Innholdsfortegnelse for 1912 / 1913 i Auto Express

V502.4 S GEORGE VEDMORE OWNER SINCE: 2022 Approx value: £800 Year: 2004 Engine: 2.4-litre petrol Top speed: 138 mph SOMETIMES, your perfect car will find you, and my 2004 Volvo V50 is one such example. It was gifted to me by a friend who, at the time, had a very similar life to mine, principally that he had a young child and, around his day job, was engaged in a house-renovation project. The V50 has been the perfect family workhorse, offering a safe cabin, allall the child-friendly safety features one would expect to find in a car of its age, asas well as ample boot (and roof) space for transporting materials, and, lest I forget, my dog Olive (pictured). Its compact estate proportions also mean that tight city parking is…

Sport SHANE WILKINSON OWNER SINCE: 2024 Approx value: £5,343 Year: 2015 Engine: 1.6-litre petrol Top speed: 121mph THERE are plenty of cars that’ll leave my Suzuki Swift Sport behind, but this was the last hot hatch to follow the formula of having a revvy, naturally-aspirated engine and a low kerbweight to create maximum fun. As a result, I always emerge from this car grinning like a Cheshire Cat. This is a traditional driver’s car, and you have to work for the power by pushing its 1.6-litre engine hard while changing up and down through a delightful six-speed manual gearbox. Once the momentum has been built, it’s easy to maintain because the handling is superb. You might have noticed that I’ve made some modifications to get it looking and sounding its…

RYAN BIRCH OWNER SINCE: 2024 Approx value: £11,451 Year: 2019 Engine: 2.3-litre turbo petrol Top speed: 155mph I’M quite partial to a hot hatchback. I've owned three so far and my Mk4 Ford Focus ST is undoubtedly the best of the bunch. A twisty country road is its natural habitat. Stick it in Sport mode and you’ll find a massive smile appear on your face. Its playful handling and slick rev-matching gearbox are a sheer delight, all complimented by a meaty induction growl and the occasional tasteful exhaust bang when you’re really trying to cover some ground. It’s a properly fun driver’s car. Settle down, and it’s quiet, practical and surprisingly fuel efficient. My average over 8,000 miles is 37.0mpg. It’s not perfect though. The brakes seem to lack an…

TOM BARNARD OWNER SINCE: 2024 Approx value: £1,000 Year: 2004 Engine: 1.8-litre petrol Top speed: 127mph I CONSTANTLY test car-care products, so there is virtually no point in me having a car that’s pristine. I need something that has tired paintwork and grubby fabrics so I can see if the potions I’m testing actually make a difference. So, when a friend offered me a shabby but solid MG TF at a bargain price, I jumped at it. Like almost all red cars from this era, the lacquer coat is gradually making its exit one flake at a time, revealing the dull paint underneath. But this is great for testing polishes and protective coatings. I also drive it surprisingly often, taking the opportunity to put the roof down whenever it’s sunny.…

THE eighties saw Audi demonstrate the value of four-wheel drive in performance cars. But by the time the nineties arrived, the firm wanted to establish itself as a serious rival to BMW and Mercedes. So, the Coupé that arrived in 1991 paved the way for a new generation of Audis. It was also the basis for the first S performance model, the S2 Coupé that you see here, although it also came as an Avant estate and rare saloon. However, while it was a fresh start, the S2 still had connections with the past. The regular Coupé uses the same platform and running gear as the 80 and 90 saloons, but the S2 turned things up a notch, courtesy of the 2.2-litre turbocharged five-cylinder 20-valve engine and four-wheel drive system…

FOR a completely different take on the nineties performance car, we head north to Sweden and the company that made its name as a safety pioneer. In an attempt to earn some street cred, Volvo went radical, teaming up with the TWR racing team to enter the 850 Estate in the British Touring Car Championship. There was modest success, but the cars themselves became legendary, and the roadgoing version, the T5-R, has earned a similar reputation. Although the racer had to stick to 2.0-litre Super Touring rules, the T5-R was fitted with a 2.3-litre five-cylinder turbocharged powerplant. Porsche was also drafted in to ensure this front-wheel-drive machine delivered more than just straight-line pace. Helping it stand out from the rest of the 850 line-up was the Cream Yellow paint of…

WHILE the MX-5 created a new era of rear-wheel-drive sports cars, the Toyota MR2 flew the flag for mid-engined machines. The second generation was sold for the whole of the nineties, and the combination of sporty looks and Toyota dependability meant it was a fairly popular proposition on the new-car market. Following in the tracks of the wedge-shaped original, the Mk2 (known internally by the model code SW20) was larger and more powerful, while the bodywork was curvier. For most of the nineties, the MR2 was the most affordable mid-engined sports car you could buy. The smooth lines caused some onlookers to refer to the MR2 as a poor man’s Ferrari, and indeed some MR2s have been sacrificed at the altar of kit cars to make knock off Prancing Horse…

ISSUE 1,892 THERE are some of us who believe they can easily pick out an unmarked police car on a busy motorway. But my ride-along with Cheshire Constabulary highlighted how easy it is to fly under the radar, and how driving around incognito opens your eyes to a surprising number of people breaking the rules of the road. Within minutes we witnessed people speeding and overtaking dangerously (Alderley Edge is notorious for reckless drivers blasting around in exotic and high-performance cars) but almost instantly we came across cars that hadn’t been taxed or insured, had been involved in crime and even potentially driven by wanted criminals. All of this was down to the ANPR camera linked to our patrol MINI Countryman JCW’s windscreen, which scanned and ran checks on the…

ISSUE 1,907 EVERY now and then, there’s an automotive event that feels like a game changer – and the Japan Mobility Show in October was one of them. Sometimes, swathes of concept cars show up, other times you’re given unbelievable access to the industry’s most important people – and sometimes you get all of that rolled into one. These manufacturers can sometimes feel like they’re from another world, developing the world’s biggest-selling models without any insights from over here in Europe. We’re often given incredible access to our European favourites, sometimes seeing new models and design mock-ups three, four or even five years ahead of their market launches. But this is rarely the case with the Japanese makers. So when I got the chance to go over to Tokyo and…

ISSUES 1,878, 1,890 EUROPE’S car industry faces a torrent of Chinese rivals and a thicket of regulations. So it was uplifting to tour key British manufacturing sites – Nissan Sunderland, Bentley Crewe and Land Rover Halewood – to witness the fightback. All are preparing new electric production. The most ground-breaking facility is Plant 2, a sprawling gigafactory erected beside Nissan’s hi-tech facility. Owned by Japanese battery maker AESC, Plant 2 will boost the site’s battery output from 1.8GWh to a colossal 15.8GWh, sufficient for around 150,000 Nissans per year. The first beneficiary will be the all-new Leaf crossover, then the electric Juke. A £2.6billion investment has made Bentley’s Pyms Lane site unrecognisable from when I visited pre-Covid. A hi-tech paint shop dominates the perimeter and a new design studio cooks up…

FEATURE 25 SUPERSTAR CARS FOR 2025 ISSUE 1,863 WHILE this list will suggest otherwise, here at Auto Express we mostly like to look forward, not backwards. That’s why we started this year as we do any other, by picking out at our 25 star cars for 2025. Back in January, we teed up the most exciting models due this year, from the Citroen C5 Aircross and Nissan Leaf, to the Audi Q3 and Fiat Grande Panda. Also included was the car that would ultimately be crowned Auto Express Car of the Year at our annual New Car Awards bash in July: the multi-talented Skoda Elroq. Many of the models we picked out have had repeated coverage in the pages of Auto Express over the course of the past 12 months. Whether…

SPECIAL THE BRIT AWARDS ON FOUR WHEELS ISSUE 1,878 WHAT is the state of the British car industry in 2025? Our 36-page special took a deep dive into where all our favourite brands are heading, and why any rumours of the UK losing its way are totally unfounded. We looked at the country’s thriving car factories, starting with Nissan’s Sunderland plant, which is making huge strides when it comes to world-class EV production – both of the cars and their batteries. It’ll be here that the new Leaf and Juke EV will be built in 2026, with Nissan working to localise as much of the manufacturing as possible to keep the cradle-to-grave carbon footprint lean. In subsequent months, the Government’s electric-car grant was announced, incentivising exactly this type of thinking;…

AWARDS ELROQ ON TOP IN NEW CAR HONOURS ISSUE 1,889 FOLLOWING on from the excellent Citroen e-C3’s win in 2024, in July the automotive industry stopped to find out what would be crowned the Auto Express Car of the Year in 2025. As ever, it was a tall order to pick a single winner from a year that’s given us plenty of fantastic new cars in so many segments. The Kia Picanto beat 2024’s winner, the Hyundai i10, to claim victory as the City Car of the Year. Then there was the Honda Civic Type R, bowing out ahead of its last year on sale with a well deserved win as 2025’s champion Hot Hatch. BMW must have been happy with its showing because the 2 Series won Coupé of…

NEWS DACIA HIPSTER CAUSES A STIR ISSUE 1,903 SOMETIMES, a concept car can make waves not because of its crazy design or futuristic interior, but because of what it represents. The Dacia Hipster that we revealed in October is one such a car, given that it previewed to the firm’s customers – and competition – how it plans to build a low-cost EV with the potential of mobilising millions of people across the world. The Hipster was designed to elicit conversation about everything from regulation within the European Union, to the social impact a £13,000 EV would have on European car buyers. One of the main topics it tackled surrounded a new regulation that’s currently being negotiated between the EU and European car manufacturers, with the aim of making cars…

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THE Qashqai has long been a big seller for Nissan, but it has never achieved spectacular results in our Driver Power surveys. The Mk3 model here made its Driver Power debut in 2022 in 57th place (out of 75), before dropping out of the survey in 2023. It was back in 2024 (in 42nd place out of 50), and this year it has climbed to 28th spot. Launched in June 2021, the Qashqai Mk3 came with a turbocharged 1.3-litre petrol engine with 138bhp or 156bhp. Then the e-Power arrived, with a 1.5-litre petrol engine that acted as a generator, so the wheels were driven by a 187bhp electric motor. This variation is potentially capable of 70mpg. Quite a few of the Qashqai owners who took part in this year’s survey…

HOW OUR GUIDE WORKS PERFORMANCE: This is the manufacturer’s claimed acceleration time for a car, and is measured from 0-60mph or 0-62mph (0-100km/h), in seconds. ECONOMY/EMISSIONS/RANGE: Combined WLTP economy in miles per gallon, emissions in grams per kilometre of CO2 and maximum claimed range for EVs. Figures are achieved in the latest WLTP tests, but will vary according to equipment and are unlikely to be representative of everyday efficiency. INSURANCE: Group rating as quoted by the Association of British Insurers. WARRANTY: Next to each manufacturer’s name is the basic warranty period in months and miles for the mechanical parts. EVs and hybrids will have dedicated battery cover. LIST PRICE: This is the on-the-road figure and includes VAT, delivery to dealer, the first 12 months’ of emissions-based road tax, number plates…

JAGUAR’S future starts here. Which is why Auto Express was invited into the inner sanctum of the company’s headquarters in Gaydon, Warwickshire, for a passenger ride in one of next year’s most important new cars, the £120,000-plus, 1,000bhp four-door GT. We climbed in alongside JLR’s ex-Lotus vehicle engineering director Matt Becker for our first taste of one of the most pivotal cars in Jaguar’s history. The black and white zebra pattern does little to hide the scale of the four-door GT, with its long bonnet stretching out into the distance, and the low-slung look carrying over from the Type 00. But opening the frameless doors and dropping into the cabin, it doesn’t feel as low and sporty as it looks. Our passenger ride around a test track has been designed…

THE NEW cut-price Tesla Model Y Standard is now available to order in the UK from £41,990 – some £3,000 less than the previous entry-level version it replaces – or from £299 per month. We were among the first to drive the new Model Y Standard last month (below), before it was confirmed that it was coming to the UK. Despite the price cut, the Tesla SUV is still more expensive than key rivals such as the Renault Scenic, Skoda Enyaq and Smart #5. However, the Model Y Standard is a significant £7,000 cheaper than the Long Range Rear-Wheel Drive version – now called ‘Premium’–itsitsbelow inthe line-up. The Model Y Standard doesn’t feature a lightbar at the front or rear like other trims, and there’s no panoramic glass roof –…

HERE at Auto Express we pride ourselves on the sheer variety of cars we cover - from superminis to supercars. The cars we run at home are almost as varied (supercars aside, sadly), so here’s where we’ve put our money. The ages of our cars are fairly broad, from a classic of the seventies to a two-year-old EV. Many are tasked with different duties too, from carting around dogs to thrilling us on B-road blasts. A balance of head and heart has gone into each purchase. We’ve even given you a glimpse of the next chapter of our car buying journeys with an example of what we’d trade our much-loved motors for. So read on to see what we drive and why we chose them.…

58kWhV2 PAUL BARKER OWNER SINCE: 2023 Value: £18,952 Year: 2023 Powertrain: 58kWh battery, 1x e-motor Top speed: 99mph OUR family transport is a fine example of the consumer value of our long-term tests. Back in 2022, I ran a Cupra Born, in the lovely Rayleigh Red that they don’t offer anymore, and with the bigger 77kWh battery. It slotted really well into family life, to the point where Mrs Barker declared it her favourite of all the cars I’ve run. Yes, it was a bit cosy for longer family trips, but as a second car for work, running kids around town and the occasional trip out to family further afield, it ticked all the boxes. So when our 2010 Mazda 3 decided it was getting tired after a decade of…

D3 SE Lux MAX ADAMS OWNER SINCE: 2025 Value: £2,917 Year: 2013 Engine: 2.0-litre diesel Top speed: 130mph CAN you think of another family hatchback like the Volvo V40 with a five-cylinder diesel engine? Apart from the older C30, neither can I. And due to the collapse of the diesel car market, we probably won’t see its like again, so I thought I’d snap one up. Some may scoff at its Ford underpinnings, but I don’t because it drives as well as a Focus, just with a characterful five-cylinder roar. You can’t knock the piffling £35 annual VED and 50mpg fuel economy, either. Mine needed servicing, had an oil leak, and and the heated driver’s seat didn’t work, but I’ve since fixed all those issues. It’ll be sticking around as…

TOMJERVIS OWNER SINCE: 2023 Approx value: £20,686 Year: 2023 Engine: 1.6-litre turbo petrol Top speed: 143mph “THE SUSPENSION IS SPINE-SHAKINGLY FIRM, ALTHOUGH THIS DOES MAKE THE i20 N FEEL INCREDIBLY POISED ON A TWISTY ROAD” WHAT you see before you is the combined result of a quarter-life crisis and wanting to put one’s money where one’s mouth is. Wind the clock back to 2023 and the Hyundai i20 N had recently been crowned our Hot Hatch of the Year. I was in the market for a new car at the time and tempted by the i20 N. I took the plunge into the deep Performance Blue. Immediately, the first thing you notice is that despite its rather silly appearance, the Hyundai hot hatch is a serious piece of kit. The…

THERE was a lot going on in the nineties. The Internet started to creep across the globe, while mobile phones became smaller and more affordable. In the cinema, blockbusters such as Jurassic Park and Titanic did battle with a new wave of independent movies, such as Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction, and in the music charts, pop groups battled Britpop, grunge, hip-hop and rave culture for success. Famous names such as Princess Diana, Bill Clinton and Nelson Mandela hit the headlines for different reasons, too, but what about the cars? The nineties still saw turbocharging as a performance-car upgrade, whether that was from the factory or as part of the modified scene covered by the likes of Max Power magazine. Electrification was largely the domain of milk floats, while the SUV was…

THE nineties were a period of major upheaval in the timeline of the iconic Porsche 911. The air-cooled engine was finally put out to pasture in 1998 in favour of an all-new water-cooled unit, but before that happened, the 993-generation car went out with a bang. At the very top of the range, the GT cars are pure-bred racers for the road, while the Turbo and Turbo S versions deliver a more refined performance, but still with plenty of character. Although the 993 follows the same basic silhouette as the original 911, especially around the roofline and window frames, the smooth front and rear ends added a more modern look. For the Turbo this was augmented by wider wheelarches and a rear wing that harked back to the original 930…

“THERE IS ADISTINCT LACK OF ELECTRONIC DRIVER AIDS, WHICH IS REFRESHING NEXT TO THECURRENTM5” IF one car company is known for building roadgoing machines with their roots in racing, it’s BMW. After all, the M badge that’s applied to all of its flagship performance machines does stand for Motorsport. The first E28-generation M5 had racing roots, courtesy of the M88 in-line six it shared with the M1 supercar and successful M635 touring car, but the subsequent E34 M5 changed direction, and created a super-saloon template that has defined a whole class of performance car. When the E34 was launched in 1988, it hit showrooms in a period when BMW embraced in-line six-cylinder engines. For the new model, BMW fitted its S38 unit, which was an evolution of the M88 and…

Down 1. One Italian supermini (3) 3. Frank ___, designer of the modern MINI and Fiat 500 (10) 4. British racing car maker of the thirties, forties and fifties (1,1,1) 5. Circular component that rotates to move the car (5) 6. Surname of actor who plays Sonny Hayes in the 2025 F1 movie (4) 9. Mary ___, invented the windscreen wiper in the early 1900s (8) 10. Term for the driver survival shell in a racing car (3) 11. Ibiza and Arona maker (4) 12. Aerodynamic device that promotes overtaking in racing (1,1,1) 16. Car component providing grip on the road (4) 17. Italian luxury sports car brand, famous for its F40 (7) 18. Key part of most modern steering systems, along with pinion (4) 21. Innermost point of a…

ISSUE 1,900 I COULD have picked any number of exotic car launches or fancy features as my highlight of 2025. But instead I’ve chosen one of the many moments where I’ve felt truly proud to work for Auto Express. We beaver away tirelessly to bring you the latest new-car news and reviews, covering every event possible to ensure we’re in the right rooms, speaking to the right people. And nowhere was that more evident than at September’s Munich Motor Show. Four of us travelled to Germany to chat with industry executives, designers, engineers and CEOs, to deliver the inside line on all the important debuts – plus plenty that’s still to come. I unearthed a flurry of articles while chatting to Volkswagen’s top brass. The biggest of which came by…

ISSUE 1,878 MY highlight of 2024 was testing the Hyundai Ioniq 5 N around the mountain roads north of Barcelona. This year I’ve picked the same place, but a different car. Getting to Spain to drive Morgan’s new Supersport before lunch required me to get up at 3am, something I had no issue with because I’d seen the car at the firm’s Malvern base a few months before. I thought if it drove as well as it looked then I’d be in for a treat. I can’t stress enough how much I adore the styling of the new Supersport; I lost count of the amount of times I pulled over to try and capture its best angles. Having driven the BMW Z4 and Toyota Supra before with the same engine and…

DRIVEN GRANDE PANDA DOESN’T DISAPPOINT ISSUE 1,868 THE Fiat Grande Panda was one of 2025’s most hotly anticipated new models, so when the opportunity came about to drive it so early in the year, we simply couldn’t wait – we were on that flight to Italy faster than you can say “Ciao, Bella!” Having sold more than 7.8 million examples over three generations, the Panda is an incredibly important nameplate for the established Italian car marker. Each version, dating back as far as 1980, had a “simple, unfussy yet masterful execution of both form and function” – as our man explained at the time. The new car is available with a choice of petrol and electric powertrains, but it was the latter we tried first in Issue 1,868. Fitted with…

DRIVEN Dolphin Surf electric city car makes waves ISSUE 1,884 TWO years after it was unveiled, the BYD Seagull finally hopped off the slow boat from China, with the electric city car sporting a starting price of less than £19,000 and a new name: the Dolphin Surf. Apparently the swap was because Brits aren’t the biggest lovers of seagulls, but we were certainly fans of this sharp-looking EV that felt more spacious and sophisticated than you might expect for the price. We also liked the smooth, refined driving experience, nearly 200-mile range and low running costs. FEATURE Manual models are an endangered species ISSUE 1,884 AUTO Express proved the death of the manual gearbox isn't a petrolhead conspiracy theory, after data we collected showed that a dwindling number of cars…

BIG CHANGES INSIDE FOR MK2 VW T-ROC NEWS ISSUE 1,897 AN integral part of Volkswagen’s line up, the T-Roc was given a thorough overhaul for its second generation in 2025. But when we went out to Munich, Germany, for a closer look earlier this year, it was evident VW had played it safe – the Mk2 T-Roc was a classic case of evolution rather than revolution. While the exterior of the new T-Roc might have passers-by thinking not much has changed, the same can’t be said about the interior. There’s heavy influence from the latest Passat and Tiguan; on the dashboard you’ll find a 10.2-inch touchscreen or, on higher-trim versions, a 12.9-inch unit instead. We were pretty impressed with the new cabin of the T-Roc, both from our initial viewing in…

NEWS TWINGO KEEPS RENAULT ON A RETRO ROLL ISSUE 1,908 RENAULT’S been playing a blinder with its retro-inspired small cars over the past 12 months. First, to much fanfare, came the supremely talented Renault 5, with the more practical but just as loveable R4 arriving towards the middle of this year. But nothing could prepare us for the fabulously striking, yet incredibly relevant new Twingo. That relevancy is important, because at first glance we questioned its place alongside the R5 and R4: why did Renault need another battery-electric small car? But a quick look at the ‘just-right’ tech specs and it all made sense. A smaller battery and motor, dinkier dimensions and a proposed £17k starting price? This was the car to truly democratise electro mobility. Using the same AmpR…

325i Touring ALASTAIR CROOKS OWNER SINCE: 2025 Value: £2,500 Year: 2004 Engine: 2.5 petrol Top speed: 147mph I’VE previously owned the E36 and E91 models that sandwich this E46, so I thought it was only right to complete this significant corner of BMW’s 3 Series history. The reasoning I pitched to myself was that my MINI JCW long-term test car wasn’t suitable transportation for my two dogs, so naturally an estate was the only other viable option. Yet in the month or so I’ve owned it, the dogs have enjoyed precisely zero trips in the BMW, while they’ve been in the back of the MINI several times. Luckily, the E46 has other benefits. Firstly, it’s a manual. Secondly, it’s a six-cylinder. The steering is spot on, the ride is much…

3.0SDiesel GEORGE ARMITAGE OWNER SINCE: 2025 Approx value:£5,274 Year:2014 Engine: 3.0-litre V6 diesel Top speed:155mph CHOOSING my Jaguar XF was easy. After selling my old BMW Z4, my next purchase needed to be fuel-efficient, but I also wanted a car with soul, something that made me smile every time I walked back to it. That’s why the Jag is so perfect. When it came out, the XF was, in my view, the most beautiful executive car on the market. Plus, the 3.0-litre V6 produces 271bhp, allowing the XF to reach 60mph from standstill in 5.9 seconds – there’s substance to back up the exquisite style. You wouldn’t expect a Jag like this to be economical, but on a recent trip to Manchester and back it covered 250 miles on a…

PETE BAIDEN OWNER SINCE: 2022 Approx value: £16,118 Year: 2022 Engine: 58kWh battery, 1x e-motor Top speed: 114mph BACK in 2021, we named the Hyundai Ioniq 5 as our Car of the Year. I drove it at the time, and fell in love with it. It’s great to drive, and even better to look at. But the Ioniq 5’s biggest feature is just how much interior space it’s got. There is so much room inside that you’d be forgiven for thinking you were in an Ioniq 9 instead. And everything is customisable for your needs. Need a bigger boot? You can simply move the rear seats forward and free up extra space. Despite it being an almost perfect family car, it does have one major problem – the lack of…

Fast Ford fans adore the brand’s roadgoing version of the model built to conquer rallying FORD has been intertwined with motorsport ever since the dawn of the motor car. Over the years, the brand has enjoyed success at Le Mans, in Formula One, the Indy 500, NASCAR, touring cars, and, of course, rallying. The Escort has played its part on the rally stage – it’s where the Escort Mexico earned its name – and in the nineties the RS Cosworth arrived to maximise Ford’s chances on the special stages. But all is not what it seems, because while the Cossie looks like a Mk5 Escort with a crazy bodykit, under the skin it was essentially a Sierra Cosworth. That car blitzed the opposition in touring car championships, but its size…

LOOKING back at the history of Aston Martin reveals a company that has had plenty of ups and downs, but the DB7 was a car that marked the dawn of a new era for the British luxury marque. However, it actually wasn’t originally meant to be an Aston, because the initial development work was conducted by Jaguar. You see, both companies were owned by Ford at the time, and when Jag couldn’t make the numbers add up to build a replacement for the XJS, Tom Walkinshaw (whose TWR outfit ran Jaguar’s successful Le Mans sportscars at the time) picked up the project and repackaged it as a new ‘entry-level’ model (for want of a better description) for Aston Martin. And the Jaguar connections didn’t end there, with the DB7 being…

IN the world of performance cars, the late eighties and early nineties was witness to an arms race between car makers as they attempted to break the 200mph barrier and then aim for ever-higher top speeds. But in Japan, Mazda took a completely different approach to the idea of making a car that’s fun and entertaining to drive. Using classic British sports cars such as the MGB and Lotus Elan as inspiration, a team of engineers and designers set about reviving the front-engined, rear-drive roadster, and the result has gone on to be the best-selling open-topped two seater in history, the MX-5. You can see the original MX-5’s inspiration from every angle, with the rounded nose and pop-up headlights taking cues from the Elan, while the proportions would do justice…

ISSUE 1,911 NOT long ago, if I had admitted that my highlight of the year was driving a Ford Focus, my colleagues would have put me in a padded cell. Times change. The news earlier this year that Ford was axing the famous nameplate swept me away on a wave of nostalgia. Back in the mid-nineties I was a very junior member of the Auto Express team. At that time we had a burgundy ‘office’ Ford Escort Mk5. Indeed, I have some fond memories of using it for the 1995 Glastonbury festival, but in truth that was only because literally nobody else wanted to drive it. Then, three years later everything changed. The Mk1 Focus’s revolutionary curves and brilliant driving experience set the family-car benchmark for years to come. Another…

ISSUE 1,871 FOR all of the amazing drives I had this year, my highlight boiled down to a choice between two. Although I’m unlikely to ever drive something as expensive or as powerful as the £2million, 2,000bhp Lotus Evija again, there’s something about a V12 Ferrari that’s impossible to overlook. That’s especially true if it’s being driven, roof-off and, unlike the Evija, not near Norwich, but along the stunning Atlantic roads of Portugal. The 12Cilindri Spider is simply a divine performance car, because of its incredible looks, unbelievable Grand Tourer credentials (its ride comfort is spookily good considering the roadholding), but most of all, that engine. It’s hard to know what is more special: the performance offered up by the 6.5-litre V12, or the spine-tingling noise it makes when using all…

ISSUE 1,912 A LATE-November shoot near Ipswich does not sound like a photographer’s highlight. After all, I get to travel to some great locations and snap some great cars. However, sometimes the Essex boy in me comes to the surface. In my youth, Ford produced some crazy cars, and I wished I could own one. Thirty years later, I’m yet to take the plunge, so the next best thing is shooting one. The Ford Escort Cosworth shot with the Audi Quattro as the sun set behind them like an eighties ad was a real highlight, and a quick blast in the Focus RS down the runway made me feel young again. “FORD MADE SOME CRAZY CARS, AND I WISHED I COULD OWN ONE. I HAVEN’T TAKEN THE PLUNGE”…

ISSUE 1,901 HIGHLIGHT might be a bit too strong a word for my pick, but one day in particular certainly stood out. Fresh from judging at the 2026 Towcar of the Year test with the Caravan and Motorhome Club, and being impressed by the towing ability of the EVs that we had lined up, we decided to see exactly how a caravan affects electric range. So we hitched a Bailey Unicorn to a Kia EV9 and attempted to drive 198 miles from Bailey’s Bristol HQ to the tip of Cornwall and Land’s End. But as soon as we hitched the caravan, the EV9’s range halved, so grand plans of doing the run in one go quickly went out of the window, and a marathon test of endurance ensued. There was…

NEWS VW REGAINS ITS EV SPARK ISSUE 1,873 NOT satisfied with promising a sub-£25,000 EV next year with its new ID. Polo, VW revealed its most ambitious electric-car project yet in the new ID. Every1 Concept back in March. This cute show car foreshadows a future city-sized model, probably called ID. Lupo, due in 2027 with a proposed £17,000 starting price. But for VW this is more than just an exercise in building a cheap electric car; it’s a display of how much the German brand is committed to creating EVs for the European masses. To be built on the MEB+ platform that’s about to be used under the new ID. Polo, this A-segment model should have a battery size of around 35 to 40kWh, powering the front wheels via…

NEWS NEW KIA SPORTAGE ISSUE 1,885 WE already considered the latest fifth-generation Kia Sportage to be among the best SUVs on the market, and we’re certainly not the only ones. It was the second most popular car in the UK in 2024, dominating the segment-defining Nissan Qashqai and only narrowly pipped to the top of sales charts by the Ford Puma. So the arrival of the new and improved version was one of the most important moments for us in 2025. The Sportage was already one of the most striking cars in its class, although the Battlestar Galactica-esque face wasn’t to everyone’s taste, and didn’t have that much of a resemblance to the other Kias. So as part of its mid-life nip and tuck, the Sportage received a new front…

NEWS MUNICH SHOW STARS DECK THE HALLS WITH STYLE ISSUE 1,899 THIS year’s Munich Motor Show certainly didn’t disappoint. Indeed, it was difficult for us to know where to look at times. Audi brought along its stunning Concept C – a sleek two-door coupé widely reported as a successor to the iconic TT. The production version will herald the introduction of Audi’s new design language, with CEO Gernot Döllner insisting the company “won’t show studies anymore. Every concept we show will have a production design behind it”. Elsewhere, Renault pulled the covers off its new Clio. Despite the Renault 5 grabbing all the headlines over the past year or so, a new Clio is always a huge moment in the automotive world; we’d spied the sixth-generation car testing a few…

VOLKSWAGENID.BUZZLWB STEVE WALKER HEAD OF DIGITAL CONTENT ISSUE 1,891 IS it a campervan? That’s the thing people ask you most when you drive a Volkswagen ID. Buzz – and people really do like to ask you stuff about this car. The answer was no, but that didn’t take the shine off my time with VW’s massive MPV in the slightest, and the Buzz did indeed come into its own on holidays and camping trips. As someone who subscribes to the holiday packing policy of “if it fits, you might as well take it with you”, the long-wheelbase Volkswagen’s 1,340-litre boot with the third-row seats folded down felt like an open invitation. It’s amazing how much you can get inside and even I didn’t get close to its capacity. It’s a first-rate…

TESLA is one of the world’s youngest car makers, yet it’s by far the most valuable. It’s worth nearly 20 times as much as General Motors and Volkswagen, and at least three times as much as Toyota. People love or hate the brand in equal measure. Whatever your views on the world’s most talked-about car company, its products are incredibly efficient, while the ownership experience is massively improved by having access to Tesla’s Supercharging network. When Tesla’s first mainstream car arrived, the Model S, it put the cat among the pigeons. Its most recent product, the Model Y, did the same when it hit the British market almost four years ago. As always, the new arrival attracted plenty of vitriol – but not from owners or professional reviewers, so how…