Home//Evo/September 2018/In This Issue
Evo|September 2018Ed speakIT WOULD APPEAR THAT THE FIA AND the ACO have answered the majority of sports car and GT racing fans’ wishes with the announcement of new technical regulations for 2020. These new rules will see the return of GT1-style hypercars competing at the front of the grid in place of the largely irrelevant, albeit spectacularly fast, LMP1 hybrids.In a move that is hoped will attract manufacturers back to the top class and therefore avoid scenarios such as this year’s super-season where Toyota is effectively in a class of one, the new ‘hybrid hypercar’ category will be as much about aesthetics as it is aerodynamics; ‘aerodynamics cannot take precedence over aesthetics’ said the statement.Who can we expect to line up on the grid in 2020? Toyota has already shown a new…2 min
Evo|September 2018BMW 8-series CoupeBMW IS BRINGING BACK THE 8-SERIES AFTER an absence of nearly 20 years. The coupe you see here is just the beginning of the new line-up, which will later include convertibles and four-door Gran Coupes, with M8 variants available in all three body styles.For now the two - door hard-top version offers a new option for buyers looking for a sophisticated yet still dynamic ally adept GT coupe. Topping the range at launch will be the M850i xDrive, which at £100,045 looks to be a keen compromise between the Porsche 911 Carrera 4 GTS and the more laid-back Mercedes-Benz S560 Coupe, both of which are priced around £103k. We’d also throw the £144k Aston Mar tin DB11 V8 into the mix.Here’s what the new 8-series Coupe will bring to tackle…3 min
Evo|September 2018Ed speakIT WOULD APPEAR THAT THE FIA AND the ACO have answered the majority of sports car and GT racing fans’ wishes with the announcement of new technical regulations for 2020. These new rules will see the return of GT1-style hypercars competing at the front of the grid in place of the largely irrelevant, albeit spectacularly fast, LMP1 hybrids. In a move that is hoped will attract manufacturers back to the top class and therefore avoid scenarios such as this year’s super-season where Toyota is effectively in a class of one, the new ‘hybrid hypercar’ category will be as much about aesthetics as it is aerodynamics; ‘aerodynamics cannot take precedence over aesthetics’ said the statement. Who can we expect to line up on the grid in 2020? Toyota has already shown…2 min
Evo|September 2018EssentialsCLOTHINGHeel Tread socks£10 heeltread.comOnly motoring types will pick up on the subtle message sent out by Heel Tread’s socks, which are inspired by classic motorsport liveries and details from iconic road cars. The pattern on this Rosso Red pair, for example, is based on the vents, air intakes and headlights on a 250 GTO.BOOKThe History of Motorsport€29.90 delius-klasing.deIt’s a big claim to have condensed all of motorsport’s history into a single, illustrated book, but The History of Motorsport has a good go at it. A beautifully designed publication, this Delius Klasing hardcover is an essential for any motorsport fan’s library.FOOTWEARTod’s Gommino Driving Shoes£315 store.tods.comWet days can have you abandoning your favourite suede driving shoes for something more suited to the weather than fancy footwork. Handily, luxury brand Tod’s has a…2 min
Evo|September 2018Aston Martin DBS SuperleggeraREADY FOR ANOTHER NEW ASTON MARTIN? Of course you are, so here’s the new DBS Superleggera, the replacement for the Vanquish S that sits between the Vantage and the DB11. (Although there’s also a new Vanquish on its way, too…) In Aston speak the DBS Superleggera is a super GT and mixes the grand-touring attributes of the DB11 with the supercar performance of the Vantage. With 7 15bhp, a 211mph top speed and an aluminium and carbonfibre construction it sounds more like a supercar to us. As with the car it replaces, and the DBS of 2008-2012, the new DBS faces some strong rivals in Bentley’s new Continental GT, Ferrari’s ferocious 812 Super fast and Mercedes-AMG’s imperious S63 (or S65 if you must have 12 cylinders). The sales numbers may…3 min
Evo|September 2018Lamborghini Aventador S RoadsterLAMBORGHINI WILL CHARGE YOU an additional £30,608 if you want two removable carbonfibre roof panels on your Aventador S. Two small panels that, when you first come to remove them, will have you questioning if they are designed to be taken out at all. Get beyond the extraction phase and it’s then just the small matter of slotting them into their respective holders in the front luggage compartment – look for the little corresponding numbers on the panels and in the boot.After my first attempt at all this I was impressed with the sub-15-minute time I had achieved. However, this was just long enough for Britain’s summertime to pause and the rain to return, and it then took a further ten minutes to no longer be sitting in a diamond-stitched…5 min
Evo|September 2018Volvo gets serious. Germany sweatsVOLVO’S RANGE REVAMP CONTINUES WITH an all-new S60 compact executive saloon to rival the soon-to-be-revealed new BMW 3-series and Alfa’s Giulia. Closely based on the handsome V60 estate, the new S60 will be the first Volvo built in the USA, and also bucks the class trend in being available with petrol engines only. If miserly fuel economy is your thing, there’s an alternative in the hybridised T6 and T8 versions, but, curiously, those looking for extra performance will likely be drawn in the same direction. That’s because the T6 and T8 ‘Twin Engine’ plugin hybrids are both more efficient and more powerful than their lesser T4 and T5 siblings thanks to their combination of a twincharged 2-litre four-cylinder driving the front wheels and an electric motor powering the rears. Those…1 min
Evo|September 2018VW Golf R Performance PackTHE FIRST THING YOU NEED TO understand about the Golf R Performance Pack is that it doesn’t have any extra, erm, performance – at least not in the traditional sense. Unlike the GTI Performance models, the R’s turbocharged 2-litre engine remains untouched, so it has the same 306bhp and 295lb ft power and torque figures as the standard car. There’s also the same fast-acting 4Motion four-wheel-drive system and recently introduced seven-speed DSG gearbox (the Performance Pack isn’t available with the six-speed manual).So, what do you get over the standard car? Well, Volkswagen claims the Performance Pack is aimed at owners who are likely to take their Golf on track, so the biggest upgrade is to the brakes, which now get slightly larger and cross-drilled front discs that, for the avoidance…4 min
Evo|September 2018Nürburgring lap record smashedTHIRTY-FIVE YEARS. THAT’S HOW long Stefan Bellof’s Nürburgring Nordschleife lap record had stood for. Thirty-five years of debate asking if it could – would – ever be broken. Now Porsche has ended that debate. And then some. By 51.58 seconds. That’s how much quicker Timo Bernhard lapped the 12.9-mile circuit in the 919 Evo than Bellof managed in the Porsche 956 C. The now-defunct 919 LMP1 race car had already set a lap record at Spa earlier in the year, but the Nürburgring time was The One. Friday 29 June 2018 started with an 8am ‘warm-up’ and finished with a time of 5min 31.0sec. A new record. On a warm-up lap. Thirty minutes later the five-time N24 winner, two-time Le Mans winner and reigning World Endurance Champion left the pits…3 min
Evo|September 2018evo track evening season heats upEVO’S SECOND TRACK EVENING OF THE YEAR, held at Rockingham on Friday 22 June, played out under the hot summer sun. A diverse array of cars could be found glinting in the pitlane, ranging from a Ford Escort RS2000 to a 991 Porsche 911 GT3. Once the circuit opened, drivers headed out onto the 1.94-mile International Super Sports Car Circuit to get some laps under their belt. Many attendees also grabbed the opportunity to sample some of the cars brought along by our trackday season sponsor, BMW. An M140i, an M240i and an M3 Competition Package were available to be driven on track, with qualified instructors riding along side, while a static display of the new M5 Competition and i8 Roadster completed the BMW showcase. With two-and-a-half hours of track…1 min
Evo|September 2018EssentialsCLOTHING Heel Tread socks £10 heeltread.com Only motoring types will pick up on the subtle message sent out by Heel Tread’s socks, which are inspired by classic motorsport liveries and details from iconic road cars. The pattern on this Rosso Red pair, for example, is based on the vents, air intakes and headlights on a 250 GTO. BOOK The History of Motorsport €29.90 delius-klasing.de It’s a big claim to have condensed all of motorsport’s history into a single, illustrated book, but The History of Motorsport has a good go at it. A beautifully designed publication, this Delius Klasing hardcover is an essential for any motorsport fan’s library. FOOTWEAR Tod’s Gommino Driving Shoes £315 store.tods.com Wet days can have you abandoning your favourite suede driving shoes for something more suited to…1 min
Evo|September 2018THE FAST SHOWTHE LAST VILLAGE IS WAY behind us and the road has opened out into one of those straights that stretches well beyond the vanishing point. I’ve clicked down to second gear and the Ferrari 812’s manettino control is switched to Race. With nothing ahead and the barely contained forces of the Ferrari’s 6.5-litre V12 eager to escape, my self-control lasts barely a fraction of a second. Well you would, wouldn’t you?That said, I’ve been building up to this moment during our first drive of the Superfast on UK roads – you don’t simply hop into a 789bhp supercar and bury the throttle before you’ve so much as got out of the car park. No, there’s a period of shadowboxing first; some tentative exploration of the car’s lower reaches that you…12 min
Evo|September 2018MIND BENDCHALLENGE STRADALE. SCUDERIA. Speciale. Pista. For once, the linguistic translation doesn’t fall in the Italians’ favour with the 488 ‘Track’, ‘Pista’ not dancing gracefully off the tongue in the same way, but the intent is obvious. It’s been five years since the 458 Speciale exploded into life with its banshee 9000rpm rev limit, and now, with little in the way of surprise, but no less feverish expectation, arrives the track-honed version of the twin-turbocharged 488 GTB. As with this line’s 360 Modena-based original, the 488 Pista is a ‘Challenge Stradale’; in effect a road-going Challenge car, without the rear wing, racing wheels and rubber and motorsport safety equipment of Ferrari’s one-make racer.Nestled in the old factory courtyard in Fiorano is a Rosso Corsa 488 Pista with evo’s name on it,…11 min
Evo|September 2018APOLLO MISSIONTHE APOLLO INTENSA Emozione looks like no other car. The kind you’d expect to see at the Geneva motor show as ‘a statement of intent to what [insert manufacturer of choice here] has planned for the future’, then referred to when it’s followed by a bland econobox that has a wing mirror that sort of looks like the concept’s. But this is not a concept, nor is it a statement of intent, it’s a real car that real people have paid real money for.Apollo Automobili picks up where Gumpert (remember them and their Apollo supercar?) left off. From the ashes of Gumpert came 2016’s Apollo Arrow concept car, and now the new company’s first production car, the Intensa Emozione, or IE for short. The IE is all angles, drama and…7 min
Evo|September 2018THE RIVALSTHERE MAY BE NO OBVIOUS NEW German rivals to the Ford and Aston, but there’s a very tempting used duo waiting in the wings. First up is the E92 BMW M3, which offers the same naturally aspirated V8 and manual ’box combination. You’d actually have to try quite hard to spend £40,000 on a V8 M3 these days (outside of the GTS and CRT versions, of course), with only late models with less than 15,000 miles under their wheels approaching that figure. It loves a drink of superunleaded and isn’t without reliability concerns, but there’s something very special about that rev-happy V8, and it’s a very easy car to live with.Over at Mercedes-Benz, you’ll be surrendering the manual gearbox but getting a whole lot of displacement in return, because this…2 min
Evo|September 2018Mercedes-AMG S63 CoupeA MULTI-PURPOSE VEHICLE WAS A very different mode of transport when I was still trying to dodge the Eleven-Plus. Five grown-up chairs – two with the grand title of captain’s chair, no less – a glasshouse to rival a conservatory and the squishy dynamics you would expect from a vehicle that resembled a box with a wheel at each corner. They were practical, though, with space for five without the rear three passengers having to spend the entire journey making knee contact or sitting on their luggage. Try that in an example of today’s lifestyle crossover. A modern MPV is a very different machine indeed. Few manufacturers have persevered with the concept. SEAT still builds an Alhambra, which I’m told is the preferred choice on the school run by those…4 min
Evo|September 2018Ford Focus RS Red EditionIN TYPICAL FASHION, FORD IS SAYING goodbye to the Mk3 Focus RS with a run of special models. First there was the Edition (an RS with an LSD on the front axle), then the Red Edition (an RS with an LSD and some red paint) and, finally, the Heritage Edition (an RS with an LSD, some orange paint and a Stage 1 Mountune upgrade). Thanks to its ruby hue, this particular car is clearly the Red Edition, but to confuse matters it has also been equipped with the Heritage Edition’s power upgrade, which take the engine from 345bhp and 347lb ft of torque to 370bhp and 376lb ft. The Red Edition also gets Recaro bucket seats as standard (normally optional) and carbonfibre interior trim, but it’s the chassis alterations that…1 min
Evo|September 2018Kia Stinger GT SI GUESS IT WAS A TEENY BIT provocative turning up to the drive of the still-prototype BMW M850i Coupe (Driven, evo 249) in the Stinger, what with Hyundai-Kia having lured a couple of significant Germans to work on the increasingly impressive Korean brands. They are Peter Schreyer, the former top Audi designer, and Albert Biermann, once chief engineer of BMW’s M Division. But, hey, it’s my long-termer, and when you’re going to assess dynamics it’s useful to arrive in a car that you rate, and for me the Stinger has great steering and brake feel.If I’d not been hurrying back I’d have taken the Kia onto some of the very best north Wales roads, but I had to make do with those to and from the hotel in Ruthin where…3 min
Evo|September 2018Hyundai i30 NYOU’RE PROBABLY AWARE THAT THE letter ‘N’ attached to our Fast Fleet i30 not only refers to Namyang, Hyundai’s main test facility in South Korea, but also to the Nürburgring, another development venue favoured by the team behind this new performance sub-brand. In fact, a preproduction i30 N competed in the Nürburgring 24 Hours race in 2016, so it seemed appropriate to take our long-termer to the Ring for the 2018 event, in which a pair of i30 N TCRs were entered.The journey started easily enough from my digs in west London, out to the M25 and down onto the horror that is the M20’s corrugated road surface. Once out of the Channel Tunnel, France’s smooth, dull roads were supremely undramatic, but after crossing the border into Belgium, the deterioration…3 min
Evo|September 2018RICHARD PORTERTHEY SAY THAT SMELL CARRIES THE MOST powerful memories. A whiff of sun cream that conjures up a holiday; a hint of perfume that recalls love lost; a noseful of food that reminds you why you can never eat paella again. Close behind that is music; the little snippets of lyrics and melodies that transport you back in a scalp-tightening, spine-tingling roar down memory lane that blindsides you on an otherwise unremarkable Tuesday afternoon. And to this list of the most intense triggers that open the archive section of the mind I can now add something that hurled me back in time only last week: an archive photo of freshly made Ferrari 288 GTOs. Like cat jokes and racism, this picture appeared unexpectedly on Twitter. It was dated 1984 and…4 min
Evo|September 2018Skoda Superb SportLineWE LOVE A Q-CAR HERE AT EVO – the melding of stealth and speed is utterly compelling. Yet these under-the-radar machines are a bit of a rarity these days, as manufacturers and buyers alike seem increasingly unlikely to want to hide their car’s performance light under a bushel – if you’ve got it, flaunt it, and all that. In fact, it’s fair to say that until our Skoda Superb SportLine 4x4 slipped almost unnoticed into our car park we’d pretty much forgotten about the Q class.From the moment it arrived it was clear that this big Czech fulfilled the quick and covert Q-car brief, particularly in its blend-into-the-background £575 Quartz Grey metallic paint. Sure, our car’s SportLine trim added some attractive 19-inch alloys, a smattering of gloss black trim and…3 min
Evo|September 2018SEAT Ibiza FRIT’S NOT BEEN THE BEST OF months for the Ibiza. Getting a call from the SEAT press office with a safety warning isn’t the most reassuring way to start the day. Or indeed instil confidence in a car that’s been my daily companion for most of this year.It turns out that carrying three passengers in the rear of the current Ibiza is not in your (and certainly not their) best interest, because when the middle seat is occupied, a sudden lane change can cause the seat belt buckle holder to push down on the button for the belt to the left, causing it to unlock. It’s not just the Ibiza that’s affected, either. It’s a problem on SEAT’s Arona compact crossover and Volkswagen’s Polo, too.Now I’m no expert, but I’m…3 min
Evo|September 2018Mercedes-AMG C43 4Matic CoupeFLYING UNDER THE RADAR IS A speciality of the Mercedes-AMG C43, a car that seamlessly blends stealth and speed. Slotting in below the bombastic C63, the C43 is a more measured machine that falls into the increasingly rare category of Q-car, its impressive blend of pace, agility and everyday usability only really obvious to those in the know. So it’s somewhat fitting that its mid-life refresh is just a little low-key.As before, you can choose from saloon, estate, coupe and cabriolet versions (priced from £47,720, £48,920, £50,010 and £53,829 respectively) and on all of them the changes are of the blink-and-you’ll-miss-them variety. True aficionados may notice the subtly different LED headlamps and tail lights, plus the reprofiled bumpers. Oh, and the quad-exit exhausts are now round, not rectangular.The more obvious…3 min
Evo|September 2018THE FAST SHOWTHE LAST VILLAGE IS WAY behind us and the road has opened out into one of those straights that stretches well beyond the vanishing point. I’ve clicked down to second gear and the Ferrari 812’s manettino control is switched to Race. With nothing ahead and the barely contained forces of the Ferrari’s 6.5-litre V12 eager to escape, my self-control lasts barely a fraction of a second. Well you would, wouldn’t you? That said, I’ve been building up to this moment during our first drive of the Superfast on UK roads – you don’t simply hop into a 789bhp supercar and bury the throttle before you’ve so much as got out of the car park. No, there’s a period of shadowboxing first; some tentative exploration of the car’s lower reaches that…11 min
Evo|September 2018Kia Stinger GT-Line 2.2 CRDiKIA’S STINGER HAS THUS FAR PROVED an accomplished first foray into the premium segment, whether as the V6-engined GT S model that evo naturally gravitates towards, or as the lesser 2-litre petrol GT-Line that ‘out-Jaguars Jaguar’. But there’s another GT-Line model that’s likely to be a big seller: the £34,225, 2.2-litre diesel.In terms of firepower it bests its German price equivalents, with 197bhp and 324lb ft of torque providing ample in-gear shove to dispatch slower traffic with ease. So it has its GT remit covered, then, as the reserved but pleasant interior confirms.Like the petrol Stingers it’s rear-wheel drive and has an eight-speed automatic ’box, which in day-to-day driving makes for smooth going. While you can cycle through the ratios via the wheel-mounted paddles, the gearbox never hands you full…1 min
Evo|September 2018DMS McLaren 720STHE LAST THING YOU THINK WHEN driving a McLaren 720S is ‘this car needs more power’. So why on earth would anyone bother to tune one? Well, DMS has been developing packages for McLarens since the 12C, remapping the turbocharged V8 to increase power and improve driveability. So when the 710bhp 720S was released, DMS set about extracting more power from it too, because, for whatever reason, that’s what its customers will expect.Without the strict confines of OEM tolerances, DMS’s software changes alone increase the engine’s outputs by 100bhp and 74lb ft, but you don’t have to stop there. The standard catalytic converters can be replaced with higher-flow units, which, combined with the remap, allow the engine to produce a massive 819bhp and 657lb ft of torque – 109bhp more…4 min
Evo|September 2018The KnowledgeSUPERMINIS / HOT HATCHESOUR CHOICEHonda Civic Type R. Building on the promise shown by the short-lived FK2 version, the FK8 Type R is a more rounded proposition – and is all the better for it. It’s outrageously fast on every kind of road, edges ahead of its rivals on track, offers oodles of interaction and is practical to boot.BEST OF THE RESTIf you can’t stomach the Civic’s styling, the classy Volkswagen Golf R may be more up your street (there’s even a handy estate version), while the Hyundai i30 N Performance is an intriguing – and impressive – alternative to the usual suspects. If it’s a smaller hot hatch you’re after, look no further than the new Ford Fiesta ST (left).SALOONS / ESTATES / SUVsOUR CHOICEAlfa Romeo Giulia Quadrifoglio. At…3 min
Evo|September 2018HEART v HEAD AMV8 V MUSTANGTHIS IS A TALE OF TWO V8s. One car is raw, very mechanical in feel and wears its heart proudly on its sleeve – you know the sort of thing. The other is a bit less physical to drive, friendly even, and has quite a few advanced features – oh, and it’s not the one built in Gaydon. Yep, consign the old blue collar clichés to the bin straight away, because the latest Ford Mustang might still look like a good ol’ boy ready for some misdemeanours, but it’s resolutely moored in the 21st century these days. So you’re on the starting line, metaphorically speaking, with just over £40,000 to spend, and you want a V8 coupe. Fuel costs are not something you’re worried about – unless they’re going to…6 min
Evo|September 2018Volkswagen Golf GTI 16v (Mk2)AFTER SIX BRILLIANT YEARS OF ownership, the time had arrived to say goodbye to my Mk2 Volkswagen Golf GTI 16v. I can still remember the day my dad and I drove to view the car in Somerset. The plan was to purchase it and then for me to drive on to south Wales where I was studying at university. Luckily for us the GTI was as described and the deal was done. Driving over the Severn Bridge I went to move the knob that adjusts the side mirror and it fell off in my hand. I instantly started laughing and thought to myself: what have I just spent my student loan on? The GTI was replacing an Audi A3 Sport as my everyday car… The simple interior design was new…4 min
Evo|September 2018Kia Stinger GT SI GUESS IT WAS A TEENY BIT provocative turning up to the drive of the still-prototype BMW M850i Coupe (Driven, evo 249) in the Stinger, what with Hyundai-Kia having lured a couple of significant Germans to work on the increasingly impressive Korean brands. They are Peter Schreyer, the former top Audi designer, and Albert Biermann, once chief engineer of BMW’s M Division. But, hey, it’s my long-termer, and when you’re going to assess dynamics it’s useful to arrive in a car that you rate, and for me the Stinger has great steering and brake feel. If I’d not been hurrying back I’d have taken the Kia onto some of the very best north Wales roads, but I had to make do with those to and from the hotel in Ruthin…3 min
Evo|September 2018Slim fastIT WAS ONLY A MATTER OF TIME BEFORE McLaren revived its Long Tail badge, given the over whelming success of the terrific 675LT. Akin to Porsche’s GT moniker, the LT designation has now been applied to a Sports Series model for the first time, taking the already ballistic 570S as its starting point.The benchmark for the 600LT wasn’t a rival’s car, but the 675LT, despite it hailing from the class above. In fact, the £185,000 600LT sits in a niche of its own: more expensive than Porsche’s 911 GT3 RS but less than a GT2 RS, and with a power figure in between the two. The focus has been on weight reduction, enhanced aerodynamic s, more power and a track bias for the chassis dynamics. Out of these, an increasing…4 min
Evo|September 2018Volvo gets serious. Germany sweatsVOLVO’S RANGE REVAMP CONTINUES WITH an all-new S60 compact executive saloon to rival the soon-to-be-revealed new BMW 3-series and Alfa’s Giulia. Closely based on the handsome V60 estate, the new S60 will be the first Volvo built in the USA, and also bucks the class trend in being available with petrol engines only.If miserly fuel economy is your thing, there’s an alternative in the hybridised T6 and T8 versions, but, curiously, those looking for extra performance will likely be drawn in the same direction. That’s because the T6 and T8 ‘Twin Engine’ plugin hybrids are both more efficient and more powerful than their lesser T4 and T5 siblings thanks to their combination of a twincharged 2-litre four-cylinder driving the front wheels and an electric motor powering the rears.Those wanting even…1 min
Evo|September 2018Nürburgring lap record smashedTHIRTY-FIVE YEARS. THAT’S HOW long Stefan Bellof’s Nürburgring Nordschleife lap record had stood for. Thirty-five years of debate asking if it could – would – ever be broken. Now Porsche has ended that debate. And then some. By 51.58 seconds.That’s how much quicker Timo Bernhard lapped the 12.9-mile circuit in the 919 Evo than Bellof managed in the Porsche 956 C. The now-defunct 919 LMP1 race car had already set a lap record at Spa earlier in the year, but the Nürburgring time was The One.Friday 29 June 2018 started with an 8am ‘warm-up’ and finished with a time of 5min 31.0sec. A new record. On a warm-up lap. Thirty minutes later the five-time N24 winner, two-time Le Mans winner and reigning World Endurance Champion left the pits once again…3 min
Evo|September 2018Slim fastIT WAS ONLY A MATTER OF TIME BEFORE McLaren revived its Long Tail badge, given the over whelming success of the terrific 675LT. Akin to Porsche’s GT moniker, the LT designation has now been applied to a Sports Series model for the first time, taking the already ballistic 570S as its starting point. The benchmark for the 600LT wasn’t a rival’s car, but the 675LT, despite it hailing from the class above. In fact, the £185,000 600LT sits in a niche of its own: more expensive than Porsche’s 911 GT3 RS but less than a GT2 RS, and with a power figure in between the two. The focus has been on weight reduction, enhanced aerodynamic s, more power and a track bias for the chassis dynamics. Out of these, an…4 min
Evo|September 2018RICHARD PORTER COLUMNISTTell us your earliest evo memoryI started at evo helping out with subediting during press week, so my first memory isn’t thrashing supercars across open moorland. It’s late nights in the old office, John Barker having a crafty rollie out of the window, Dickie Meaden making excuses for why he hadn’t done his Ed Speak words, Harry Metcalfe padding around asking for news stories to fill up a gap in the front section, Peter Tomalin quietly corralling the whole thing from the corner with overseas cricket commentary waffling from the little radio on his desk. My earliest, and possibly my fondest, memory.What was the first car you drove for evo?Some kind of sporty Astra. An SRi, maybe? I can’t remember now. It was preproduction and the middle of the dash…3 min
Evo|September 2018BMW 8-series CoupeBMW IS BRINGING BACK THE 8-SERIES AFTER an absence of nearly 20 years. The coupe you see here is just the beginning of the new line-up, which will later include convertibles and four-door Gran Coupes, with M8 variants available in all three body styles. For now the two - door hard-top version offers a new option for buyers looking for a sophisticated yet still dynamic ally adept GT coupe. Topping the range at launch will be the M850i xDrive, which at £100,045 looks to be a keen compromise between the Porsche 911 Carrera 4 GTS and the more laid-back Mercedes-Benz S560 Coupe, both of which are priced around £103k. We’d also throw the £144k Aston Mar tin DB11 V8 into the mix. Here’s what the new 8-series Coupe will bring…3 min
Evo|September 2018Mercedes-AMG S63 CoupeA MULTI-PURPOSE VEHICLE WAS A very different mode of transport when I was still trying to dodge the Eleven-Plus. Five grown-up chairs – two with the grand title of captain’s chair, no less – a glasshouse to rival a conservatory and the squishy dynamics you would expect from a vehicle that resembled a box with a wheel at each corner. They were practical, though, with space for five without the rear three passengers having to spend the entire journey making knee contact or sitting on their luggage. Try that in an example of today’s lifestyle crossover.A modern MPV is a very different machine indeed. Few manufacturers have persevered with the concept. SEAT still builds an Alhambra, which I’m told is the preferred choice on the school run by those who…4 min
Evo|September 2018Ford Focus RS Red EditionIN TYPICAL FASHION, FORD IS SAYING goodbye to the Mk3 Focus RS with a run of special models. First there was the Edition (an RS with an LSD on the front axle), then the Red Edition (an RS with an LSD and some red paint) and, finally, the Heritage Edition (an RS with an LSD, some orange paint and a Stage 1 Mountune upgrade). Thanks to its ruby hue, this particular car is clearly the Red Edition, but to confuse matters it has also been equipped with the Heritage Edition’s power upgrade, which take the engine from 345bhp and 347lb ft of torque to 370bhp and 376lb ft.The Red Edition also gets Recaro bucket seats as standard (normally optional) and carbonfibre interior trim, but it’s the chassis alterations that make…1 min
Evo|September 2018RICHARD MEADENTWENTY-EIGHTEEN IS MY 25TH YEAR AS A full-time motoring journalist. Closer to 30 if you count the period I spent writing in my spare time and trying to find a berth on a magazine. I know, I barely look old enough. Unsurprisingly, much has changed in the last quarter of a century. The once imperious magazine publishing industry has been torn asunder by the increasingly disruptive effects of online content (and trying to make it pay) combined with a general lack of appreciation for what the hardcore, dedicated consumers of print magazines want. It’s easy to snipe at ‘the suits’, but the truth is there are no easy, obvious or palatable solutions for how to help a long-established print product remain solvent while diverting meagre resources to producing and managing…4 min
Evo|September 2018TED KRAVITZEVERY MOTORSPORT AFICIONADO HAS A SOFT spot for Williams. Well, as long as they’re over the age of 30. Growing up in the 1980s meant that whoever your favourite driver was, you’d always keep an eye out for Williams, always in there, hustling against the odds. More greasy and oily than McLaren, more successful than Tyrrell and somehow more identifiable than whatever passed for the post-Colin Chapman Team Lotus.The team’s story was rags to riches, although it seemed there was never much of the latter. Frank Williams, an athletic charmer – and chancer – followed a burning ambition to own and run a successful racing team. It almost broke him financially, while an accident in a rented Ford Sierra did break him (at least his back), physically, but eventually it…4 min
Evo|September 2018DRIVING THE ORIGINALIT HAD LOOKED LIKE NO ONE OUTSIDE THE factory would ever get to drive the only road-going TVR Cerbera Speed 12. But a few years after the prototype was parked up in a quiet corner of the Blackpool works, it was up for sale. The eventual buyer went through a vetting process that included a meeting with Wheeler. He said it felt like asking for Wheeler’s daughter’s hand in marriage.When the deal was done, the rebuild began. The neglected Speed 12 had been pillaged for parts for the race versions in the British GT Championship. Now the process was reversed, including fitting carbonfibre bodywork from one of the racers. The 7.7-litre V12 got ‘soft’ cams, dropping the claimed output by 80bhp… to ‘just’ 880bhp.The opportunity to feel what almost 900bhp…2 min
Evo|September 20183 KINGSCHALLENGE STRADALE. SOUNDS GOOD, doesn’t it? Sounds fast; evokes images of racers with number plates on the Targa Florio, tattered bodywork and factory-spec engines, oil-streaked Perspex windows and extra lamps plastered in dead insects. In the case of the 360 CS of 2003-04, it was effectively a road-going version of the 360 Challenge race car used by Ferrari’s one-make series for its V8-engined baby supercar. Less than 15 years ago it seemed daringly cutting edge, shunning the open-gate manual gearbox for Ferrari’s then market-leading semi-automatic ’box, offering 420bhp when that number in itself was a towering figure, particularly from an engine that remained defiantly naturally aspirated.As I approach the CS today, and open its feather weight door, it seems compact and almost cuddly alongside the militaristic 458 Speciale, let alone…12 min
Evo|September 2018When the ‘wrong’ side is rightSO MUCH OF WHAT WE’VE BEEN talking about in recent months has been to do with weight transfer, often in place of more traditional driving technique topics, such as cornering lines. But even on a straight section of track we’re still thinking about weight transfer. Let me explain why. You may have watched the Italian Grand Prix at Monza and wondered why it is that when the cars exit the Ascari corner and head down to the Parabolica they stay on the ‘wrong’ side of the track (the right-hand side) for a while, instead of immediately moving across to the left. The reason is to do with weight transfer. When you cross a normal-width track at anything over 100mph you’re putting 300kg into the outer front tyre – however subtly…1 min
Evo|September 2018HEART v HEAD AMV8 V MUSTANGTHIS IS A TALE OF TWO V8s. One car is raw, very mechanical in feel and wears its heart proudly on its sleeve – you know the sort of thing. The other is a bit less physical to drive, friendly even, and has quite a few advanced features – oh, and it’s not the one built in Gaydon. Yep, consign the old blue collar clichés to the bin straight away, because the latest Ford Mustang might still look like a good ol’ boy ready for some misdemeanours, but it’s resolutely moored in the 21st century these days.So you’re on the starting line, metaphorically speaking, with just over £40,000 to spend, and you want a V8 coupe. Fuel costs are not something you’re worried about – unless they’re going to be…7 min
Evo|September 2018Jaguar I-Pace HSEIT’S POSSIBLY SOMEWHAT SHOCKING to see an all-electric SUV gracing the pages of evo, but bear with us, because the Jaguar I-Pace really does deserve your attention. Why? Because this is arguably the first mainstream battery-powered car that delivers some genuine driver entertainment. Yes, all the normal ownership concerns about running a pure EV remain (range anxiety, poor charging infrastructure and the like), but if this type of car fits into your lifestyle and you’re looking to go electric, then an I-Pace should arguably be at the top of your list. The Jaguar’s raw statistics certainly make for interesting reading. For starters, its twin electric motors (one for each axle) develop a combined power output of 394bhp, which along with 513lb ft of torque (available from zero rpm) allows the…5 min
Evo|September 2018VW Golf R Performance PackTHE FIRST THING YOU NEED TO understand about the Golf R Performance Pack is that it doesn’t have any extra, erm, performance – at least not in the traditional sense. Unlike the GTI Performance models, the R’s turbocharged 2-litre engine remains untouched, so it has the same 306bhp and 295lb ft power and torque figures as the standard car. There’s also the same fast-acting 4Motion four-wheel-drive system and recently introduced seven-speed DSG gearbox (the Performance Pack isn’t available with the six-speed manual). So, what do you get over the standard car? Well, Volkswagen claims the Performance Pack is aimed at owners who are likely to take their Golf on track, so the biggest upgrade is to the brakes, which now get slightly larger and cross-drilled front discs that, for the…3 min
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SC Sage Daily Market UpdateEvo|September 2018Caterham Seven 310RWHILE THE AUDI RS3 WAS A LITTLE out of its depth at the first evo track evening of 2018 (see right), the Caterham was in its element. In the month or so it’s been with us the Seven has already proved itself to be a riot on the road, but get it on a circuit and it truly shines. There really are few other cars that deliver such intense and seemingly never-ending driver involvement. However, before I could pop on a crash helmet and scream onto the Bedford Autodrome’s South West Circuit there were a few pre-flight checks that needed to be done.With modern motors you rarely lift the bonnet, instead shamefully relying on the ever-increasing array of dashboard warnings to tell you if there’s an issue – which there…3 min
Evo|September 2018Fast masteredI AM AMAZED BY THE ACCELERATION OF A middle-of-the-range new 911. In your Aston Martin Vantage group test (evo 250) you recorded the PDK-equipped 911 Carrera 4 GTS covering 0-60mph in just 3.1 seconds! The question is, where do manufacturers go from there to improve? They must be at the limit of what can be achieved. It reminds me of my 2001 Yamaha R1. Seventeen years on and the latest superbikes are marginally quicker on track, but they offer no real difference on the road. Will it soon be the same situation with fast cars? Iain Colwell Not so fast… Richard Meaden’s column (evo 250) struck a chord with me when he said he was going to wean himself off V8 long-termers after the enjoyment he experienced driving a Porsche…8 min
Evo|September 2018RICHARD MEADENTWENTY-EIGHTEEN IS MY 25TH YEAR AS A full-time motoring journalist. Closer to 30 if you count the period I spent writing in my spare time and trying to find a berth on a magazine. I know, I barely look old enough. Unsurprisingly, much has changed in the last quarter of a century. The once imperious magazine publishing industry has been torn asunder by the increasingly disruptive effects of online content (and trying to make it pay) combined with a general lack of appreciation for what the hardcore, dedicated consumers of print magazines want. It’s easy to snipe at ‘the suits’, but the truth is there are no easy, obvious or palatable solutions for how to help a long-established print product remain solvent while diverting meagre resources to producing and managing…4 min
Evo|September 2018Peugeot 308 GTi by Peugeot SportYOU’RE RIGHT – IT’S NOT THAT LONG since we last ran a 308 GTi on our fleet. That car departed just over a year ago (see evo 236), having largely impressed us with its value for money, its capable and involving drive, and its practical shape and size. So with all that already established, why are we now running another one? Well, for starters this 308 isn’t quite the same as the last one we ran, as it benefits from a facelift outside and in – an update that includes a new infotainment system that we’re hoping will address our concerns about the slow-reacting old one.But the real reason we wanted to welcome a 308 GTi back onto our fleet is that the hot hatch landscape in which it sits…3 min
Evo|September 2018TED KRAVITZEVERY MOTORSPORT AFICIONADO HAS A SOFT spot for Williams. Well, as long as they’re over the age of 30. Growing up in the 1980s meant that whoever your favourite driver was, you’d always keep an eye out for Williams, always in there, hustling against the odds. More greasy and oily than McLaren, more successful than Tyrrell and somehow more identifiable than whatever passed for the post-Colin Chapman Team Lotus. The team’s story was rags to riches, although it seemed there was never much of the latter. Frank Williams, an athletic charmer – and chancer – followed a burning ambition to own and run a successful racing team. It almost broke him financially, while an accident in a rented Ford Sierra did break him (at least his back), physically, but eventually…4 min
Evo|September 2018Buying JourneyFord Escort XR3i (Mk4) ‘My first car upon passing my test in 2000. It was grey with spotlights and a bodykit, everything a 17-year-old could want. Three months after I bought it the exhaust fell off and it was beyond economical repair to fix.’ Ford Focus ST170 (Mk1) ‘My father’s Alfa 147 1.6 was more than a match for my ST170 in terms of pace. A different gearbox and another 20bhp would have made it far more exciting.’ Renault Sport Clio 172 ‘Properly quick and a monster when thrown at a corner, it infected me with the Renault Sport bug. It did feel fragile, and the driving position was baffling, but all this ceased to matter when you drove it.’Renault Sport Clio 182 Cup (1) ‘After my 172 was crashed…2 min
Evo|September 2018DRIVING THE ORIGINALIT HAD LOOKED LIKE NO ONE OUTSIDE THE factory would ever get to drive the only road-going TVR Cerbera Speed 12. But a few years after the prototype was parked up in a quiet corner of the Blackpool works, it was up for sale. The eventual buyer went through a vetting process that included a meeting with Wheeler. He said it felt like asking for Wheeler’s daughter’s hand in marriage. When the deal was done, the rebuild began. The neglected Speed 12 had been pillaged for parts for the race versions in the British GT Championship. Now the process was reversed, including fitting carbonfibre bodywork from one of the racers. The 7.7-litre V12 got ‘soft’ cams, dropping the claimed output by 80bhp… to ‘just’ 880bhp. The opportunity to feel what…2 min
Evo|September 2018Jaguar XE 2.0 240PS DieselYOU’D HAVE TO REALLY LOVE DIESEL cars to buy one right now. The black fuel’s reputation is in tatters, what with cars cheating tests, experiments on monkeys and extortionate pump prices, and that’s before government legislation starts to make diesel cars economically unfeasible. But if an oil burner really gets the derv flowing through your circulatory system, then Jaguar’s £39,180 240PS XE Diesel will be your sort of car.There’s something admirable about how unapologetically dieselly its 237bhp, 369lb ft four-cylinder twin-turbo engine is; from behind the wheel it sounds as if there has been no attempt at all to hide its coarse, industrial din. And with eight gears in the auto gearbox the revs hardly ever drop, keeping that noise as constant and droning as possible. The multitude of ratios…1 min
Evo|September 2018MIND BENDCHALLENGE STRADALE. SCUDERIA. Speciale. Pista. For once, the linguistic translation doesn’t fall in the Italians’ favour with the 488 ‘Track’, ‘Pista’ not dancing gracefully off the tongue in the same way, but the intent is obvious. It’s been five years since the 458 Speciale exploded into life with its banshee 9000rpm rev limit, and now, with little in the way of surprise, but no less feverish expectation, arrives the track-honed version of the twin-turbocharged 488 GTB. As with this line’s 360 Modena-based original, the 488 Pista is a ‘Challenge Stradale’; in effect a road-going Challenge car, without the rear wing, racing wheels and rubber and motorsport safety equipment of Ferrari’s one-make racer. Nestled in the old factory courtyard in Fiorano is a Rosso Corsa 488 Pista with evo’s name on…11 min
Evo|September 2018TUNER ESSENTIALSPowerflex bushes for Porsche 996 and 997 rear upper link arm£56.28 for inner and outer kit (£28.14 for each)Powerflex has been making kits for both the inner and outer bushes for the 996 and 997 for some time. However, some cars came with an arm with a 19.5mm internal diameter, rather than the regular 22mm so Powerflex has made a new kit so all 996/997s are catered for.Dreamscience Stratagem iMAP for Ford Performance cars£445This tuning handset allows you to choose from a variety of tuning files. The device plugs into the car’s OBD port and allows you to change the tune of your vehicle a limitless number of times. It’s compatible with the Mk3 Focus RS, V8 and four-cylinder Mustangs, and the Focus and Fiesta ST.Momo Indy Heritage steering wheel£242.39This…3 min
Evo|September 2018GREAT OCEAN ROADAS THE TRAIN SLIDES OUT OF LONDON you settle into your window seat and listen (you don’t have much choice) to the conversation two rows away. A girl called Victoria is espousing on why Imbruglia was better than Minogue in Neighbours. ‘Rubbish’ you think as you close your eyes and let the motion of the Alstom Class 390 Pendolino lull you to sleep.You pull a paddle and downchange on the way into a roundabout, just catching a glimpse of the road sign. It seems you’re leaving Torquay. But not the one in Devon, the one near Melbourne. Lovely as the sandy stretches are in the south-west of England, what appears on your left out of the shallow windscreen is something else altogether as the golden expanse of Bells Beach reaches…3 min
Evo|September 2018THE RIVALSTHERE MAY BE NO OBVIOUS NEW German rivals to the Ford and Aston, but there’s a very tempting used duo waiting in the wings. First up is the E92 BMW M3, which offers the same naturally aspirated V8 and manual ’box combination. You’d actually have to try quite hard to spend £40,000 on a V8 M3 these days (outside of the GTS and CRT versions, of course), with only late models with less than 15,000 miles under their wheels approaching that figure. It loves a drink of superunleaded and isn’t without reliability concerns, but there’s something very special about that rev-happy V8, and it’s a very easy car to live with. Over at Mercedes-Benz, you’ll be surrendering the manual gearbox but getting a whole lot of displacement in return, because…2 min
Evo|September 2018Caterham Seven 310RWHILE THE AUDI RS3 WAS A LITTLE out of its depth at the first evo track evening of 2018 (see right), the Caterham was in its element. In the month or so it’s been with us the Seven has already proved itself to be a riot on the road, but get it on a circuit and it truly shines. There really are few other cars that deliver such intense and seemingly never-ending driver involvement. However, before I could pop on a crash helmet and scream onto the Bedford Autodrome’s South West Circuit there were a few pre-flight checks that needed to be done. With modern motors you rarely lift the bonnet, instead shamefully relying on the ever-increasing array of dashboard warnings to tell you if there’s an issue – which…3 min
Evo|September 2018Mercedes-AMG C43 EstateMY AFFECTION FOR THE BLACK BENZ – ‘Blitzen’ as I call it – continues to grow, to the point where it’s reached the evangelical stage. There’s always the danger of being a car bore in such situations, but plenty of questions invoke the emphatic answer of ‘buy a C43 wagon’. The C43 may be subtle, but it’s surprising how many petrolheads clock the badging and wander over to ask ‘What’s it like?’ My answer is almost universally positive, bar a few minor reservations, it must be said. One of these is the gearbox, which now seems to have added an occasional low-speed clunkiness to its inherently slothful behaviour during high-rev upshifts. It never seems troubled in auto mode, but if you’re using the paddles for a manual downchange it can…2 min
Evo|September 2018Peugeot 308 GTi by Peugeot SportYOU’RE RIGHT – IT’S NOT THAT LONG since we last ran a 308 GTi on our fleet. That car departed just over a year ago (see evo 236), having largely impressed us with its value for money, its capable and involving drive, and its practical shape and size. So with all that already established, why are we now running another one? Well, for starters this 308 isn’t quite the same as the last one we ran, as it benefits from a facelift outside and in – an update that includes a new infotainment system that we’re hoping will address our concerns about the slow-reacting old one. But the real reason we wanted to welcome a 308 GTi back onto our fleet is that the hot hatch landscape in which it…3 min
Evo|September 2018Skoda Superb SportLineWE LOVE A Q-CAR HERE AT EVO – the melding of stealth and speed is utterly compelling. Yet these under-the-radar machines are a bit of a rarity these days, as manufacturers and buyers alike seem increasingly unlikely to want to hide their car’s performance light under a bushel – if you’ve got it, flaunt it, and all that. In fact, it’s fair to say that until our Skoda Superb SportLine 4x4 slipped almost unnoticed into our car park we’d pretty much forgotten about the Q class. From the moment it arrived it was clear that this big Czech fulfilled the quick and covert Q-car brief, particularly in its blend-into-the-background £575 Quartz Grey metallic paint. Sure, our car’s SportLine trim added some attractive 19-inch alloys, a smattering of gloss black trim…3 min
Evo|September 2018SEAT Ibiza FRIT’S NOT BEEN THE BEST OF months for the Ibiza. Getting a call from the SEAT press office with a safety warning isn’t the most reassuring way to start the day. Or indeed instil confidence in a car that’s been my daily companion for most of this year. It turns out that carrying three passengers in the rear of the current Ibiza is not in your (and certainly not their) best interest, because when the middle seat is occupied, a sudden lane change can cause the seat belt buckle holder to push down on the button for the belt to the left, causing it to unlock. It’s not just the Ibiza that’s affected, either. It’s a problem on SEAT’s Arona compact crossover and Volkswagen’s Polo, too. Now I’m no expert,…3 min
Evo|September 2018Buying JourneyFord Escort XR3i (Mk4) ‘My first car upon passing my test in 2000. It was grey with spotlights and a bodykit, everything a 17-year-old could want. Three months after I bought it the exhaust fell off and it was beyond economical repair to fix.’ Ford Focus ST170 (Mk1) ‘My father’s Alfa 147 1.6 was more than a match for my ST170 in terms of pace. A different gearbox and another 20bhp would have made it far more exciting.’ Renault Sport Clio 172 ‘Properly quick and a monster when thrown at a corner, it infected me with the Renault Sport bug. It did feel fragile, and the driving position was baffling, but all this ceased to matter when you drove it.’ Renault Sport Clio 182 Cup (1) ‘After my 172 was…2 min
Evo|September 2018Mercedes-AMG C43 4Matic CoupeFLYING UNDER THE RADAR IS A speciality of the Mercedes-AMG C43, a car that seamlessly blends stealth and speed. Slotting in below the bombastic C63, the C43 is a more measured machine that falls into the increasingly rare category of Q-car, its impressive blend of pace, agility and everyday usability only really obvious to those in the know. So it’s somewhat fitting that its mid-life refresh is just a little low-key. As before, you can choose from saloon, estate, coupe and cabriolet versions (priced from £47,720, £48,920, £50,010 and £53,829 respectively) and on all of them the changes are of the blink-and-you’ll-miss-them variety. True aficionados may notice the subtly different LED headlamps and tail lights, plus the reprofiled bumpers. Oh, and the quad-exit exhausts are now round, not rectangular. The…3 min
Evo|September 2018Jaguar XJR575JAGUAR’S XJR575 IS, WITHOUT question, more of a luxury car than a performance one. It may have a 567bhp 5-litre supercharged V8 and dash from 0 to 62mph in just 4.4 seconds, but the deep carpets that your feet sink into, the soft leather seats, the space and the car’s hushed, relaxed demeanour say this is more about comfort and class than all-out aggression. Inside, the slightly creaky polished plastic, the tacky chrome trim and the outdated satnav try to discredit the otherwise upmarket feel, but they don’t significantly do so. Despite the mostly plush environment, it doesn’t take much to unearth the 575’s more athletic side; the engine just needs a little encouragement to be woken up and stirred into life. Granted, the Jag doesn’t have the punch of…1 min
Evo|September 2018Aston Martin DBS SuperleggeraREADY FOR ANOTHER NEW ASTON MARTIN? Of course you are, so here’s the new DBS Superleggera, the replacement for the Vanquish S that sits between the Vantage and the DB11. (Although there’s also a new Vanquish on its way, too…)In Aston speak the DBS Superleggera is a super GT and mixes the grand-touring attributes of the DB11 with the supercar performance of the Vantage. With 7 15bhp, a 211mph top speed and an aluminium and carbonfibre construction it sounds more like a supercar to us.As with the car it replaces, and the DBS of 2008-2012, the new DBS faces some strong rivals in Bentley’s new Continental GT, Ferrari’s ferocious 812 Super fast and Mercedes-AMG’s imperious S63 (or S65 if you must have 12 cylinders). The sales numbers may be small,…3 min
Evo|September 2018New Alfa Romeo 8C and GTV for 2022ALFA ROMEO WANTS TO CAPITALISE ON the success of its Giulia and Stelvio with the introduction of seven new models by 2022, and two of these will be sports cars: a Giulia-based GTV and an all-new 8C.The 8C will have a carbonfibre monocoque (hopefully no relation to the 4C’s) and will be powered by a mid-mounted twin-turbo engine plus an electric motor on the front axle, together producing in the region of 700bhp. Good enough, claims Alfa, for a sub-three-second 0-62mph time.Joining the 8C will be a new two - door GTV coupe, based on the Giulia. With 600bhp, four-wheel drive and room for four, it should give AMG, Audi Sport and BMW M engineers a few sleepless nights.Alfa has also confirmed a new Giulietta hatch for 2022.…1 min
Evo|September 2018evo track evening season heats upEVO’S SECOND TRACK EVENING OF THE YEAR, held at Rockingham on Friday 22 June, played out under the hot summer sun. A diverse array of cars could be found glinting in the pitlane, ranging from a Ford Escort RS2000 to a 991 Porsche 911 GT3.Once the circuit opened, drivers headed out onto the 1.94-mile International Super Sports Car Circuit to get some laps under their belt. Many attendees also grabbed the opportunity to sample some of the cars brought along by our trackday season sponsor, BMW. An M140i, an M240i and an M3 Competition Package were available to be driven on track, with qualified instructors riding along side, while a static display of the new M5 Competition and i8 Roadster completed the BMW showcase.With two-and-a-half hours of track time, cars…1 min
Evo|September 2018WATCHESMarchand Legacymarchandwatches.com £199With its chequered-flag dial, there’s no mistaking the Legacy’s motorsport pretensions. Available in several colour schemes, it has a 42mm case and an automatic movement.Porsche Design 1919 Chronotimer Flybackporsche-design.com £4450With a minimalist case design constructed from titanium – itself 40 per cent lighter than steel – this latest piece from Porsche Design should be pleasingly light on the wrist.TAG Heuer Monaco Bamfordtagheuer.com c£6000 (est)Another lightweight, thanks to its carbonfibre case, this take on the Monaco represents customiser Bamford Watch Department’s first official production model with TAG Heuer.…1 min
Evo|September 2018When the ‘wrong’ side is rightSO MUCH OF WHAT WE’VE BEEN talking about in recent months has been to do with weight transfer, often in place of more traditional driving technique topics, such as cornering lines. But even on a straight section of track we’re still thinking about weight transfer. Let me explain why.You may have watched the Italian Grand Prix at Monza and wondered why it is that when the cars exit the Ascari corner and head down to the Parabolica they stay on the ‘wrong’ side of the track (the right-hand side) for a while, instead of immediately moving across to the left. The reason is to do with weight transfer.When you cross a normal-width track at anything over 100mph you’re putting 300kg into the outer front tyre – however subtly you turn…1 min
Evo|September 2018Jaguar I-Pace HSEIT’S POSSIBLY SOMEWHAT SHOCKING to see an all-electric SUV gracing the pages of evo, but bear with us, because the Jaguar I-Pace really does deserve your attention. Why? Because this is arguably the first mainstream battery-powered car that delivers some genuine driver entertainment. Yes, all the normal ownership concerns about running a pure EV remain (range anxiety, poor charging infrastructure and the like), but if this type of car fits into your lifestyle and you’re looking to go electric, then an I-Pace should arguably be at the top of your list.The Jaguar’s raw statistics certainly make for interesting reading. For starters, its twin electric motors (one for each axle) develop a combined power output of 394bhp, which along with 513lb ft of torque (available from zero rpm) allows the I-Pace…5 min
Evo|September 2018New Alfa Romeo 8C and GTV for 2022ALFA ROMEO WANTS TO CAPITALISE ON the success of its Giulia and Stelvio with the introduction of seven new models by 2022, and two of these will be sports cars: a Giulia-based GTV and an all-new 8C. The 8C will have a carbonfibre monocoque (hopefully no relation to the 4C’s) and will be powered by a mid-mounted twin-turbo engine plus an electric motor on the front axle, together producing in the region of 700bhp. Good enough, claims Alfa, for a sub-three-second 0-62mph time. Joining the 8C will be a new two - door GTV coupe, based on the Giulia. With 600bhp, four-wheel drive and room for four, it should give AMG, Audi Sport and BMW M engineers a few sleepless nights. Alfa has also confirmed a new Giulietta hatch for…1 min
Evo|September 2018Fast masteredI AM AMAZED BY THE ACCELERATION OF A middle-of-the-range new 911. In your Aston Martin Vantage group test (evo 250) you recorded the PDK-equipped 911 Carrera 4 GTS covering 0-60mph in just 3.1 seconds! The question is, where do manufacturers go from there to improve? They must be at the limit of what can be achieved.It reminds me of my 2001 Yamaha R1. Seventeen years on and the latest superbikes are marginally quicker on track, but they offer no real difference on the road. Will it soon be the same situation with fast cars?Iain ColwellNot so fast…Richard Meaden’s column (evo 250) struck a chord with me when he said he was going to wean himself off V8 long-termers after the enjoyment he experienced driving a Porsche 356.My daily driver is…8 min
Evo|September 2018RICHARD PORTERTHEY SAY THAT SMELL CARRIES THE MOST powerful memories. A whiff of sun cream that conjures up a holiday; a hint of perfume that recalls love lost; a noseful of food that reminds you why you can never eat paella again.Close behind that is music; the little snippets of lyrics and melodies that transport you back in a scalp-tightening, spine-tingling roar down memory lane that blindsides you on an otherwise unremarkable Tuesday afternoon.And to this list of the most intense triggers that open the archive section of the mind I can now add something that hurled me back in time only last week: an archive photo of freshly made Ferrari 288 GTOs.Like cat jokes and racism, this picture appeared unexpectedly on Twitter. It was dated 1984 and showed 31 GTOs…4 min
Evo|September 2018NEED FOR SPEED 12IT’S THE CAR THAT SNAPPED THE INPUT shaft of a 1000bhp-rated dyno. The car with acceleration so monumental that evo’s John Barker summed it up in one word: terrifying. The car hard-driving, weekend-racing TVR boss Peter Wheeler backed out of after taking it home for the night, declaring it ‘too wild and powerful for the road’.Put simply, back in the late ’90s, the TVR Cerbera Speed 12 was too fast to live. Even though Project 7/12’s development brief was heavily biased towards creating a GT1 endurance racer, with the aim of competing at Le Mans, a naturally aspirated 7.7-litre V12 developing nearly 900bhp in a road car weighing just 1100kg must have seemed looney tunes with knobs on. Even so, word on the street was this might just be the…9 min
Evo|September 2018WATCHESMarchand Legacy marchandwatches.com £199 With its chequered-flag dial, there’s no mistaking the Legacy’s motorsport pretensions. Available in several colour schemes, it has a 42mm case and an automatic movement. Porsche Design 1919 Chronotimer Flyback porsche-design.com £4450 With a minimalist case design constructed from titanium – itself 40 per cent lighter than steel – this latest piece from Porsche Design should be pleasingly light on the wrist. TAG Heuer Monaco Bamford tagheuer.com c£6000 (est) Another lightweight, thanks to its carbonfibre case, this take on the Monaco represents customiser Bamford Watch Department’s first official production model with TAG Heuer.…1 min
Evo|September 2018RICHARD PORTER COLUMNISTTell us your earliest evo memory I started at evo helping out with subediting during press week, so my first memory isn’t thrashing supercars across open moorland. It’s late nights in the old office, John Barker having a crafty rollie out of the window, Dickie Meaden making excuses for why he hadn’t done his Ed Speak words, Harry Metcalfe padding around asking for news stories to fill up a gap in the front section, Peter Tomalin quietly corralling the whole thing from the corner with overseas cricket commentary waffling from the little radio on his desk. My earliest, and possibly my fondest, memory. What was the first car you drove for evo? Some kind of sporty Astra. An SRi, maybe? I can’t remember now. It was preproduction and the middle…3 min
Evo|September 2018YOUNG GUNSIF THERE WAS ONE WORD THAT SUMMED up our feelings after driving Suzuki’s new Swift Sport for the first time (evo 249), it was ‘underwhelmed’. Yes, it was quicker, grippier and more refined than before, but it appeared that, in attempting to broaden the car’s appeal, Suzuki’s engineers had dimmed much of its predecessor’s sparkle.That said, there was also a nagging suspicion that the Sport had been slightly overawed by the wide and fast roads at the car’s launch location – the epically quick and exquisitely surfaced routes of Andalusia in Spain are better suited to supercars than mildly spiced superminis. Perhaps the Suzuki would feel more at home on the UK’s tighter and twistier tarmac? Well, there’s only one way to find out…To make matters even more interesting, we’ve…7 min
Evo|September 2018Lamborghini Aventador S RoadsterLAMBORGHINI WILL CHARGE YOU an additional £30,608 if you want two removable carbonfibre roof panels on your Aventador S. Two small panels that, when you first come to remove them, will have you questioning if they are designed to be taken out at all. Get beyond the extraction phase and it’s then just the small matter of slotting them into their respective holders in the front luggage compartment – look for the little corresponding numbers on the panels and in the boot. After my first attempt at all this I was impressed with the sub-15-minute time I had achieved. However, this was just long enough for Britain’s summertime to pause and the rain to return, and it then took a further ten minutes to no longer be sitting in a…5 min
Evo|September 2018V8 VANTAGE EXPERT VIEW: PETER MARTIN OF MARTIN’S ASTON SERVICES‘THE VANTAGE GENERALLY WEARS ITS mileage well, and high-milers can actually drive better than really low-mileage cars, as long as they’ve been maintained well.‘When you go to inspect the car take a close look at the paintwork, and if you’re not confident, take someone along who knows what they’re looking for. Vantages can suffer from corrosion on the doors – along the edges, around the handles and the wing mirror supports. Most will have had rectifying paintwork for this and the inevitable stone chips on the front, but how well has it been done? They can rust around the rear wheelarches, too.‘Inside, if the leather on the seats hasn’t been fed it can crack on the driver’s seat bolster. Unless it’s really bad, a few feeds can bring it back.…2 min
Evo|September 2018Volkswagen Golf GTI 16v (Mk2)AFTER SIX BRILLIANT YEARS OF ownership, the time had arrived to say goodbye to my Mk2 Volkswagen Golf GTI 16v.I can still remember the day my dad and I drove to view the car in Somerset. The plan was to purchase it and then for me to drive on to south Wales where I was studying at university. Luckily for us the GTI was as described and the deal was done.Driving over the Severn Bridge I went to move the knob that adjusts the side mirror and it fell off in my hand. I instantly started laughing and thought to myself: what have I just spent my student loan on? The GTI was replacing an Audi A3 Sport as my everyday car…The simple interior design was new to me, but…4 min
Evo|September 2018Audi RS3‘GO EASY ON THE FRONT TYRES.’ That was my sole instruction from road test editor James Disdale when he handed me the key to his Audi RS3 long-termer at our track evening. The way he said it made it sound as if the compact green saloon car might want to understeer its way around catastrophically, front tyres billowing with smoke like a 1960s racing Mini.I was perplexed, because my main impression of the RS3 on the road has been one of huge amounts of grip almost all the time – a very typical Audi stance. Yet even despite this lack of adjustability, I’ve been quite smitten every time I’ve driven it: our RS3 sounds like a supercar, is the colour of a supercar and is near as dammit as fast…2 min
Evo|September 2018Mercedes-AMG C43 EstateMY AFFECTION FOR THE BLACK BENZ – ‘Blitzen’ as I call it – continues to grow, to the point where it’s reached the evangelical stage. There’s always the danger of being a car bore in such situations, but plenty of questions invoke the emphatic answer of ‘buy a C43 wagon’. The C43 may be subtle, but it’s surprising how many petrolheads clock the badging and wander over to ask ‘What’s it like?’ My answer is almost universally positive, bar a few minor reservations, it must be said.One of these is the gearbox, which now seems to have added an occasional low-speed clunkiness to its inherently slothful behaviour during high-rev upshifts. It never seems troubled in auto mode, but if you’re using the paddles for a manual downchange it can really…2 min
Evo|September 2018Honda Civic Type R‘IS IT AN OPTICAL ILLUSION OR is the front-right wheel on the Civic slightly buckled?’ asked staff writer Will Beaumont as he entered the evo office. Uh-oh. We went outside to take a closer look. Sure enough, if you crouched down and followed the red pinstripe around the wheel’s edge, there was a subtle flat spot on the rim.I know exactly when it happened. Around four weeks earlier, at night on an unlit road, the Type R had clobbered a nasty pothole at about 30mph. It was one of those thumps that makes you wince, curse and check the instrument display for a puncture warning. But nothing appeared, the car felt fine, and I simply forgot about it.After Will’s eagle-eyed observation, however, I have tuned into the merest of shudders…2 min
Evo|September 2018Ford Mustang 5.0 V8THE LIFE OF A FAST FLEET CAR tends to reflect that of its custodian. In my case, and therefore the Mustang’s, this means a life of contrasts.Prolonged spells sitting outside my house wondering if I’m ever going to get my pile of overdue stories written are punctuated by high-speed dashes to the local shop for a bottle of Writer’s Block-Busta, or Merlot as it’s more commonly known. We’ll pound motorways for hours, then be separated for days as I jet off somewhere and the Mustang sits forlornly in a car park. We’ll do early starts and late finishes, supermarket runs, cross country commutes and trips to That London. We do it all.Somewhat against appearance and expectations, the big Ford is a very capable everyday car. The decent stereo and quick-witted…2 min
Evo|September 2018NEED FOR SPEED 12IT’S THE CAR THAT SNAPPED THE INPUT shaft of a 1000bhp-rated dyno. The car with acceleration so monumental that evo’s John Barker summed it up in one word: terrifying. The car hard-driving, weekend-racing TVR boss Peter Wheeler backed out of after taking it home for the night, declaring it ‘too wild and powerful for the road’. Put simply, back in the late ’90s, the TVR Cerbera Speed 12 was too fast to live. Even though Project 7/12’s development brief was heavily biased towards creating a GT1 endurance racer, with the aim of competing at Le Mans, a naturally aspirated 7.7-litre V12 developing nearly 900bhp in a road car weighing just 1100kg must have seemed looney tunes with knobs on. Even so, word on the street was this might just be…8 min
Evo|September 2018Jaguar XJR575JAGUAR’S XJR575 IS, WITHOUT question, more of a luxury car than a performance one. It may have a 567bhp 5-litre supercharged V8 and dash from 0 to 62mph in just 4.4 seconds, but the deep carpets that your feet sink into, the soft leather seats, the space and the car’s hushed, relaxed demeanour say this is more about comfort and class than all-out aggression. Inside, the slightly creaky polished plastic, the tacky chrome trim and the outdated satnav try to discredit the otherwise upmarket feel, but they don’t significantly do so.Despite the mostly plush environment, it doesn’t take much to unearth the 575’s more athletic side; the engine just needs a little encouragement to be woken up and stirred into life. Granted, the Jag doesn’t have the punch of an…1 min
Evo|September 20183 KINGSCHALLENGE STRADALE. SOUNDS GOOD, doesn’t it? Sounds fast; evokes images of racers with number plates on the Targa Florio, tattered bodywork and factory-spec engines, oil-streaked Perspex windows and extra lamps plastered in dead insects. In the case of the 360 CS of 2003-04, it was effectively a road-going version of the 360 Challenge race car used by Ferrari’s one-make series for its V8-engined baby supercar. Less than 15 years ago it seemed daringly cutting edge, shunning the open-gate manual gearbox for Ferrari’s then market-leading semi-automatic ’box, offering 420bhp when that number in itself was a towering figure, particularly from an engine that remained defiantly naturally aspirated. As I approach the CS today, and open its feather weight door, it seems compact and almost cuddly alongside the militaristic 458 Speciale, let…11 min
Evo|September 2018Mercedes A-classTO MANY BUYERS IT’LL BE ALMOST immaterial what the new A-class is like to drive. They’ll wander into their local showroom enticed by the monthly payment plan of the A180d, open the driver’s door, and the deal will be done before they’ve fully whizzed the electric seat into place.It’s not quite as inventive as a BMW i3’s multifaceted cabin, but the A’s innards are about as desirable as a conventional car’s gets right now. No rival is quite so slick in its ambience, nor as airy, with the instruments free-standing in a pared-back dashboard.It ain’t cheap to upgrade the standard 7-inch screens to 10.25-inch items for the best mini-S-class effect, requiring you to spend £1395 on the Executive Pack (10.25-inch touchscreen, Active Park Assist, heated seats) and £2395 for the…1 min
Evo|September 2018YOUNGGUNSIF THERE WAS ONE WORD THAT SUMMED up our feelings after driving Suzuki’s new Swift Sport for the first time (evo 249), it was ‘underwhelmed’. Yes, it was quicker, grippier and more refined than before, but it appeared that, in attempting to broaden the car’s appeal, Suzuki’s engineers had dimmed much of its predecessor’s sparkle. That said, there was also a nagging suspicion that the Sport had been slightly overawed by the wide and fast roads at the car’s launch location – the epically quick and exquisitely surfaced routes of Andalusia in Spain are better suited to supercars than mildly spiced superminis. Perhaps the Suzuki would feel more at home on the UK’s tighter and twistier tarmac? Well, there’s only one way to find out… To make matters even more…7 min
Evo|September 2018APOLLO MISSIONTHE APOLLO INTENSA Emozione looks like no other car. The kind you’d expect to see at the Geneva motor show as ‘a statement of intent to what [insert manufacturer of choice here] has planned for the future’, then referred to when it’s followed by a bland econobox that has a wing mirror that sort of looks like the concept’s. But this is not a concept, nor is it a statement of intent, it’s a real car that real people have paid real money for. Apollo Automobili picks up where Gumpert (remember them and their Apollo supercar?) left off. From the ashes of Gumpert came 2016’s Apollo Arrow concept car, and now the new company’s first production car, the Intensa Emozione, or IE for short. The IE is all angles, drama…7 min
Evo|September 2018V8 VANTAGE EXPERT VIEW: PETER MARTIN OF MARTIN’S ASTON SERVICES‘THE VANTAGE GENERALLY WEARS ITS mileage well, and high-milers can actually drive better than really low-mileage cars, as long as they’ve been maintained well. ‘When you go to inspect the car take a close look at the paintwork, and if you’re not confident, take someone along who knows what they’re looking for. Vantages can suffer from corrosion on the doors – along the edges, around the handles and the wing mirror supports. Most will have had rectifying paintwork for this and the inevitable stone chips on the front, but how well has it been done? They can rust around the rear wheelarches, too. ‘Inside, if the leather on the seats hasn’t been fed it can crack on the driver’s seat bolster. Unless it’s really bad, a few feeds can bring…2 min
Evo|September 2018Audi RS3‘GO EASY ON THE FRONT TYRES.’ That was my sole instruction from road test editor James Disdale when he handed me the key to his Audi RS3 long-termer at our track evening. The way he said it made it sound as if the compact green saloon car might want to understeer its way around catastrophically, front tyres billowing with smoke like a 1960s racing Mini. I was perplexed, because my main impression of the RS3 on the road has been one of huge amounts of grip almost all the time – a very typical Audi stance. Yet even despite this lack of adjustability, I’ve been quite smitten every time I’ve driven it: our RS3 sounds like a supercar, is the colour of a supercar and is near as dammit as…2 min
Evo|September 2018Hyundai i30 NYOU’RE PROBABLY AWARE THAT THE letter ‘N’ attached to our Fast Fleet i30 not only refers to Namyang, Hyundai’s main test facility in South Korea, but also to the Nürburgring, another development venue favoured by the team behind this new performance sub-brand. In fact, a preproduction i30 N competed in the Nürburgring 24 Hours race in 2016, so it seemed appropriate to take our long-termer to the Ring for the 2018 event, in which a pair of i30 N TCRs were entered. The journey started easily enough from my digs in west London, out to the M25 and down onto the horror that is the M20’s corrugated road surface. Once out of the Channel Tunnel, France’s smooth, dull roads were supremely undramatic, but after crossing the border into Belgium, the…3 min
Evo|September 2018Honda Civic Type R‘IS IT AN OPTICAL ILLUSION OR is the front-right wheel on the Civic slightly buckled?’ asked staff writer Will Beaumont as he entered the evo office. Uh-oh. We went outside to take a closer look. Sure enough, if you crouched down and followed the red pinstripe around the wheel’s edge, there was a subtle flat spot on the rim. I know exactly when it happened. Around four weeks earlier, at night on an unlit road, the Type R had clobbered a nasty pothole at about 30mph. It was one of those thumps that makes you wince, curse and check the instrument display for a puncture warning. But nothing appeared, the car felt fine, and I simply forgot about it. After Will’s eagle-eyed observation, however, I have tuned into the merest…2 min
Evo|September 2018Ford Mustang 5.0 V8THE LIFE OF A FAST FLEET CAR tends to reflect that of its custodian. In my case, and therefore the Mustang’s, this means a life of contrasts. Prolonged spells sitting outside my house wondering if I’m ever going to get my pile of overdue stories written are punctuated by high-speed dashes to the local shop for a bottle of Writer’s Block-Busta, or Merlot as it’s more commonly known. We’ll pound motorways for hours, then be separated for days as I jet off somewhere and the Mustang sits forlornly in a car park. We’ll do early starts and late finishes, supermarket runs, cross country commutes and trips to That London. We do it all. Somewhat against appearance and expectations, the big Ford is a very capable everyday car. The decent stereo…2 min
Evo|September 2018Jaguar XE 2.0 240PS DieselYOU’D HAVE TO REALLY LOVE DIESEL cars to buy one right now. The black fuel’s reputation is in tatters, what with cars cheating tests, experiments on monkeys and extortionate pump prices, and that’s before government legislation starts to make diesel cars economically unfeasible. But if an oil burner really gets the derv flowing through your circulatory system, then Jaguar’s £39,180 240PS XE Diesel will be your sort of car. There’s something admirable about how unapologetically dieselly its 237bhp, 369lb ft four-cylinder twin-turbo engine is; from behind the wheel it sounds as if there has been no attempt at all to hide its coarse, industrial din. And with eight gears in the auto gearbox the revs hardly ever drop, keeping that noise as constant and droning as possible. The multitude of…1 min
