Showing blog posts for Land Rover

At the last minute, the petrolhead gods answered my prayers and a very generous friend agreed to lend me his Range Rover TDV8, Vogue. Having lived in London for 7 years I have always had mixed feelings regarding Chelsea Tractors and have often resented them clogging up the already congested London streets. What is the point in owning such a huge car in such a densely populated, urban area? Most of the “Rangers” (pronounced like “Bangers”) that cruise the more salubrious parts of London, sport 22” rims and boast countless, unnecessary extras that help them tackle the treacherous puddles outside Harvey Nichols.

So, when offered the chance to put one of these monsters through its paces in some challenging conditions, I jumped at the opportunity. Interestingly I was advised to stay clear of BMW X5s and similarly other German manufacturers’ imitations, as when the conditions really deteriorate, the Range was the only way forward – figuratively and physically. On collection, I took a few moments to behold the Vogue in the car park, all 2.7 tonnes of it, it really is enormous. Moments later I was immediately impressed at how quickly I had settled into the 4x4 experience; from the lofty driving position you have excellent visibility and the car’s huge size does seem to diminish as you quickly become accustomed to the flat-mounted, big steering-wheel and vast windscreen. The ride was executive-saloon-smooth and wielding the Range around tight London streets was surprisingly easy due to responsive, feather-light steering.

As I made my way north up the M40, M42 and onto the M6 the weather system tightened its wintery grip on the flow of traffic. The snow had all but banished motorists to the middle and inside lanes of the motorway and progress began to fall away. Emboldened by the sure-footedness of my oversized, four-wheel-drive friend, I decided to dip into the Range’s box of tricks and clicked it into “snow mode”. I then gently eased it into the fresh powdered terrain of the outside lane. Manoeuvring the Vogue into a straight line was easy, then slowly but surely I applied pressure with my right foot and began to leave the rest of my motorway companions spinning their way to nowhere in the other 2 lanes. It was a liberating feeling and scanning the road ahead I could only see other Land Rover vehicles advancing at the same rate: mostly Range Rover Sports, a few Vogues and occasionally a Volvo XC90 whose Scandinavian roots seemed to help it cope admirably with the Alpine conditions.

This section of the journey set the tone for the rest of the weekend’s driving and whatever was the thrown at the Range was shrugged off with effortless poise and when needed, V8-powered grunt. The snow varied in depth, texture and at times was frozen hard to the road, yet the car was able to constantly adapt to the ever changing terrain. To seasoned Land Rover owners this performance is nothing new, but for someone who is only used to sliding around in rear-wheel drive coupes, it was a welcome new experience. At the end of the weekend, after 400 miles of driving and much revelry, I was surprisingly in good shape – no doubt thanks to the not only imperious, but luxurious driver’s seat that cossets you on your journey.

It will be interesting to see how Land Rover’s sales figures perform post this cold snap. I dropped into my local dealership in London this week to take a look at RR Sport, and the salesman’s smugness was a little nauseating - but to be expected given the obvious advantage they have in these extreme conditions.

Then all I need to do is point you in the direction of Land Rover. More specifically, it’s new Range Rover Evoque, launched last week in a whirl of media hype at Kensington Palace's Orangery.

Now, you don't need to have a Masters degree in perception to work out that the Evoque (still can't quite manage to type that name without feeling more than a little sick) represents a seismic shift in the values of the Range Rover brand, and one that will change the company forever.

Before we get ahead of ourselves, it's worth remembering that the original Range Rover was itself something of a novelty on its conception back in 1970. As the first 'luxury 4x4', it was aimed at those who still wanted the off-road ability of a Defender, but who also wanted their teeth intact after a trip to the shops.

Since then, the Gaydon company's flagship has moved up in the world, and now operates in an exclusive class of its own as a sort-of S-Class rival that can still cross the Sahara should the desire take you.

This is why Land Rover has taken the opportunity to expand the Range Rover brand in recent times, starting with the compact Sport model – popular among school-run mums – in 2005, and now they have given us the Evoque.

But while the Range Rover Sport resembles a shrunk-in-the-wash version of the full-fat model, there is absolutely zilch chance of any such confusion with the Evoque. It is, as they say, an entirely different animal.

For starters, Land Rover refers to the Evoque as a '3-door coupé'. Now, if you'd told me five years ago that the maker of the Discovery and Defender would be giving us a coupé within half a decade, I'd have pointed you towards the 'Psychiatrist' section of Yellow Pages. But what came out of that smoking white box last Thursday would have been enough for me to swallow my words and write you a profuse letter of apology for the bother.

It’s not as if we can argue much with the coupé tag; yes, it is pushing it a bit, but just take a look at the window line, narrowing as it does to that impossibly shallow rear screen. Seriously, if Land Rover doesn't offer parking sensors as standard on the Evoque, it will be the worst safety decision since Mercedes decided that the first-generation A-Class would be better off without ESP.

The shape has stayed remarkably, fabulously close to the LRX concept of two years ago, and some of the detailing is so intricate it makes its recently-revised big brother look like something of a concrete slab. Draw your gaze for a moment to the enticingly-shaped LED lighting front and rear, and the way in which the line linking the headlamps and those gorgeous side-vents is interrupted by the mighty curve of the wheel arch. Tell me you’re not enthralled by this stuff, I dare you.

In the Evoque, we also have the first non-4x4 Land Rover ever, available as it will be with a front-wheel-drive only option. This thing is as likely to be taken off-road as a Lotus Elise in any case, so really it’s a no-brainer.

Then we come to the number-crunching. According to Land Rover MD Phil Popham, the Evoque will be “capable of over 50mpg”, a figure partly owing to the lack of drive to the rear wheels. Land Rover also claims a miserly CO2 output of 130g/km. Quite something for a car wearing the famous Gaydon badge on its snout.

The target market for the Evoque becomes fairly obvious when you consider that it was launched in association with Vogue Magazine, and with a certain Mrs. Victoria Beckham drafted in as part of the design team. The former Spice Girl’s actual role within the company, for whatever reason, was not specified, but “Device for Earning Tabloid Headlines” probably isn’t too far off the mark.

Here we have a car, then, that will undoubtedly appeal to the wealthy and ultra fashion-conscious; to those who want a second car to go with their XJ or similar. Think of it as Land Rover's MINI, if you will – with the according scope for endless customisation.

Popham claims that the Evoque will appeal to “a younger audience than current [Range Rover] products, and probably a more female-oriented audience”. In other words, this is unchartered territory for the now Indian-owned company.

This doesn't mean there's any chance that the Evoque will turn out to be a turkey, though. The engineering input of Jaguar-Land Rover handling guru Mike Cross is practically a guarantee of exemplary road manners, and with an interior likely to be similar to the 'proper' Range Rover - only smaller and more spangly - the only area in which it might fall short is practicality. But when was the last time boot size mattered to the nouveau-riche of this world?

The pricing, I'm sure, will be on the wrong side of reasonable (a well-specced Evoque will be knocking on the door of £40k), but despite this, it will probably – no, unquestionably – sell in massive numbers and make a more-than-tidy profit for the brand.

It’s worth mentioning, too, that the Evoque will be built on Merseyside, creating 1,000 British jobs in the process. This is something that would have made Charles Spencer King, the genius behind the original Range Rover and who sadly passed away a couple of weeks ago, a very proud man indeed.

So there you have it: a 3-door Range Rover coupé that has the same footprint as a Golf and does over 50mpg. Crazy? Not a bit of it. In fact, if the Evoque doesn’t turn out to be one of the must-have cars of the decade, I’ll personally eat one. You heard it here first.