AUDI QUATTRO

WE’RE IN THE SCOTTISH BORDERS IN mid-January, not far from Kielder Forest. Officially the temperature is a little above freezing, but it’s the sort of cold that gets deep into your bones. The roads are slicked in a wet grey film of salt and grime, the tarmac mostly smooth but with occasional potholes and the associated scatterings of gravel. It should be made for the Quattro. Only right now I’m struggling to feel it.

I’m tagging along with the main four-wheeldrive group. Deputy ed Towler has offered to lead me to the day’s first photo location, so we’re heading out of Hawick and up into the hills. Adam is aboard the 911 Turbo S – 640bhp, 0-62 in 2.7sec, 205mph, state-of the-art computerised four-wheel drive and winter tyres. I’m in the 40-year-old Audi.

The deficit in power, traction and grip (not to mention driving ability) is considerable. Sure enough, every time the road opens up – and sometimes even when it doesn’t – the Turbo’s fat, silvery, mucky rump blasts off into the near distance, before Adam backs off so I can catch up a little. Then he nails it again.

I’m what you might generously call ‘feeling my way in’. The long drive up yesterday was five and a half hours of mostly motorway, which proved the Quattro to be a