Buckle up for a test drive and keep up to speed with the latest motoring news
Text Ted Macauley,
James Kevin Mac Goris
Ford’s new people carrier is in a Galaxy of its own
Elegant and roomy, the Genk-built Galaxy drives like a dream and is ideal for transporting large families in comfort
Ford, with typically unwavering confidence, trumpets its flagship Galaxy with the invitation: “Travel First Class.” And who would dare argue? Certainly not me after two weeks in the company of the people carrier voted the best MPV of 2007 by BusinessCar magazine.
It took a ride to Cliveden House, one of the Britain’s most prestigious hotels and close to Heathrow, to underpin the claims of Ford’s chief designer Claudio Messale, who says: “It has an energetic and self-assured image.” We arrived with barely a crumple to our clothes after an hour’s stop-start driving along the London orbital M25, such was the room to spread our limbs. Ford may have a point when it boasts that this newest version of the Galaxy has been developed to a new level.
The car, built at the company’s Genk plant in Belgium, cleverly maximises on the comfort levels required to transport seven adults.
We were six, husbands and wives, in all our evening dress finery, heading for a dinner at Cliveden, complete with bulky gifts and bouquets for our hostess’s birthday.
The MPV marketplace is fiercely competitive, with the Renault Espace – to my mind – an easy rider at the forefront. But the updated, uprated Galaxy, with its 32 possible seating configurations, is an elegant and worthy rival for its astute use of space and numerous compartments for stowing your gear. Vehicle engineering manager Jürgen Gagstatter stresses, with justifiable pride: “Our objective was clear from the start, we wanted the car to be a true highlight in terms of flexibility, space and a beautiful interior that make either sitting in it as a passenger or driving it a pleasure.”
Prices for the five-range series start at around €27,500, and the petrol consumption returns and performance are both favourable and impressive. The Galaxy really does the job if moving friends or large families is on the agenda.
TEST DRIVE
Saab SportCombi
James Kevin Mac Goris gets behind the wheel of the Saab SportCombi and experiences a sporting drive for all the family
It may have something to do with glacial creep, or the general lack of volatility associated with cold latitudes and northern climes, but the pace of change in design of Swedish auto maker Saab is generally reckoned to be anything but fast. Compared to the new models, redesigns and facelifts that come out annually from southern manufacturers, Saab appears to have used only half a dozen different basic body shells in its entire 60-year history.
Which makes the new SportCombi a pleasant surprise if you’re expecting – as I was – the same old Saab design masquerading as something new…. Here, in fact, you do get something new – and with a lot of the inconveniences associated with the marque’s quirky appeal either vastly improved or gone altogether.
To try out the delights of the new 1.9 TiD version, I decided to head off en famille to check out the attractions of Spa, home of Belgian Formula 1 – and the surrounding Ardennes, a plateau area in the southwest of the country that’s more than hills but not quite mountains, with a thick coating of evergreen forest that I felt was suitably close to the car’s natural Swedish habitat.
Straight out of Brussels on the E40 down to Liège and the first of Saab’s major improvements became clear. This motorway is known for its appalling surface – it’s one of those concrete slab jobs whose ridges give off a constant hum and there’s an annoying ‘bip’ every 30m as you hit the joints. Knowing Saab’s preference for giving you a hard ride (I guess the engineers used to feel it makes your driving experience more real) I was expecting the worst – but in fact the new suspension and shock-absorber system as well as the higher spec tyres make for an impressive dampening of both road noise and grain, whilst still feeling tight as a drum.
Ride comfort too was much better than my previous Saab experiences, with the usual excellent seat specs greatly appreciated by my teenage gang – in fact their vote of confidence came in the form of saying nothing at all during the one-hour snooze down to Liège, which is most unusual for adolescents who have recently discovered that the world just doesn’t understand them.
On to the Ardennes and, while it’s not quite the Alps, the place throws enough switchbacks and downcurves at you to test the gearbox and suspension fairly thoroughly. Braking in this car is impeccable, and the all-round drive distribution gives it excellent traction. The automatic gearbox isn’t quite adapted to quick or high-rev changes, but there’s a manual option that’s more useful than sporty when you’re doing a lot of changing up and down. Suspension is quite tight which makes for a precise ride, which is good when you’re doing family driving and you don’t want anyone feeling sick.
Looks-wise the 93 SportsCombi is actually more of a head turner than you’d expect… the redesigned front is much more aggressive than it’s predecessor, and the frosted (smoked says the brochure) rear lights resemble nothing more than big chunks of Swedish ice. The almost complete lack of exterior trim gives the car a very clean look and emphasises the upward sweep of the wings from front to back, giving a certain elegance to what is actually quite a blocky shape. And, of course it’s the perfect family car, with space for five adults and plenty of room in the boot.
Absolutely champion
The high-octane, international motorsport event the Race of Champions is to be staged in London this December
Following its success in landing the 2012 Olympics, a Tour de France stage and the spectacular Red Bull Air Race, London has noclinched another big-time international event. It’s the Race of Champions, a high-octane thriller with across-the-board action, featuring drivers from different disciplines but racing identical cars.
Michael Schumacher is set for a comeback in competition with Formula 1 aces David Coulthard and Jenson Button. More than 1,800 tons of asphalt will be laid at Wembley Stadium for a special, one-off track ready for the event on 16th December.
www.raceofchampions.com
DIARY DATES
MotoGP: 4 – Valencia, Spain ++
A1GP: 25 – Sepang, Malaysia ++
Shows: 26 October-3 November
The European Road Transport Show, Amsterdam; ++
26 October-11 November
40th Tokyo Motor Show
On yer bike
Macho movie heroes who’ve made motorbikes their passion and ride with a level of expertise and confidence that eludes the rest of us have topped a poll in a biker survey. Steve McQueen, a spare-time racer whose two-wheeled daredevilry and leap for freedom as the star of the 1963 wartime movie The Great Escape gave him legendary status, was voted the all-time greatest biker in a survey conducted by the Motor Cycle Industry Association.
Fellow bike fanatic actor Ewan McGregor, a tough long-distance rider, was voted the most popular. The Scot beat four-times World Superbike champion Carl Fogarty into second place, with Italian multi-MotoGP champion Valentino Rossi in third place.
In vivid contrast, Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe in his recent movie My Boy Jack is replaced by stuntmen who perform his bike scenes because he doesn’t have a licence yet. Not quite the magic touch after all then.
No comments yet.
