Clarkson in the Sunday Times
30 March 2003, 12:39 PM
#1
Scooby Regular
Thread Starter
Join Date: Apr 2002
Location: Wiltshire
Posts: 869
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Yet another EVO VIII vs STI PPP comparison online here: Sunday Times though you might have to complete (free)registration first.
Copied below as well.
The Sunday Times - Driving
March 30, 2003
Cover story: Test: Jeremy Clarkson: Mitsubishi Evo Vlll and the Subaru Impreza STi
They ain't pretty, but they sure get you going
In the recent British Press Awards a judge described motoring journalism as the least honest thing you'll find in a newspaper.
And you might argue that he has a point, since that's not exactly what he said. But it's close enough.
Well now, let's just examine this claim, shall we? Motoring journalists don't parade prisoners of war on the front cover of their magazines and they don't pay money to policemen for stories and they don't go through Angus Deayton's dustbins and they're not interested in Jade's foal.
There's a very good reason for all this. It's because most motoring journalists spend the working week in southern France, gorging on roast peacock in a light sea-horse sauce.
Motoring journalism is truly one of the world's great jobs. Twice a week, every week, one of the car companies will pour you into the first-class seat of a chartered aircraft that will then whisper you on a cushion of champagne and goose liver to Nice. Or Miami, or Kyoto, or Cape Town. My last passport was filled in just five years with stamps from exotic customs officers all over the world.
Once, in a single first-class 10-day trip to drive a new car that I crashed after five minutes, Daihatsu took me to Hong Kong, Tokyo, Hawaii and San Francisco. And it's important to emphasise at this point that the wining and dining doesn't stop when the jet's turbofans are turned off. The group is then gently shepherded into whatever car is being launched so that they may wobble their way to the nearest 15-star hotel.
Over the years I've been wined and dined by car firms at the Burj Al Arab in Dubai, the Carlton in Cannes, the Regent in Hong Kong, the Fairmont in San Francisco, the George V in Paris, the Arts in Barcelona, the Hyatt in Beaver Creek, the Phoenician in Phoenix, the Byblos in St Tropez . . . there's no point going on because the list is endless.
Once, Alfa Romeo took me to the Cipriani in Venice. It actually had a press launch for a car in a city with no roads.
It was great but I spent so much time flying round the world, wiping swan fat from round my chops with the silken underpants of Vietnamese virgins, that in my first year of motoring journalism I earned £2,100. In the second year that fell slightly, to £1,900.
Today it's the same story. A junior reporter on one of the car magazines can expect to earn £15,000. And yet, unlike anyone else on £15,000 a year, he goes home every night in a different test car, a Bentley perhaps, or a Porsche. He pays no tax for these cars and puts no petrol in their tanks — the car firms take care of that, and the insurance. He doesn't even have to pick the car up. It's delivered to his house, or his office, or any place that takes his fancy.
On Tuesday he'll drive it to Stansted for a Mercedes trip to Vienna. And on Thursday he'll drive it to Gatwick for a Toyota jolly to Helsinki.
Nobody, with the possible exception of Michael Jackson's children, enjoy such a gulf between earnings and lifestyle. Motoring journalists live in one-bedroom flats (usually with nothing for company but their dirty fingernails) but lead a life that would leave Michael Winner breathless. And broke.
They don't even have to buy their own clothes. Because on most of the foreign trips the car firms will hand out branded jackets and shirts and even shoes. This is often in addition to the small gift waiting in your room. A pen perhaps, or a television or, once, an Olivetti computer.
So now put yourselves in the shoes of the poor chap (or chapess, if you prefer). You've been flown to the Mamounia in Morocco to drive a car that you don't like very much. By all means you can go home and write that, but think of the consequences. No more foreign trips. No more shoes. No more press test cars. Just you, in your flat, with your fingernails and the bailiffs. This is not a gravy train, remember. This is the jus de veau blond aux fleurs de thym express. And there's no way in hell that anyone on board is going to pull the communication cord by writing: "This car is crap."
One of the motoring hack pack told me last year, and this wasn't some new boy on Autocar, this was Andrew English from Her Majesty's Daily Telegraph, that: "The car industry needs our help." He was livid because I'd savaged the Vauxhall Vectra again, and that, in the world of motoring journalism, is simply not done.
So why do I do it? Well, when I first got a job on Top Gear (£380 in 1989 rising to £400 by 1991), I became too busy to fly around the world any more. So I joined the small band of motoring journalists out there who drive the car firms' offerings, but don't let the car firms drive their word processors in return. With nothing to lose, I let rip.
There's another reason, too, though. I genuinely like cars. Ho-hum engineering done with one eye on the profit-and-loss account causes my ear lobes to swell up in impotent rage. Fish finger, reality TV, package holiday cars for the uneducated and the uncaring make me as mad as hell.
I know how good cars can be because occasionally I trip over one. Last week, though, was unique because I tripped over two, the Mitsubishi Evo VIII and the new Subaru Impreza STi. Many believe these cars give ordinary, everyday motorists a flavour of what it might be like to drive a fully fledged world championship rally car. Sadly, this isn't the case.
I've driven pukka rally cars and they're absolutely awful; fire-spitting thoroughbreds that pop and bang if you don't treat them roughly and spin if you do. I think it's fair to say that the hardest, most unforgiving and most unpleasant car I ever drove was Colin McRae's Focus WRC. Take it from me, the new Subaru and the new Mitsubishi are infinitely better than their rallying sisters. In fact, I dare say that all things considered they're probably better than any other car on the road today.
No, really, think about it. They are both inexpensive four-door saloons, so you get all the practicality of a vacuum cleaner. And yet, with their trick four-wheel-drive systems and their turbocharged engines, they go with a fizz that's pure rock'n'roll. On the sort of twisting ribbon of tarmac that you dream about in the wee small hours there is no road car made today, no low-slung, knuckle-dragging Ferrari, Lamborghini or Porsche, which could even get close.
I found myself on such a road last week. Built to take Trident missiles to the Faslane submarine base, it was smooth — well, it would have to be really — and blessed with every type of corner you can imagine, along with every type of weather and view. There were tendrils of cloud clinging to mountainsides, sunlight flickering off the loch far below and that vodka-clear air which is such a hallmark of Scotland.
And yet, despite the uncanny transparency of the sky, I saw nothing because I was having far too much fun. There's a big debate raging in the motoring world at the moment over which of these two cars is best. The new Subaru is beefier than the old one and the Evo VIII is a bit more gay than the old Evo VII. So theoretically they've met in the middle.
Not so. The Evo was better on wide open roads and the Subaru was better when things got twisty and bumpy down by the lochside. But I'm talking about microscopic differences between two cars that are utterly, completely, soul-bendingly brilliant.
It's not the power, although 0 to 60 in 4.6sec is obviously pretty intoxicating, and it certainly isn't the style, because neither car has any at all. It's the handling and the grip, the sense that you can take any corner at pretty well any speed that takes your fancy. And it's the feel that comes back at you through the seat and the wheel as the car fights to stay out of the nearest sheep.
If I may be permitted to liken cars to people, most spend their days cleaning the bath and going to work and sewing name tags on children's PE kit. The Evo and the Impreza get all that stuff out of the way before breakfast and then spend the rest of the time having wild, mad, passionate and, it must be said, often illegal sex.
I agree they're not pretty. But you know what people say about ugly birds.
The big question now, however, is this: which one's best? Well, in the past Mitsubishi has taken me to La Residencia in Majorca and an amazing place in Grenada and the Byblos in St Tropez, where I spent all night playing cards with the managing director.
Subaru, on the other hand, has never taken me anywhere. Its press launches are few and far between and normally at a little pub in England. Probably this is because the company that imports them is run by a man called Bob Edmiston who in the past four years has donated £41m of his own money to his Christian charity. So he sends aid round the world rather than motoring journalists. And for that reason alone, I'm going to make the Impreza my winner.
VITAL STATISTICS
Model Mistsubishi Lancer Evo VIII
Engine type Four cylinders, turbo, 1997cc
Power 276bhp @ 6500rpm
Torque 289 lb ft @ 3500rpm
Transmission Six-speed manual
Suspension (front) MacPherson struts, coils springs, anti-roll bar; (rear) multi-link, coil springs, anti-roll bar
Tyres 235/45 ZR17
Fuel mpg 23.5mpg (combined)
C02 334g/km
Acceleration 0 to 62mph: 5.3sec
Top speed 157mph
Price £26,995
Insurance Group 20
Dimensions Height 1450mm, Width 1770mm, Length 4490mm
Verdict Intoxicating, best for wide open roads
Rating
VITAL STATISTICS
Model Subaru Impreza 2.0 WRX STi (with Prodrive performance pack)
Engine type Four cylinders, turbo, 1994cc
Power 300bhp @ 6000rpm
Torque 299 lb ft @ 4000rpm
Transmission Six-speed manual
Suspension (front and rear) inverted struts, coil springs, anti-roll bar
Tyres 225/45 ZR17
Fuel n/a
C02 n/a
Insurance Group 20
Acceleration 0 to 60mph: 4.6sec
Top speed 155mph
Price £26,990
Dimensions Height 1440mm, Width 1740mm, Length 4415mm
Verdict Soul-bendingly brilliant, best on the twisty, bumpy bits
Rating
Copied below as well.
The Sunday Times - Driving
March 30, 2003
Cover story: Test: Jeremy Clarkson: Mitsubishi Evo Vlll and the Subaru Impreza STi
They ain't pretty, but they sure get you going
In the recent British Press Awards a judge described motoring journalism as the least honest thing you'll find in a newspaper.
And you might argue that he has a point, since that's not exactly what he said. But it's close enough.
Well now, let's just examine this claim, shall we? Motoring journalists don't parade prisoners of war on the front cover of their magazines and they don't pay money to policemen for stories and they don't go through Angus Deayton's dustbins and they're not interested in Jade's foal.
There's a very good reason for all this. It's because most motoring journalists spend the working week in southern France, gorging on roast peacock in a light sea-horse sauce.
Motoring journalism is truly one of the world's great jobs. Twice a week, every week, one of the car companies will pour you into the first-class seat of a chartered aircraft that will then whisper you on a cushion of champagne and goose liver to Nice. Or Miami, or Kyoto, or Cape Town. My last passport was filled in just five years with stamps from exotic customs officers all over the world.
Once, in a single first-class 10-day trip to drive a new car that I crashed after five minutes, Daihatsu took me to Hong Kong, Tokyo, Hawaii and San Francisco. And it's important to emphasise at this point that the wining and dining doesn't stop when the jet's turbofans are turned off. The group is then gently shepherded into whatever car is being launched so that they may wobble their way to the nearest 15-star hotel.
Over the years I've been wined and dined by car firms at the Burj Al Arab in Dubai, the Carlton in Cannes, the Regent in Hong Kong, the Fairmont in San Francisco, the George V in Paris, the Arts in Barcelona, the Hyatt in Beaver Creek, the Phoenician in Phoenix, the Byblos in St Tropez . . . there's no point going on because the list is endless.
Once, Alfa Romeo took me to the Cipriani in Venice. It actually had a press launch for a car in a city with no roads.
It was great but I spent so much time flying round the world, wiping swan fat from round my chops with the silken underpants of Vietnamese virgins, that in my first year of motoring journalism I earned £2,100. In the second year that fell slightly, to £1,900.
Today it's the same story. A junior reporter on one of the car magazines can expect to earn £15,000. And yet, unlike anyone else on £15,000 a year, he goes home every night in a different test car, a Bentley perhaps, or a Porsche. He pays no tax for these cars and puts no petrol in their tanks — the car firms take care of that, and the insurance. He doesn't even have to pick the car up. It's delivered to his house, or his office, or any place that takes his fancy.
On Tuesday he'll drive it to Stansted for a Mercedes trip to Vienna. And on Thursday he'll drive it to Gatwick for a Toyota jolly to Helsinki.
Nobody, with the possible exception of Michael Jackson's children, enjoy such a gulf between earnings and lifestyle. Motoring journalists live in one-bedroom flats (usually with nothing for company but their dirty fingernails) but lead a life that would leave Michael Winner breathless. And broke.
They don't even have to buy their own clothes. Because on most of the foreign trips the car firms will hand out branded jackets and shirts and even shoes. This is often in addition to the small gift waiting in your room. A pen perhaps, or a television or, once, an Olivetti computer.
So now put yourselves in the shoes of the poor chap (or chapess, if you prefer). You've been flown to the Mamounia in Morocco to drive a car that you don't like very much. By all means you can go home and write that, but think of the consequences. No more foreign trips. No more shoes. No more press test cars. Just you, in your flat, with your fingernails and the bailiffs. This is not a gravy train, remember. This is the jus de veau blond aux fleurs de thym express. And there's no way in hell that anyone on board is going to pull the communication cord by writing: "This car is crap."
One of the motoring hack pack told me last year, and this wasn't some new boy on Autocar, this was Andrew English from Her Majesty's Daily Telegraph, that: "The car industry needs our help." He was livid because I'd savaged the Vauxhall Vectra again, and that, in the world of motoring journalism, is simply not done.
So why do I do it? Well, when I first got a job on Top Gear (£380 in 1989 rising to £400 by 1991), I became too busy to fly around the world any more. So I joined the small band of motoring journalists out there who drive the car firms' offerings, but don't let the car firms drive their word processors in return. With nothing to lose, I let rip.
There's another reason, too, though. I genuinely like cars. Ho-hum engineering done with one eye on the profit-and-loss account causes my ear lobes to swell up in impotent rage. Fish finger, reality TV, package holiday cars for the uneducated and the uncaring make me as mad as hell.
I know how good cars can be because occasionally I trip over one. Last week, though, was unique because I tripped over two, the Mitsubishi Evo VIII and the new Subaru Impreza STi. Many believe these cars give ordinary, everyday motorists a flavour of what it might be like to drive a fully fledged world championship rally car. Sadly, this isn't the case.
I've driven pukka rally cars and they're absolutely awful; fire-spitting thoroughbreds that pop and bang if you don't treat them roughly and spin if you do. I think it's fair to say that the hardest, most unforgiving and most unpleasant car I ever drove was Colin McRae's Focus WRC. Take it from me, the new Subaru and the new Mitsubishi are infinitely better than their rallying sisters. In fact, I dare say that all things considered they're probably better than any other car on the road today.
No, really, think about it. They are both inexpensive four-door saloons, so you get all the practicality of a vacuum cleaner. And yet, with their trick four-wheel-drive systems and their turbocharged engines, they go with a fizz that's pure rock'n'roll. On the sort of twisting ribbon of tarmac that you dream about in the wee small hours there is no road car made today, no low-slung, knuckle-dragging Ferrari, Lamborghini or Porsche, which could even get close.
I found myself on such a road last week. Built to take Trident missiles to the Faslane submarine base, it was smooth — well, it would have to be really — and blessed with every type of corner you can imagine, along with every type of weather and view. There were tendrils of cloud clinging to mountainsides, sunlight flickering off the loch far below and that vodka-clear air which is such a hallmark of Scotland.
And yet, despite the uncanny transparency of the sky, I saw nothing because I was having far too much fun. There's a big debate raging in the motoring world at the moment over which of these two cars is best. The new Subaru is beefier than the old one and the Evo VIII is a bit more gay than the old Evo VII. So theoretically they've met in the middle.
Not so. The Evo was better on wide open roads and the Subaru was better when things got twisty and bumpy down by the lochside. But I'm talking about microscopic differences between two cars that are utterly, completely, soul-bendingly brilliant.
It's not the power, although 0 to 60 in 4.6sec is obviously pretty intoxicating, and it certainly isn't the style, because neither car has any at all. It's the handling and the grip, the sense that you can take any corner at pretty well any speed that takes your fancy. And it's the feel that comes back at you through the seat and the wheel as the car fights to stay out of the nearest sheep.
If I may be permitted to liken cars to people, most spend their days cleaning the bath and going to work and sewing name tags on children's PE kit. The Evo and the Impreza get all that stuff out of the way before breakfast and then spend the rest of the time having wild, mad, passionate and, it must be said, often illegal sex.
I agree they're not pretty. But you know what people say about ugly birds.
The big question now, however, is this: which one's best? Well, in the past Mitsubishi has taken me to La Residencia in Majorca and an amazing place in Grenada and the Byblos in St Tropez, where I spent all night playing cards with the managing director.
Subaru, on the other hand, has never taken me anywhere. Its press launches are few and far between and normally at a little pub in England. Probably this is because the company that imports them is run by a man called Bob Edmiston who in the past four years has donated £41m of his own money to his Christian charity. So he sends aid round the world rather than motoring journalists. And for that reason alone, I'm going to make the Impreza my winner.
VITAL STATISTICS
Model Mistsubishi Lancer Evo VIII
Engine type Four cylinders, turbo, 1997cc
Power 276bhp @ 6500rpm
Torque 289 lb ft @ 3500rpm
Transmission Six-speed manual
Suspension (front) MacPherson struts, coils springs, anti-roll bar; (rear) multi-link, coil springs, anti-roll bar
Tyres 235/45 ZR17
Fuel mpg 23.5mpg (combined)
C02 334g/km
Acceleration 0 to 62mph: 5.3sec
Top speed 157mph
Price £26,995
Insurance Group 20
Dimensions Height 1450mm, Width 1770mm, Length 4490mm
Verdict Intoxicating, best for wide open roads
Rating
VITAL STATISTICS
Model Subaru Impreza 2.0 WRX STi (with Prodrive performance pack)
Engine type Four cylinders, turbo, 1994cc
Power 300bhp @ 6000rpm
Torque 299 lb ft @ 4000rpm
Transmission Six-speed manual
Suspension (front and rear) inverted struts, coil springs, anti-roll bar
Tyres 225/45 ZR17
Fuel n/a
C02 n/a
Insurance Group 20
Acceleration 0 to 60mph: 4.6sec
Top speed 155mph
Price £26,990
Dimensions Height 1440mm, Width 1740mm, Length 4415mm
Verdict Soul-bendingly brilliant, best on the twisty, bumpy bits
Rating
30 March 2003, 04:09 PM
#2
Scooby Regular
Join Date: Jan 2002
Location: The Muddy Wasteland that is the Thames Estuary
Posts: 318
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
the Subaru was better when things got twisty
[Edited by jimbrit - 3/30/2003 5:10:21 PM]
30 March 2003, 10:44 PM
#4
Scooby Regular
Join Date: Oct 2002
Posts: 1,333
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Two weeks ago I met Clarkson at the mini roundabout, he was probably going to turn left (to his mansion) but wasn't indicating so I paused before going across and in the slo-mo microsecond I could see him checking my WRX out - thankfully it had just had a serious polish and was gleaming like a new pin!
:-)
Mike
:-)
Mike
31 March 2003, 07:33 AM
#5
Scooby Regular
Join Date: Mar 2000
Location: www.karenphillips.co.uk
Posts: 3,154
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
The new Subaru is beefier than the old one and the Evo VIII is a bit more gay than the old Evo VII.
Nice.
31 March 2003, 08:25 AM
#6
Scooby Regular
Fantastic write up, very enjoyable, this made me spit coffee all over my monitor
Love the way Mr Clarkson uses words...
[Edited by Bottomfeeder - 3/31/2003 9:25:57 AM]
....as the car fights to stay out of the nearest sheep.
[Edited by Bottomfeeder - 3/31/2003 9:25:57 AM]
Trending Topics
31 March 2003, 02:41 PM
#10
Scooby Regular
Join Date: Mar 2001
Posts: 628
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
so what is it the 'people say about ugly birds'...?
Usually they put more effort in between the sheets to attract fellas despite looking like pitbulls licking p155 off a thistle is the general opinion.
31 March 2003, 06:29 PM
#12
Scooby Regular
Join Date: Dec 2001
Posts: 547
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
so what is it the 'people say about ugly birds'...?
Thread
Thread Starter
Forum
Replies
Last Post
Mattybr5@MB Developments
Full Cars Breaking For Spares
28
28 December 2015 11:07 PM