST

B E NTLE Y F LY I N G FERRARI S A LO O N CO U P E /C A B R I O
S PU R ROMA B M W M 3/ M 4 BMW 2-SERIES
Epic interior; a joy whether Beautifully balanced design, Bewitching front-end grip and Pick the M240i version for a
you’re up front or in the back and a drive to match balance. Utterly stellar miniaturised M4

BEST SUB-£500pcm BEST £500pcm+ B EST B EST

FAMILY CAR FAMILY CAR £ 50 0 pcm+ E V SU B - £ 50 0 pcm E V
BMW 3-SERIES BMW 5-SERIES P O R S C H E TAYC A N MG 4
Looks great, drives great, Still the de facto big Now a bigger seller than the Confounds expectations: as
makes you feel great saloon/estate choice 911 – and deservedly so fun a car as it is credible

130 CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK | MAY 2023

 ô

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