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258 Posts
This is the write up I have place on the Fiat Coupe forum:
"I have never been in the presense of a more menacing looking car. Black, antracite wheels, black and red leather trim. If aliens invaded the Earth, this is what they'd come in. Get in, get comfortable, press the red starter button and the thing rumbles into life. No indication yet of the power - it sounds pretty ordinary (I can see why some of you fit the Miltek Y pipe thingy). After a quick lesson on the transmission I put it in full auto and take to the road.
The car feels huge - great sweeping dash board like a people carrier, big instruments, long bonnet. What struck me first though was how comfortable it was to drive. I cannot understand the journalists who talk about it being too hard - it just isn't. Very firm, yes, but informative and cossetting somehow at the same time. Then I realised there was a comfort ride setting and things became even more serene. What a bunch of crap car writers talk.
The road opens up so I switch to manual (paddles) and give it about 25% throttle in 3rd. There is a little lag, a mutted, distant roar from the front of the car, then suddenly - whap.
OMFG.
That was quarter throttle.
I get another stretch, drop to 2nd and give it about half throttle.
Now i've driven 2 GT3s but didn't really push them hard, and an R8 which I pushed harder but only on one slip road as it was rush hour. This was something else.
The dealer is sat in the back (poor man, there isn't much headroom back there) and let us drive the car for around 10 miles. A roads, twisty B roads and a stretch of the M11. As I got braver I gave it more and more beans "go on, floor it" the guy is telling me and I didn't want to disappoint him. I think I managed full throttle about three times, once from standstill and a couple of times in 2nd and 3rd. It is incredible. Utterly so. It makes the R8 feel slow (which it isn't, trust me) and utterly transforms your impression of what a car can do. The noise at high revs is like something from the engine room of the USS Enterprise going into warp. I've read how a good car seems to shrink around you when you drive it quickly and that's what the GTR does - you don't feel intimidated despite everything around you because you get the distinct feeling that this beast from outer space is on your side. The handling is awesome - completely planted at all times and confidence inspiring with heavy but accurate steering (you get used to the tramlining after about a mile or two). The brakes... a set of lights went red 50 yards ahead and I was doing around 60. It was like hitting a wall.
By the time we got back to the guy's place (a big house in the country with a gravel drive and a garage full of his own cars - Bentley, Ferrari, Mercedes, old Corvette - he's beyond loaded) I had a smile on my face a mile wide.
What a simply unbelievable car."
You guys are very, very lucky.
"I have never been in the presense of a more menacing looking car. Black, antracite wheels, black and red leather trim. If aliens invaded the Earth, this is what they'd come in. Get in, get comfortable, press the red starter button and the thing rumbles into life. No indication yet of the power - it sounds pretty ordinary (I can see why some of you fit the Miltek Y pipe thingy). After a quick lesson on the transmission I put it in full auto and take to the road.
The car feels huge - great sweeping dash board like a people carrier, big instruments, long bonnet. What struck me first though was how comfortable it was to drive. I cannot understand the journalists who talk about it being too hard - it just isn't. Very firm, yes, but informative and cossetting somehow at the same time. Then I realised there was a comfort ride setting and things became even more serene. What a bunch of crap car writers talk.
The road opens up so I switch to manual (paddles) and give it about 25% throttle in 3rd. There is a little lag, a mutted, distant roar from the front of the car, then suddenly - whap.
OMFG.
That was quarter throttle.
I get another stretch, drop to 2nd and give it about half throttle.
Now i've driven 2 GT3s but didn't really push them hard, and an R8 which I pushed harder but only on one slip road as it was rush hour. This was something else.
The dealer is sat in the back (poor man, there isn't much headroom back there) and let us drive the car for around 10 miles. A roads, twisty B roads and a stretch of the M11. As I got braver I gave it more and more beans "go on, floor it" the guy is telling me and I didn't want to disappoint him. I think I managed full throttle about three times, once from standstill and a couple of times in 2nd and 3rd. It is incredible. Utterly so. It makes the R8 feel slow (which it isn't, trust me) and utterly transforms your impression of what a car can do. The noise at high revs is like something from the engine room of the USS Enterprise going into warp. I've read how a good car seems to shrink around you when you drive it quickly and that's what the GTR does - you don't feel intimidated despite everything around you because you get the distinct feeling that this beast from outer space is on your side. The handling is awesome - completely planted at all times and confidence inspiring with heavy but accurate steering (you get used to the tramlining after about a mile or two). The brakes... a set of lights went red 50 yards ahead and I was doing around 60. It was like hitting a wall.
By the time we got back to the guy's place (a big house in the country with a gravel drive and a garage full of his own cars - Bentley, Ferrari, Mercedes, old Corvette - he's beyond loaded) I had a smile on my face a mile wide.
What a simply unbelievable car."
You guys are very, very lucky.
