Autocar: Britain’s Best Driver’s Car 2014

[Zafiro]

The line-up for Britain’s Best Driver’s Car usually assembles itself. There’s a big name, a must-have, which everything else falls easily around.

But not this year. Not since Lamborghini declined, wisely perhaps, to allow any publication to compare a Huracán alongside any other car. So we mulled over a long list of what we thought we should gather for what we informally know as Handling Day.

Usually, we’d then cut that list down to 10 plus last year’s winner. But we realised that the 12-car list was one of the most stonkingly strong line-ups in the competition’s 25-year history, so we left it entirely as it was.

Handling Day is actually three days of testing, photography and video on the road and on a circuit. This year we based ourselves at Castle Combe, Chippenham, within easy reach of decent roads in Wiltshire and surrounding counties. And by decent, we of course mean poorly surfaced and badly cambered as only the finest British roads can be.

The cars:

Alfa Romeo 4C – deserves its chance to show what it can do here.

Ariel Atom 3.5R – most-focused version of the latest Atom.

BMW i8 – more GT than sports car but a must-have for BBDC.

BMW M4 – a 3-series-based M coupé is usually a front-runner.

Chevrolet Corvette Stingray – it’s already impressed us.

Ferrari 458 Speciale – a five-star road test car, but BBDC is full of surprises.

Jaguar F-type R coupé – hardcore V8 coupé with plenty of fans here.

McLaren 650S – a grower, we think, and a force to be reckoned with.

Porsche 911 GT3 – last year’s winner earns itself an automatic recall.

Porsche Cayman GTS – dubbed the best sports car in the world. Let’s see.

Renault Mégane RS 275 Trophy – hot hatchback heaven.

Vauxhall VXR8 GTS – provides the brawny, large-capacity kicks.

 

[Zafiro]

 

[Mafalda]

Ferrari 458 Speciale – 1min 11.9sec
McLaren 650S – 1min 12.9sec
Porsche 911 GT3 – 1min 13.1sec

BMW i8 – 1min 19.4sec
Porsche Cayman GTS – 1min 17.4sec
BMW M4 – 1min 16.8sec


Chevrolet Corvette Stingray – 1min 14.3sec
Jaguar F-type R coupé – 1min 14.3sec
Vauxhall VXR8 GTS – 1min 14.9sec

Alfa Romeo 4C – 1min 17.7sec
Ariel Atom 3.5R – 1min 10.7sec
Renault Mégane RS 275 Trophy – 1min 19.4sec

 

[Rolf]

Here is the result:

We feared for the Alfa Romeo 4C when we planned this feature, but not all of our testers had driven one and there was a chance, we’d heard, that the geometry had been knocked out on the last one we drove. So it got another chance but didn’t take it.

We thought that Jaguar’s F-type R coupé would fare rather better. But Castle Combe is a testing circuit, to which the Jaguar’s front wheels were better tethered than its rears. We like an oversteering car, but when that’s inadvertently in a straight line at 100mph, it’s less amusing.

Also less amusing than it could be is BMW’s M4, whose trick of going as sideways, and only on demand, is combined with too few other abilities to lift it clear of Vauxhall’s VXR8. That its daytime job is being a large saloon means equal ninth is more dignified for it than it is for the BMW.

BMW’s i8 is not a sports car and its handling changes dependent on the state of its batteries. It’s also quite charming, hence a respectable eighth-place finish, just behind the Renault Mégane 275, which we all liked a lot, and the Corvette Stingray, which some of us loved more than others. A better road performance would have placed the ’Vette higher still.

The top five were much harder to separate. McLaren has extracted so much from the 650S’s mechanical layout that it’s difficult to imagine it being better, so engaging is it. It finished a whisker behind the Porsche Cayman GTS, which would have fared better still, we suspect, were this a road-only contest.

Which leaves the top three. Last year’s winner, Porsche’s 911 GT3, occupies the bottom step on the podium. On the road, it feels utterly focused. On a circuit, it feels like motorsport. But even it couldn’t match the Ariel Atom 3.5R, which was unlike anything else on the track but whose unforgiving road nature prevented a few of our testers from placing it high enough to snatch first.

Which leaves the Ferrari 458 Speciale, which, by dint of three judges placing it first and no judge lower than third, takes a very narrow victory. Come the final reckoning, none of us felt it was undeserved.

The final scores:

1. Ferrari 458 Speciale – 16 points

2. Ariel Atom 3.5R – 19

3. Porsche 911 GT3 – 27

4. Porsche Cayman GTS – 33

5. McLaren 650S – 39

6. Chevrolet Corvette Stingray – 43

7. Renault Mégane RS 275 Trophy 54

8. BMW i8 – 64

9=. BMW M4 – 78

9=. Vauxhall VXR8 GTS – 78

11. Jaguar F-type R coupé – 80

12. Alfa Romeo 4C – 93

 

[Betty Swollocks]

PLEASE let this end the comments that Autocar is inherently biased towards JLR!!! The F-Type came second from bottom!!

 

[Betty Swollocks]

Rate my comment "old" all you like when people stop crying "bias".

 

[Sunny]

And Sutcliffe rated the Jag last. And the Vette second!

 

[Betty Swollocks]

And Sutcliffe rated the Jag last. And the Vette second!

Yes, somebody is getting paid by Chevrolet!


Seriously, why don't people cry "bias" when he puts the Corvette 2nd? The simple reason is that when it's JLR people draw a LAZY conclusion and that they're both British so there MUST be bias involved.

Sorry to go on about this, but I find this whole "bias" thing utter clap trap. When that stops then you won't hear me mention it again.

 

[Beemer B773ER]

You always wondered why anyone would buy an i8. Apparently AutoCar thinks it's an all-round better driver's car.

 

[Betty Swollocks]

You always wondered why anyone would buy an i8. Apparently AutoCar thinks it's an all-round better driver's car.

It's also one of the most expensive cars on the test and roughly the same as the 911 GT3. My argument was always "why would anybody buy an i8 FOR THAT PRICE".

 

[Rolf]

You always wondered why anyone would buy an i8. Apparently AutoCar thinks it's an all-round better driver's car.

Yes they rated it better than the M4 as a drivers car! Mmmmm interesting!

 

[Sunny]

Yes they rated it better than the M4 as a drivers car! Mmmmm interesting!

Check my post in i8 thread - http://www.germancarforum.com/threads/bmw-i8.49586/page-27#post-716693.

 

[Cashmere]

McLaren 650S – 1min 12.9sec
Porsche 911 GT3 – 1min 13.1sec

When looking at how comfortable the 650S is a daily driver car, that track time is super impressive. Mclaren really have put out a far more mature product with the 650S compared to its predecessor. No surprise they got rid of the whole MP4-12C nomenclature.

 

[Soup]

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