Evo Magazine

THERE’S NO ESCAPING IT, THE THRILL of driving is harder to seek out with every passing day. In the pursuit of, quite rightly, catching the reckless and dangerous, every motorist has a higher probability of being snared in the authority’s net. The pro

ONE THOUSAND, SIX HUNDRED AND ninety kilos. No, that’s not a misprint, BMW’s new ‘junior’ sports coupe weighs 120kg more than the previous generation M4. And yes, we’re well aware of the improvements in occupant safety and that economies of scale mea

AT THE END OF 2021 AUDI RATIONALISED the line-up of its R8 V10 supercar. Out went the entry-level quattro and RWD (rear-wheel drive) derivatives and in came the Performance RWD to accompany the Performance quattro that remains at the top of the tree.

THERE ARE CHALLENGING TIMES AHEAD for all car makers. In early 2021, the UK government confirmed that it would ban the sale of petrol- and diesel-engined new cars in 2030. Other governments around the world have announced similar plans with deadlines

AFTER EMIRA COMES ELETRE, LOTUS’S first SUV, first four-wheel-drive car and first electric production car (since you can’t really call the limited-run, £2million Evija hypercar a production model). It’s also the first Lotus to have been designed and

THIS IS IT THEN, THE END OF THE LINE FOR Aston Martin’s penchant for shoehorning twelve cylinders and over five litres of swept volume into the front of its smallest car. The new V12 Vantage marks the end of an era that began 15 years ago and deliver

THE MOTOR CAR IS A COMPLEX DEVICE that burns stuff to produce energy that then moves it along the road. It could originally burn coal, then petrol or diesel as liquid fuels. With the electric car it often means burning stuff at a distance (what I cal

FERDINAND PIËCH’S REIGN AT VOLKSWAGEN was defined by some incredible engineering showboating, from the expensively bespoke Lupo 3L to the exceedingly strange Passat W8. It was also a time of massive self-confidence in the VW brand that saw the people

IT’S BEEN A YEAR SINCE WE FIRST WENT BEHIND THE scenes of RML’s fascinating Short Wheelbase project (evo 286). Since then much has happened. So much, in fact, that we rejoin the team at the Millbrook Proving Ground, where ‘Car Zero’ is undergoing det

READING JETHRO’S COLUMN IN EVO 296, IT IS CLEAR TO me that the beautiful thing about ‘the thrill of driving’ is that it evolves with driver age and time. I recall evo describing the common bond between their readers, from the young person with their

SOME MOMENTS JUST STICK IN THE MIND. It’s early October, 2005, and my feet crunch onto the expansive gravel frontage of a rather grand Tuscan hotel, the sort of establishment that until a year or so earlier I’d been completely oblivious about, before

INVINCIBLE. IT’S THE ONLY WAY TO describe how the BMW M5 CS felt on the recent evo Car of the Year test (issue 293). On narrow, bumpy roads, this huge car seemed small and absurdly agile. When the rain came down and others floundered, the CS cut thro

I POKE MY HEAD THROUGH THE GAP in the hotel room curtains but there’s no great surprise in store: I’ve already been keeping more than one eye on the weather forecast for the last 24 hours, with increasing dispiritedness, and the rapidly scudding clou

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REGARDLESS OF YOUR FEELINGS TOWARDS such vehicles, the rollout of ever faster, more powerful and more extreme super-SUVs isn’t coming to an end anytime soon. The majority understand why manufacturers are hooked on them: they deliver huge profit margi

FOR A GUY WITH A WEBSITE PACKED with such vibrant images, who’s Canon-sponsored (the only automotive photographer on the camera company’s books), who’s the official photographer for Pikes Peak and the Formula Drift series in the USA, LA-based Larry C

I HAVE A FEW ROAD TEST MEMORIES indelibly preserved in my mind. They can be played over and over like Tik-Tok clips but more immersive; I’m in the car and can feel what’s going on. One is of the Mégane R26.R on the Bala to Ffestiniog road (oh, the po

‘THE M15 WAS, WITHOUT A SHADOW of a doubt, the best car we ever made,’ says Lee Noble, not boastfully but with certainty. The handful of journalists who got to drive the prototype in 2006 agreed with him, including Steve Sutcliffe, who wrote: ‘It fee

I’M ABOUT TO FIRE UP THE ASTON after three and a half months of winter hibernation in a local storage unit (the car, that is, not me). There’s a certain frisson, not least because any last trace of Mobil 1 will have long since drained from the cylind

THEY SAY THE BEST THINGS COME to those who wait, and I’ve waited longer than most on the evo team to get a turn behind the wheel of an A110. Having read all the reviews, and witnessed many a road tester doing the ‘delicate steering’ mime while talkin

THE A1 IS A ROAD THAT HAS FEATURED heavily in the Stelvio’s recent adventures. To the north there were two trips, to Durham and then Newcastle, and to the south lay a visit to some quiet B-roads for evo photoshoot duties. Starting with the former, it

DESPITE BEING DARK GREY WITH dark wheels, the Mégane RS would occasionally cause onlookers to swivel and stare. And why not? It’s a great-looking fast hatch, one of the best, I reckon, with its wider yet perfectly blended front and rear arches and wi

‘GIVE IT TIME,’ I WROTE AT THE END OF MY first report on our 2-litre GR Supra. Well I’ve done just that and, I’m glad to report, the relationship is definitely starting to blossom. As it almost always does when you get more familiar with a car and le

SAY HELLO TO OUR CUPRA LEON ESTATE 2.0 TSI VZ3 4Drive 310PS DSG. Quite a name for what is, under the skin, quite a familiar car. Haven’t we just run one of these on evo’s Fast Fleet? Yes, that’s true – but that was a hatchback and front-wheel drive;

LANE SIX AT HEATHROW’S TERMINAL 2 short stay car park is a sneaky barsteward. It knew that I knew that it was there, lurking in the shadows, its entry late and on a bit of an acute angle. I doubt it knows the E63 S has such poor steering lock, but I

IT’S HARD TO IMAGINE A TOUGHER start to life on the Fast Fleet than the one endured by our RS3. Collected from Germany by digital news ed Jordan Katsianis, driven at speeds unsuitable for winter tyres across the autobahn system and then, almost as so

WHERE TO BEGIN WITH THE URUS? I’M sure many of you have already made up your minds about it without even so much as sitting in one. And that’s okay, because perhaps more than any other new car currently on sale, it exists to provoke strong reactions.

HAVE YOU EVER FOUND A PEN THAT makes your writing feel neat and flowing and easy all at once? That’s the feeling of the McLaren GT’s steering. After many cars with electric power steering, the feel and connection of the McLaren’s hydraulic power assi

READING ABOUT ADAM DRIVING A NEW mid-engined Porsche to the top of a hill (see p58), made me think about driving a Cayenne Turbo at 150mph through the night on the way from Stuttgart to Calais. Let me explain. Back in early 2009 Porsche offered evo t