Don't Stop Me Now (24 page)

It’s weird. You climb into what looks like a racing car, and yet it behaves like a family saloon. I think I know why they’ve done this. It’s so they can argue that it is a GT car, a comfortable long-distance cruiser with a boot. And we’ll gloss over the fact that the boot lid needs an Allen key and three burly blokes to remove it.

I was still thinking along these lines when I first put my foot down. Oh. My. God. There’s none of the aural histrionics you might expect from a car that churns out 623 bhp. You just get a savage punch in your kidneys as the huge rev counter explodes round the dial. Bang, you pull the right-hand paddle, and in a couple of milliseconds you have a new gear and a new kind of agony in your spleen. In less than 4 seconds you are past 60 mph and on your way to 205 mph.

It goes like a train, this car; but the most impressive thing is that it also feels like a train; one of those 180 mph TGVs that whistle through France while you sit in silence eating cheese.

Sadly, things aren’t quite so satisfactory in the corners. Where an Enzo is flat and grippy, the MC12 wallows and understeers. And every time you go near the throttle, you’re told via a dash warning panel that the traction control system is keeping you out of the hedge. But hey, driving a car like this with the traction control on is like eating boil-in-the-bag food at the Wolseley. So you turn it off. And once again. Oh. My. God.

When the understeer comes, you give the throttle a tiny nudge to unstick the back end and… whoa, it’s as though the rear wing has been hit with a wrecking ball. Now you’ve got an armful of opposite lock and you know things are about to get messy.

It takes practice, getting this car to power slide. In the same way that it would take practice to get an aircraft carrier to power slide. But it is possible. And it’s worth it, because then you feel the Enzo foundations. The sense of total balance. That said, it’s not as good as an Enzo. It’s not as savage or as exciting. And it’s not as fast. But they only made 399 Enzos, so, if you weren’t one of the lucky ones, the MC12 might appear to be the next best thing.

Yes, it is very, very quick and it will, if you concentrate, blow your mind clean in half in the corners. But you’re always aware somehow that it’s a big, ugly, cobbled-together con trick with no back window. And that for couple of hundred grand less you could have a vastly superior Porsche Carrera GT.

Sure, this car was built to win races. But I’m afraid it fails to win something more important. My heart.

Sunday 27 February 2005

As you read this, a ship called the
Terrier
is forging a path across the bitter north Atlantic on its way from the eastern seaboard of America to the north coast of Germany. I hope she has a smooth and unruffled passage, because in her bowels is something very precious. My brand new Ford GT.

I first drove this 212 mph monster about two years ago in Detroit, and I pretty much knew as I flew home that I simply had to have one. I mean, it was a modern-day incarnation of my childhood dream machine, the GT40, the car that had been built to take a working-class sledgehammer to Ferrari’s aristocratic dominance of European motor sport. And a car that had done just that by winning Le Mans four times on the trot.

Unfortunately, by the time I got round to ringing Ford, it had already had 2,000 serious enquiries about the 28 GTs that would be coming to Britain. It seemed bleak, but I was at journalism college with Ford’s head of PR, so guess what? I was squeezed on to the list of accepted customers between Damon Hill, Martin Brundle, Eddie Jordan and Ron Dennis.

This was certainly the first time I’d ordered anything without having a clue about how much it would cost. But in hushed whispers Ford was saying I should
think along the lines of the Ferrari 360. So that meant a whisker under
£
100,000. And that seemed all right, for the realisation of a dream.

What’s more, as the months rolled by, the dollar weakened until we were teetering on a two-to-one exchange rate. I even started to think it might be under
£
4.50. I was happy.

And then everything started to go wrong.

First of all, the cars went on sale in America, but there was no sign of any coming to Europe. ‘Ah,’ said my friend at Ford, ‘that’s because we have to change the lights and the exhaust system before it can be sold here.’

Now look: the BBC was recently asked to make 18 episodes of
Top Gear
for the American market in which all references to petrol, bonnets, pounds sterling, boots, motorways, footpaths and bumpers were altered.

On top of this, all mentions of Bolton Wanderers and wellington boots had to be expunged. And we did that in a week. So how come it had taken the world’s third-biggest car firm six months to fit its flagship with a new exhaust pipe? Then I was sent a recall notice, saying the front suspension was likely to crumble and that the car must not be driven under any circumstances. Well, that was unlikely, since the parts for mine were still being dug out of the ground.

Then the delivery date slipped from Christmas to Easter, I suspect because Ford in America had lost its atlas and couldn’t remember where Britain was.

And then they announced the price. Despite the whispers and the exchange rate, the car was going to cost
£
120,677 plus
£
2,79° for stripes,
£
1,600 for the fancy wheels,
£
160 for the road fund licence,
£
38 for the first registration fee,
£
25 for number plates and
£
75 for the first tank of petrol. Which at 4 mpg wouldn’t even get me home from the dealership. Gulp.

People kept telling me not to worry because GTs imported privately from the US were being sold in Britain for
£
180,000, and I was still in profit.

But I hadn’t ordered this car to turn a buck.

I’d ordered this car because I have the mental age of a seven-year-old, and I wanted a 5.1-litre supercharged monster to play with.

I know of course that it won’t fit in any parking space and that every penny I earn will be used to feed its fuel injectors. I also know that people will point as I rumble by and say, ‘Ooh look. There goes someone who can’t afford a Ferrari Enzo.’

I know too that it has no satellite navigation, no hands-free phone, no traction control and that the exhaust system, the very thing that has delayed the car for so long, will have to be replaced with the louder, squirrel-killing American set-up.

But I don’t care. I don’t care about the wait, the price or what anyone will think. Because I’m going to be travelling at 3½ miles a minute in the best-looking, most evocative, most exciting, muscle-bound meat machine the world has seen.

And now it’s time to talk about Porsche. Yes, I know I talked about the Boxster last week, and there was a review of the new convertible the week before that, but
I haven’t finished yet. Because I’ve just been driving the bog standard two-wheel-drive 3.6-litre 911.

As you may know, I’ve never really liked the 911 because over the years it’s adhered to a flawed basic premise. That the engine should be in the back.

Yes, as the car squats under fierce acceleration, this layout gives you better traction. But in the bends it becomes a giant pendulum, using the laws of physics to swing you clean off the road. So, as you scream along your favourite bit of blacktop, there’s always been a worry that you’re messing with the forces of nature.

It’s like being an anti-terrorist policeman. You get it right for year after year and nothing happens. But if you get it wrong just once, everyone in London ends up with 14 ears and lungs like walnuts. This makes the job a bit unrewarding somehow.

Now, though, after 40 years of constant development, the rear is held in place as firmly as Lake Mead. Which means the latest models are sculptured proof that, in a battle for supremacy between God and German engineering, beardy is always going to finish second. A modern 911 shouldn’t work, but it does. Brilliantly.

There’s a lightness to the steering that you just don’t get in any other car. It whispers information to your fingertips about what the front wheels are doing and how they’re feeling. Driving a 911 is like making love to someone you care for in the bridal suite of the Georges V Hôtel in Paris. It makes my GT feel like a knee-trembler among the empties outside a Rotherham nightclub.

And, on top of this, a 911 is beautifully made and small,
so you can use it every day. Also, it has two small seats in the back, a usable boot, and prices start under
£
60,000.

This, then, is a 177 mph car that you can choose with your head and your heart. It’ll make love to your fingertips and stir your soul. There is no part of your body that it will not stimulate and caress. But don’t, whatever you do, buy the convertible, because this won’t stroke your penis. It’ll make you look like one.

You can’t, when you’ve got a hair hole, and a gut the size of one of Saturn’s moons, drive through the middle of a populated area with the roof off any car. Trundling along with the sun on your face and a breeze in your hair may feel nice, but it’s as stupid as walking into the Ivy with a 12-year-old Russian hooker. People are going to snigger.

And it’s especially sniggersome in a 911. Because this makes you look like a prize vegetable even when the roof is up.

You see, all convertibles are engineering and dynamic compromises. They are heavier and less stiff than their hardtop brothers. That makes them slower and less wieldy, which doesn’t matter if you’re talking about a cut-down version of a car that wasn’t much good anyway. But it does matter with a 911.

This is a purist’s driving machine, an adrenalin pump. Every last detail was designed to maximise the score on the driver-o-meter. So removing the roof is like removing the laces from your training shoes. It’s only a small change but it ruins everything.

And don’t try to tell me that a convertible Porsche is
more finely honed and more delicate than my big Ford because, while this may be true, I have an answer already prepared. In my GT I shall look like Steve McQueen. In your drop-top 911 you’ll look like Robert Kilroy-Silk.

Sunday 13 March 2005

When Mercedes-Benz announced five years ago that it was going to make a car for everyone, I thought that was a figure of speech. But it seems Mercedes really is endeavouring to provide a different model for every single one of the world’s 6.4 billion people.

If you are an African dictator with a fuel expenses account paid by Bono and the World Bank, you can have a large S-class with a sumptuous and turbocharged V12 engine. If you are a taxi driver in Geneva, you can have the same car, but with diesel power and wipe-down seats. Then there’s the Maybach, which so far as I can tell was made specifically for Simon Cowell.

At the other end of the scale we find the A-class. It was developed after Merc bosses received a letter from a Mr Grant Neville of Huddersfield, who said he wanted a car with two floors and five seats. Fine. Mr Neville was very happy.

But then they got another letter from a Signor Olivio Pagnietta of Pisa, who said he wanted a car exactly the same size as an A-class and with exactly the same number of seats. But only one floor. So they came up with the Vaneo.

We see a similar everyman policy with the E-class saloon. They made a version for some chap in Ottawa
who wanted a top speed of 145 mph. And then a businesswoman from Madrid said she liked the car very much but she wanted a top speed of 143 mph. So they did another model to oblige.

This opened the floodgates, so now there is an E-class with every top speed you can think of. There’s even an E-class with a big Chrysler body on it, called the 300C. And if you want the same car but 250 millimetres shorter, they’ll sell you a C-class, which comes with a range of engines more infinite than space. Does sir want 122 bhp, or 143 or maybe 150? We can also do 162, 177, 192, 218, 229, 255 or 367. Basically, you can pick any number you like.

Now this policy of meeting all requirements, no matter how ludicrous, is extremely good news for you and me. But it is jolly expensive from Merc’s point of view. You see, when someone wrote to say they lived in Paris and wanted a small, easy-to-repair plastic car that could be parked nose-on to the pavement, Mercedes set up the Smart division, which last year lost a reported
£
250 million.

I’m delighted to say, however, that this hasn’t stopped them, a point that becomes blindingly obvious when you look at the range of coupés. There’s the C-class, the SLK, the SL, the CLK, the CLK convertible, and the CL. All of which are available with a choice of 2 million engines and 14,000 option packages.

But this wasn’t good enough for Hans Beckenbaur, a flour merchant from Dortmund, who wanted a car that looked like a coupé but was in fact a four-door saloon.

Mercedes was horrified that he’d exposed a gap in its line-up and immediately set about filling it with the car you see here, the CLS.

It is a Marmite car, I know. You either love it or you’ve put down your book and run from the room, retching. I’m in the love camp.

So far as I’m concerned, this is certainly the most spectacular-looking car Mercedes has made, and possibly one of the all-time greats from anywhere.

Those slim windows and pillarless doors put me in mind of the Batmobile, while the rear lights are similar to the
Starship Enterprise
’s exhaust vents. But the best thing is that the CLS looks more expensive than it is. Prices start at a little more than
£
40,000, which is roughly half what I was expecting them to be.

I almost didn’t want to drive it. I feared that it would be a bit like actually meeting Uma Thurman. It might be a let-down. It might not be able to cash the cheques that its glorious styling was writing.

So I started in the back, where you’d expect the sloping roofline to make the accommodation suitable only for Anne Boleyn. But no. There are only two seats, rather than three, but there is enough room for non-amputees to stretch out and relax. Even I fitted, and I have the body and legs of an ostrich.