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Driving a 510-hp Jag XFR on a dirt track is just wrong. So how come it feels so right
Appearances can be deceiving. Jaguars are for old geezers, aren’t they? And they definitely shouldn’t be spending time on a dirt oval, that most down-home of American automotive playgrounds, should they? But the new XFR most certainly isn’t for the AARP set, and all that it offers can’t be exploited fully on a paved public road.
On the surface, it’s elegant and refined. Yet it also has 510 horsepower capable of tearing the tail loose at a twitch of the stability-control button. It’s a lugubrious Jamaican fast bowler who’s your best friend until he takes to the field and tries to knock your head off.
To test our theory that the XFR is really an old-style muscle car at heart, we decided to take it to Butler Motor Speedway, a three-eighths-mile drifting nirvana near Quincy, Michigan. As a playground for large, overpowered V-8 stock cars, it’s the perfect place—no cops, only one concrete wall to hit—to wring out another overpowered V-8 sedan.
Now, it might seem that taking this $80,000 sports sedan to an oval in the wilds of Michigan isn’t exactly cricket, but then, that game is deceiving, too. To the outsider, cricket is a screwy English game with impenetrable rules, played in bucolic settings by persons dressed in white street clothing. Between jack-rabbit bursts of activity, there’s no action aside from the eating of crustless cucumber sandwiches and the sipping of tea.
But under this veneer of gentility, cricket is a vicious game in which bowlers (they’re called pitchers in baseball) try to maim batsmen with 5.5-ounce balls made of compressed leather and cork and wool that are hurled at up to 90 mph. It’s also a game in which “sledging” is an art form. (Example: A bowler yells at a batsman: “Why are you so fat?” Retort: “Because every time I make love to your wife, she gives me a biscuit.”) And the spectators on the sidelines who are clapping and providing vocal footnotes (but not too loudly) such as “Good show!”—well, they’re drunk. Why else would they turn out for days on end, except as an excuse to go boozing?
Highs: Tremendous straight-line performance, entertaining chassis, elegant styling.
Lows: Hardly a bargain, overly complex driver interface, a bit tight in back.
The Verdict: A hoon in cricket whites.
Full Story: Car and Driver - 2010 Jaguar XFR - Road Test
Video: Car and Driver - 2010 Jaguar XFR - Road Test Video
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