Ferrari Portofino review: The replacement for the California T is a special and surprisingly easy drive Ferrari would never admit its California was a car marketed at women. Back when it was launched in 2008, just four per cent of the Italian manufacturer’s customers were female. With the California, a softer sports car with a folding metal roof and lower price tag, it said it intended to reach an audience it [...]
Bentley Mulsanne Speed review: This rolling fortress is like a luxury flat on wheels There’s an old saying that Bentleys were made to be driven and Rolls-Royces were made to be driven in. That hasn’t really been the case since Bentley was taken over by Volkswagen Group and Rolls-Royce by BMW – you can now buy wafty Bentleys and sporting Rolls-Royces – but even so, you’d expect a Bentley [...]
Golf GTI 2017 review: The grand daddy of hot hatches is back, baby Manual gearbox. Tartan seats. Bright red paint. It could be the summer of ’76, with me at the wheel of Volkswagen’s brand new Golf GTI. Instead, it’s 2017 and I’m driving a revised version of the seventh-generation Golf GTI. While the GTI was once the hot hatch of choice for yuppies, fashionable mums and even [...]
US giant Ford criticised after Mustang sports car scores just two stars in crash tests January 25, 2017 US car giant Ford has been criticised by industry body Thatcham Research after its Mustang sports car achieved just two stars in official European crash tests. The Euro New Car Assessment Programme (NCAP) puts all new cars through thorough crash tests and awards them a star rating out of five. Recent changes have made it [...]
Audi R8 Spyder review: The soft-top supercar threatening Lamborghini’s supremacy January 23, 2017 When did Audi become the ultimate ‘cool’ car manufacturer? It could have been around the end of the last decade, when the original TT was launched, along with the futuristic A2 compact MPV. But all this paved the way for 2006, when Audi launched its R8 supercar, along with bold claims about it being a [...]
Lotus Evora Sport 410 review: Short, sharp bursts of pleasure that the Porsche can’t come close to January 16, 2017 W hen former PSA Peugeot Citroen boss Jean-Marc Gales took over as CEO of Lotus in 2013, things were looking a little desperate. His predecessor, Dany Bahar, had made a hasty departure amidst court cases, the company was losing money hand-over-fist, and it simply hadn’t got the cash to replace its ageing model line-up. Since [...]
Tesla Model X SUV review: Elon Musk takes a break from Mars mission to make a killer self-driving car November 29, 2016 No car brand knows how to build hype like Tesla. This relatively recent start-up (in terms of car manufacturers) has a boss who can generate hundreds of column inches just by tweeting. Every time one of its vehicles is involved in a serious crash, online forums are awash with rumours about the cause. And a [...]
Volkswagen Passat GTE review: The car the autumn statement is out to get November 14, 2016 A few years ago, company car drivers cottoned onto the tax advantages of the hybrid Toyota Prius, with its low CO2 emissions. Then, suddenly, they were everywhere – no longer limited to being the eco-warrior’s favourite mode of transport. The same happened with double-cab pick-up trucks, as company tax rules classed most pick-ups as commercial [...]
Abarth 124 Spider review: We took the high-performance Fiat to Silverstone to find out August 16, 2016 Just 12 years ago, Fiat launched the Stilo Abarth. It’s not a car that the brand’s marketeers would like us to bring up in the first paragraph of this review. It was stodgy, slow, and nowhere near a Golf GTI challenger. But the Stilo wasn’t a true Abarth. Abarth is Fiat’s performance offshoot. Initially an [...]
Audi RS7 Performance review: Is the new super-powered coupé gilding the lily? August 8, 2016 There are very few new cars more desirable than the latest Audi R8. With a 0-62mph time of 3.5 seconds and a top speed nudging 200mph, the £120,000 supercar will out-accelerate almost anything on London’s streets. Even better, it’s packed with enough technology to make even the worst traffic jams that little more bearable. But [...]
