Innholdsfortegnelse for July 2017 i Wheels

MAZDA’S SUV family is set to expand with the 2018 arrival of the CX-8. While the backroom wrangling isn’t quite a done deal, Wheels has learned Mazda Australia is confident the CX-8 will form a part of the growing model line-up for the brand that has muscled its way into second position on the sales charts. To be powered by a 2.2-litre four-cylinder diesel, the CX-8 will finally give Mazda a diesel seven-seater as a more fuel-efficient alternative to the petrol-only CX-9. At 4900mm long, the CX-8 is 175mm shorter than the CX-9, yet shares that model’s 2930mm wheelbase. However, dimensions released in a short Japanese media statement reveal the CX-8 will be 129mm narrower than the CX-9 (making it the same width as a CX-5) and with a roofline…

Many would say you have the best job in the world… It is, I really love what I do. It’s always been my passion to become a test driver. I was born in a small town near Sant’Agata and I remember when I saw my first Lamborghini. It was a white Countach and for me it was like a space shuttle. It was amazing, I was so surprised by it. How long have you been a test driver with Lamborghini? I started in 1985, so 32 years ago, and I became test driver in 1993. After that I moved to a different area inside Lamborghini, and since 1998 I’ve been in R&D, which is where we test all the new prototypes. So the Huracan Performante isn’t a new car to…

JULY-AUGUST AUDI Q5 and SQ5; BMW 530e iPerformance; HYUNDAI Sonata facelift; JEEP Grand Cherokee Trailhawk; MERCEDES-BENZ E-Class All Terrain and GLA facelift; MINI Countryman JCW; SKODA Octavia, Octavia RS and Scout facelifts; SUBARU WRX and STI facelift; VOLKSWAGEN Golf 7.5 hatch, wagon and Alltrack, and GTI and R hatches SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER AUDI A5 and S5 cabriolet; BMW 5 Series Touring; CITROEN C4 Picasso and Grand Picasso update; HONDA Civic Type R; KIA Stinger; MERCEDES-AMG GT/GT C roadster and coupe, and GT-R coupe; NISSAN X-Trail diesel; PEUGEOT 5008; SKODA Rapid facelift; VOLKSWAGEN Arteon DUE AUGUST Subaru WRX and STI (August) Updates to Subaru’s all-paw turbo hotshots are set keep the gen-four fresh alongside new-gen mainstream versions. The update will bring ride, handling and steering tweaks, new 18- (WRX) and 19-inch (STI) wheels,…

Missed out on a GTS-R W1 and want to get your hands on a piece of exclusive HSV heritage? The Kiddy Moto Billy Cart requires a smaller investment, is incredibly fuel efficient and apparently “meets all safety standards.” But without a single airbag, brakes that only operate on the rear wheels and a maximum driver weight of 50kg, we’re not convinced. HSV Kiddi Moto Billy Cart $ 199.95 shop.hsv.com.au Not satisfied with offering a car for every niche and sub niche within each of those, M Mercedes is now moving into bicycles and, true to form, the company is not just offering options in one segment, but four. Its mountain bike is the equivalent of a two-wheeled G Wagon, the road bike is the AMG GT R for…

SPECS Model Audi TT RS Coupe 2.5 TFSI quattro Engine 2480cc 5cyl, dohc, 20v, turbo Max Power 294kW @ 5850-7000rpm Max Torque 480Nm @ 1700-5850rpm Transmission 7-speed dual-clutch Weight 1440kg 0-100km/h 3.7sec (claimed) Fuel economy 8.4L/100km Price $137,900 On sale Now NOSTALGIA, according to the old adage, just ain’t what it used to be. But that’s no reason for us not to extend a nostalgic rearward glance at Audi’s history with the in-line five-cylinder engine, given that it now arrives in freshly rejuvenated form here in the second-generation TT RS. Fact is, it’s the turbo five-pot that really defines the RS variant of Audi’s now-iconic coupe, and the moment you hear its raspy, hacking crackle on start-up, you realise it provides the pivotal point of difference between this flagship variant…

Model Infiniti Q60 Red Sport Engine 2997cc V6 (60°), dohc, 24v, twin turbo Max power 298kW @ 6400rpm Max torque 475Nm @ 1600-5200rpm Transmission 7-speed automatic Weight 1784kg 0-100km/h 5.0sec (estimated) Economy 8.9L/100km Price $88,900 On sale Now FOLLOWING on from its underwhelming debut in turbo four-pot 2.0 GT guise late last year, Infiniti has thrown more coal into the Q60 coupe’s engine room in the form of a potent twin-turbo, direct-injected V6. Driving the rear wheels, the Q60 Red Sport’s turbo six brings some much-needed excitement to the Q60 family, with strong low-end pull courtesy of a 475Nm peak torque figure that begins at just 1600rpm, and a linear power delivery maxing out at a segment-leading 298kW. That’s more than rivals BMW 440i and Merc-AMG C43 Coupe, and for…

Model Audi A5 Sportback 2.0 TFSI quattro Engine 1984cc 4cyl, dohc, 16v, turbo Max power 185kW @ 5000-6000rpm Max torque 370Nm @ 1600-4500rpm Transmission 7-speed dual-clutch Weight 1535kg 0-100km/h 6.0sec (claimed) Economy 6.5L/100km Price $81,500 On sale Now FUSE the best bits of Audi’s mid-sizers into one all-rounder and you have the A5 Sportback. A versatile cocktail of passenger space and cargo room draped in dramatic, fastback styling. More than half of all Aussie A5 buyers have opted for the five-door variant since it was added in 2010, three years after the coupe. Unlike the original, the second-generation A5 was developed with a Sportback in mind from the get-go. Less packaging compromise means the new car is better in every measurable way. Its beautiful bodywork sits atop the Volkswagen Group’s…

AS SLIPS of the tongue go, it was telling. “We hope you enjoy...” then a slight furrowing of the brow as Magdalena Morin, Volvo’s senior program director for the 60 series cars mentally translated the right descriptor of the XC60, “this perfect car.” Perfect. That’s quite some billing. Everybody else, lay down your tools, it’s not going to get any better than this. Perhaps you can forgive Morin a certain pride in a job well done. The old XC60 set a heck of a benchmark, having been on sale for nine years, with 2016 – its final full year on sale – netting its highest sales figures. That’s not supposed to happen. The usual template is for cars to shift big numbers in the first three years whereupon buyer interest…

The GT is a brilliant track car; it’s no wonder the racecar was so dominant FORD originally planned to return to Le Mans last year with a Mustang. To mark 50 years since the GT40 placed 1-2-3, avenging Enzo Ferrari’s refusal to sell to the Blue Oval, it wanted to beat the Ferrari 488 GTB and others in the top-tier, production-based LM GTE class. With a muscle car. Today, standing next to the beautiful Ford GT road car we’re about to drive around the Utah Motorsports Campus near Salt Lake City, Ford Performance boss Dave Pericak explains that as the project progressed, so the Mustang Le Mans racer – dubbed Project Silver, after the Lone Ranger’s horse – strayed further and further from the production car. It wasn’t a…

This thing is tiny . It takes up less space on the road than a modern M2 and like all E28s there’s an upright screen, thin pillars and slab of a dash. The wheel in right-hookers is quirkily canted but otherwise it’s a great place to sit. Pedal it with a bit of verve and you’re instantly impressed with the sheer linearity of the engine, helped by a very long travel but instantly responsive throttle pedal. The note is smooth with a gravelly overlay. At loping speeds it sounds like a marmoset on codeine. It’s only when you approach the redline that it really gets a bit testy. The gearchange isn’t to be hurried through the gate and the pedal positioning isn’t great, but the assisted steering…

The trip to Fäviken also got us access to one of the frozen lakes on which Volvo (and every other carmaker) tests its prototypes. Slaloming the V90 around a series of long, drifty, sheet-ice bends with the stability control on, it’s striking how much slip the system allows and how subtle the help is when it arrives. In previous generations of these systems you could feel the brakes firing like machine guns to pull the car straight, or the torque just vanishing, leaving a dead throttle pedal. Now, you barely notice. With the ESP off you can induce lift-off oversteer, but the long wheelbase makes it easy to catch, and you can get back on the throttle for a classic AWD drift with all four wheels spitting snow but the…

CONVENTIONAL wisdom dictates that series parallel petrol-electric hybrids like our Prius work best in inner-urban areas, where the battery-fed motor can more-often take over rather than merely assist the internal-combustion engine. The thing is, we’re neither conventional nor particularly wise, as two sizeable intrastate trips, each taking in hundreds of kilometres, proved. One was work related. The other an extended public holiday getaway. Our Prius’ 1.8-litre Atkinson Cycle four-cylinder engine (which refers to a combustion process that prioritises fuel economy over performance) was indeed working overtime, since there was only limited electric assistance during those long stints, mostly sitting at a safe 106km/h indicated, though occasionally hitting 118km/h, as one friendly policeman pointed out. Besides copping a $300 fine and three points, the upshot was a jump in fuel consumption,…

IT WAS Al Pacino’s character Tony D’Amato, in the classic gridiron flick Any Given Sunday, who told his hapless Miami Sharks how “life is just a game of inches.” He was referring to the footy field, in a spiel that’s regarded as one of the most rousing sporting pep-talks ever filmed, but I recently found myself mouthing his immortal lines as I grunted and gasped, trying to find just one more inch in our Q7’s densely-filled luggage bay. Pacino’s growling Coach D’Amato may have believed “the inches we need are everywhere around us,” but even with the Q7’s third row folded to liberate no less than 770 litres, I was struggling to find them. Shouldering the electronic tailgate shut, I prayed it wouldn’t burst back open in protest, and willed…

BMW’s decision to revive the 8 Series nameplate will spawn a range of sleek, high-powered variants, including a barnstorming M8 flagship. Don’t get too excited for a V12, though. Despite the abandoned M8 project from 1989 having an orchestral bent-12, the modern iteration – seen here in our artist’s impression – will be sticking to a proven eight-cylinder layout, lifted from the forthcoming M5. The reworked 4.4-litre twin-turbo features new turbochargers and fuel injectors compared to the outgoing F10 M5’s powerplant. While the 6.6-litre twin-turbo V12 from the BMW 760i (and shared with Rolls-Royce) would fit under the 8 Series’ bonnet, it’s been deemed insufficiently sporty to meet M division’s lofty performance requirements. The M8 is likely to share the same switchable all-wheel-drive system as the 2018 M5. Interestingly, the…

IF YOU weren’t aware of its significance, the Phantom Black Holden Commodore that rolled down the Elizabeth production line on May 5, 2017 would have looked like any other. Sporting a Chevrolet badge, it was destined for export to the US. But peel back its carpets and you’ll discover an underbody covered in the signatures of the people that made it. The reason? It’s the last car Holden will build in Australia for sale overseas. Holden’s export business, which officially ended on May 5 with the last Chevrolet SS build, bookends a program started in 1954 with a shipment of FJ sedans to New Zealand. In time, Holden-built cars would sell in countries as far-flung as Finland, Nepal and Ecuador. Holden’s left-hand-drive program started with a shipment of FB sedans…

“Inappropriate speed kills, along with poor car maintenance, appalling roads, booze , drugs and mobile phone use” ZERO SENSE If the powers that be increased the police presence on highways (Towards Zero Sense, Redline, May) then this would be a much greater deterrent than hidden speed cameras. But hey, they would be forgoing all that lovely revenue they rake in from hapless motorists doing a handful of km/h over the posted limit! We all know what tack they will take, it is so predictable. Speed kills, they keep telling us, so they must bleed the motorist dry with fines from hidden speed cameras and then they can then say: “Look how much we collected from these irresponsible motorists.” John Reid, Bowral NSW Take a bow, Mr Corby! Once again you’ve…

Model Skoda Kodiaq 132TSI Engine 1984cc 4cyl, dohc, 16v, turbo Max Power 132kW @ 3900-6000rpm Max Torque 320Nm @ 1400-3940rpm Transmission 7-speed dual-clutch Weight 1677kg 0-100km/h 8.2sec (claimed) Economy 7.6L/100km Price $42,990 On sale Now STEVE Jobs made a solid case for the thinking that people don’t know what they want until its shown to them, while the average order at Subway suggests that choice shouldn’t be left to the consumer (Erm, teriyaki chicken, ranch sauce, swiss cheese, carrot and jalapenos... Oookay then.) So massive respect, Skoda, for past attempts at giving the average family the vehicle they need, rather than the one they’re asking for in increasing numbers. Mr Jobs has a high five he’d like to deliver from the grave. Starting with the brilliantly versatile Roomster in 2007…

Model Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV Exceed Engine 1998cc 4cyl, dohc, 16v + two electric motors Max power 87kW @ 4500rpm + 120kW motors combined Max torque 186Nm @ 4500rpm + 332Nm motors combined Transmission Single ratio Weight 1860kg 0-100km/h 9.0sec (estimated) Economy 1.7L/100km Price $55,490 On sale Now THERE’S an energy drink ad on TV with the tagline, ‘The massive hit that improves you a bit.’ And while the MY17 updates for Mitsubishi's Outlander PHEV are not exactly massive, initial impressions on local roads are that they do improve it. Behind a visage that brings the plug-in hybrid Outlander in line with the rest of the range is a largely carry-over drivetrain. However the shift from electric to engine-assisted go has been reworked and refined to remove the previous angry flare…

Model Porsche Panamera 4 E-Hybrid Engine 2894cc V6 (90°), dohc, 24v, twin turbo + electric motor Max system power 340kW @ 6000rpm Max system torque 700Nm @ 1100-4500rpm Transmission 8-speed dual-clutch Weight 2170kg 0-100km/h 4.6sec (claimed) Economy 2.5L/100km Price $242,600 On sale Q3 HERE’S the plug-in petrol-electric Panamera that Porsche really wanted to build. The S E-Hybrid model introduced in 2013 for the mid-cycle update of the 2009 Panamera Gen I, was a mash-up of components borrowed from other Volkswagen Group brands. The first Panamera Gen II hybrid, on the other hand, is all Porsche’s work. Called 4 E-Hybrid it will arrive in Australia in Q3 this year, around six months after the February 2017 launch of the core Panamera models. It has a Porsche co-developed engine and the company’s…

WE’RE AT a point in time of profound change. Australian manufacturing is winding down. Electrification is ramping up. And technology is increasingly taking control. The fast road ahead is anything but conventional. And it is here where our protagonists meet. Assembling an HSV, Mercedes-AMG and Tesla for a large super-sedan head-to-head mightn’t make immediate or obvious sense, especially considering a $140,000 differential between cheapest ($109,490 GTS-R) and dearest (Model S P100D from $251,577). And yet there really isn’t the gaping divide between the rear-drive, supercharged V8 HSV, the all-paw twin-turbo V8 AMG and the all-electric, all-wheel drive Tesla that the specs suggest. Each can warp time and speed while simultaneously accommodating five astonished souls. Each is the ultimate expression of athleticism in their respective spheres. And each one’s worth relative…

IF YOU STARTED at ‘A’ and consecutively assigned letters of the alphabet to the manufacturers most famous for hot hatches, Hyundai would, appropriately as it turns out, fall somewhere around ‘N’. The odd dabble in turbocharging and a likeable (but long-dead) coupe have barely registered in bolstering the 50-year-old South Korean firm’s brand image, so Hyundai has belatedly decided that a proper performance line is in order, starting with the camouflaged hot hatch you see here, the i30 N. Hyundai’s performance ambition is no secret, seeing its WRC cars have been wearing ‘N’ logos for several years now, but this is our first taste of what ‘N’ will mean to its road-going range. This is just a spoonful, though, because we’re driving a pair of not-quite-ready i30 N prototypes on…

SWIRLY-patterned prototype camouflage covers the bodywork of the BMW, but not its underside. Raised a couple of metres above the floor of this workshop well inside the security perimeter of the German company’s south of France proving ground, everything that makes the new M5 a very different car from its predecessor is plain to see… Dirk Häcker ignores the all-wheel-drive hardware; the transfer case, front differential and driveshaft connecting the two. BMW M Division’s engineering chief instead points to the compact block of hydraulics and electronics bolted to the car’s underside just behind the left front wheel. “The most important thing with the M xDrive,” he says, referring to M Division’s version of BMW’s xDrive all-wheel-drive tech, “is not the components and the actuators, it’s more the software. The software…

AS ANYBODY who had a mullet or a perm in the 1980s will tell you, fashion has an awful lot to answer for. People make weird choices in the name of it, and even cars fall victim to it. In the early 2000s a nostalgia craze was plundered by carmakers. Chrysler had the dreadfully underdone PT Cruiser trading on looks alone. Form overlooked function when VW resurrected the Beetle as a four-wheeled handbag around the same time, and numerous other forgettable, fashion-focused vehicles have been and gone. But not every style savvy car is mutton dressed as lamb. Since the Mini brand’s reimagining by BMW in 2001, its playful and accessible city-slicking hatchbacks have fruitfully fused retro style with modern substance far more readily than the glut of other throwbacks.…

IT WAS was back in 2015, somewhere inland from Coffs Harbour on the NSW mid-north coast, that former Wheels staffer Damion Smy and I exchanged ‘the look’. (No, not that look, people. Keep it clean. Family magazine, etc.) ‘The look’ was all that was needed to encapsulate one of the those ‘oh dear, what have they done?’ moments. We were sharing a BMW X1 on the Australian media launch, and Damo was in the passenger seat. For the previous 20 minutes or so, as the craggy but fast backroads pitched the X1 around like a cork in a cranky baby’s bath, neither of us had spoken, but we were both thinking exactly the same thing. Then came a fast, sweeping left, with ripples in the bitumen created by logging trucks…

TWO months in to Mercedes-AMG E43 ‘ownership’ and something terrible happened. I saw another one on the road – a white one – and it looked so good it made me sad. White is the colour this car should be. It lets the blacked out Night Package trim and AMG styling details work so much harder, in ways Understated Grey just can’t. Of course, this car is only on loan. I’m sure the regret would be worse had I spent $160,000 of my own hard-earned, waited (potentially months) for it to turn up, and then realised I’d made a mistake. Which got me thinking – if I did spec my ideal E43, what would I do differently? Not a lot is overlooked as standard. I even smugly discovered when leaving…

1 MORGAN 3 WHEELER 550kg Australia’s lightest car is likely also its weirdest. Some might call unfair advantage, because it’s down a wheel on other cars, but that may not necessarily be a balanced argument. 2 CATERHAM SEVEN 275 590kg The quintessential minimalist sports car packs a diminutive 100kW engine, which might sound weedy, but shoves the Seven from 0-100km/h in 5.5 seconds. 3 KTM X-BOW 790kg It might take a skeletal carbonfibre form but the 220kW turbocharged 2.0-litre Audi engine hidden behind the seats gives this Austrian track champ heavyweight punching ability. You do the math. 4 SUZUKI IGNIS 820kg You don’t have to put upholstery, windscreen and radio in the bin to sneak into this Top Five. Suzuki’s Ignis proves you can be everyday practical without piling on…

LIKE WAR, motorsport accelerates and intensifies the lives of young men, and before the modern era it had a similar attrition rate. You watch the new McLaren documentary knowing that Bruce’s career was compressed into 12 years of Grand Prix racing as a driver, designer, constructor and team manager, five of those with the team that still bears his name. Yet when you see his achievements recounted in this elegant, elegiac film you still wonder how he did it all, and you compare unfavourably your own meagre achievements by the age of 32. You know how it ends, too. But like the Senna documentary, the intensity with which Bruce lived and raced keeps you engaged with his story until that awful, inevitable moment on the Lavant Straight at Goodwood. Fewer…

HIGHLIGHTS Toyota was the big winner in May, dominating the market with a 19.3 percent share. Audi’s A3 (507 sales) and BMW’s 3 Series (256) both had big months for the luxury brands. Kia produced its best month ever with a solid lift from the Cerato, while the Civic bolstered Honda’s fortunes. Australia’s enduring love for the Mustang continues, with 1351 sales in May helping Ford build a 700-car gap on Holden, the largest margin over its traditional rival since Barbie Girl topped the charts in 1997. LOWLIGHTS Kia’s Korean sister brand Hyundai failed to capitalise on May’s strong showing, buyers unimpressed by i30 run-out offers ahead of an all-new model. Land Rover was desperate for the new Discovery, due on sale in June, to plug a growing hole in…

Newly licensed drivers are not created overnight (Towards Zero Sense, Redline, May). If, in their years of on-road experience prior to getting a driver’s licence they are not trained to think about the knowledge, skills and suitable attitudes towards surviving every road trip, then they cannot be expected to instantly turn the situation around when they start driving. As passengers, pedestrians and cyclists, they are constantly exposed to road users behaving dangerously. Any car trip in our cities will reveal pedestrians on their mobile phones crossing the road, cyclists running red lights and drivers going at speeds inappropriate for the conditions. Successfully completing each trip is no accident. Right from a child’s first road trip, survival is the aim. Maybe ‘road safety’ should be renamed ‘road survival’. By the way,…

Model Herrod Performance Ford Mustang GT Engine 4951cc V8 (90°), dohc, 32v, supercharger Max power 500kW @ 6500rpm* Max torque 750Nm @ 4000rpm* Transmission 6-speed manual Weight 1800kg* 0-100km/h 4.5sec* Economy n/a Price $88,945 (as tested) On sale Now *Estimated WITH Ford US having put the kybosh on building any right-hook Shelby GT350 ’Stangs for us muscle-car-loving folk, here is a ‘factory-aftermarket’ solution for anyone who finds that situation unacceptable: the Herrod Performance Ford Mustang GT. As an official Ford Performance Parts distributor, Rob Herrod’s slick operation in Melbourne’s Thomastown knows a bit about making Mustangs meaner. And if you go by the figures, this supercharged 500kW-plus monster puts the official 392kW/581Nm GT350 in the shade when it comes to mumbo. No, it doesn’t rev to 8250rpm, but surely 7000rpm…

Model Mazda 2 GT Engine 1496cc 4cyl, dohc, 16v Max power 81kW @ 6000rpm Max torque 141Nm @ 4000rpm Transmission 6-speed manual Weight 1038kg 0-100km/h 10.5sec (estimated) Economy 5.2L/100km Price $21,680 On sale Now THE MOTTO at Mazda HQ in Hiroshima seems to be that three-letter abbreviations improve everything. The Japanese automaker has thrown a bevy of TLAs at its light hatch in an effort to sweeten the package. Autonomous Emergency Braking (AEB) and the handling-enhancing G-Vectoring Control (GVC) systems are now standard across the range, as is improved Noise Vibration and Harshness (NVH) suppression. A digital radio tuner (DAB+) now features from Maxx up. The most important of these additions is the first. The Skoda Fabia pioneered standard AEB in this segment, but Mazda sells significantly more units that…

 IT’S ODD, but as I stand in the pit lane at Imola and gaze at the empty track, its curved main straight snaking away into the trees, I feel a little disappointed. And a fraction underwhelmed. For a circuit with such a fearsome reputation, I was hoping it’d look gloomier. More menacing. You know, with wisps of fog clinging to barriers shrouded in Senna flags and decaying flowers. That kind of thing. Instead, warm sunlight falls from a clear sky. Birds sing in the woods. And there are children playing in a park outside the Armco. It’s almost…tranquil. Until the first Huracan Performante barks into life. Behind me, a row of growling Performantes wait like jewels in the sun, their jutting noses, swooping rooflines and peacocking rear wings doing their…

JUST because you’re one of the most respected and long-serving senior engineers in the global automotive business, and just because you’ve been peeling off hot laps of the famed Nurburgring for over 40 years, does not make you immune from that exchange we’ve surely all had at one point or another with our life partners. Albert Biermann, 61, who has been serving as Hyundai’s executive vice president for vehicle testing and high-performance development since April 2015, laughs and his eyes sparkle when he recalls how his wife sometimes critiques his driving: “She likes to relax and do her knitting in the passenger seat, so yes, many times, on an autobahn, perhaps in an M5 or M6, maybe at 280km/h and being jolted in a sweeper, she would look at me;…

FIVE YEARS ago I read an article in a foodie magazine in which the writer lost control of his car on an icy road after eating at Fäviken, a tiny, remote restaurant in northern Sweden. “The car is sliding out from under us, gathering speed as it slips down the hill,” Allen Jenkins wrote. “My first thought is that I am going to bleed out in a blizzard at the bottom of a 500ft fall, and no one will know for days. My next thought is: was Magnus Nilsson’s ‘broth of lamb filtered through the forest floor’ really to die for? The answer, after we smash into a barrier and write off the car, is, of course, no. But it was very good.” I’m probably the only person who read…

SERENITY is a good thing in a car. I say this with some authority, having driven everything from a Lotus Elise on a rainy freeway to a Toyota LandCruiser with kids and in-laws aboard on a long country Christmas run. Neither is much fun, although forced to choose the Elise would win out... Those character-building experiences made me appreciate my last month in the CX-9 Azami that little bit more. Sure, the kids were occasionally squawking and bickering, but otherwise peace prevailed. The distinct lack of tyre noise on a country road is a welcome change for a Mazda. After all, serenity is something Mazda owners haven’t always had, courtesy of an early-2000s edict to strip weight (some of it sound deadening) and focus on dynamics. Being designed primarily for…

FAMILIARITY breeds contempt, so they say, but month three with the Astra RS proves that there are exceptions to that cynical maxim. The primary reason why I’ve yet to grow weary of the Astra is the fact that it is an astonishingly well-sorted drive. Scratch that: it’s just plain fun. And how could it not be? With 147kW and a mega-stout 300Nm, the Astra’s 1.6-litre donk has performance metrics that, had it rolled into showrooms a decade ago, would have put it ahead of a Golf GTI for torque and equal to the German hot hatch for power. Meld that considerable muscle with suspension that manages to be both supple and dynamic, and the result is a car with a much feistier nature than its demure exterior suggests. There are…

IF THE name Bizzarrini still sounds to you like a type of pizza or a fictional Italian supercar from Happy Days, you need educating real fast. Giotto Bizzarrini was a renaissance man of the Italian supercar scene through the 1960s. Starting his career as a test driver with Alfa Romeo and then Ferrari, his list of credits spans design and development variously of engines, chassis and bodywork across cars like the Ferrari 250 GTO, the Lamborghini Miura and the Iso Rivolta. As Ferrari’s chief experimental engineer in 1961, Bizzarrini was one of eight key figures who stood up against the meddling of Enzo Ferrari’s wife Laura and was forced to leave the company. After a brief partnership with fellow ejectee Carlo Chiti, Bizzarrini went freelance. One of his first projects…

PETER ‘Pap’ Papanicolaou is one of those characters who seems to have been around automotive publishing since, well, forever. The 53-year-old graphic designer and photographer has had a long career romping through a bunch of independent motoring and motorcycle titles. Pap has in fact spent the past 10 years with Outback, published by bootmaker R.M. Williams. But he’s more than kept his hand in the automotive scene by designing and building, with identical-twin brother Nick, a world-class track-day race car, the Spartan. In typical Pap fashion – like co-founding the odd magazine, or learning photography “because we could never get what we wanted” – the Spartan is the product of curiosity and capability. The brothers grew up in Sydney; their father owning an engineering workshop. “We used to drive around…