After three months, Six of the Best has finally succumbed to the modern SUV phenomenon. We hardly need an excuse for doing so given the segments absurd popularity, but we have one anyway. In fact, we have two. The first is that Ben Lowden is on the cusp of fatherhood, and has bought a Kia Sportage to celebrate - quite a downshift for a man who has also owned a Caterham Seven, a Lotus Elise, a Mazda MX-5 and hot hatches too numerous to count. The second is that Sam Liggett has turned 50 (or thereabouts) and needs something easy to get into.
So this is a rundown which celebrates a) Ben buying the wrong car and b) one of the things SUVs are unquestionably useful for. Also it is a nod to a segment absolutely bursting with choice. Yes, much of it is as dull as ditchwater, but some of it is not. Demand from buyers equals investment by manufacturers, and no car (save the electric one) has advanced more in the last decade than the SUV. The third generation of Porsche Cayenne runs hilarious rings round the first.
Of course you can’t have a nearly new Cayenne for our budget because we’ve limited it to £35k - coincidentally the same figure that will buy you the range-topping GT-Line S mild hybrid diesel Sportage that Ben absolutely didn’t stretch to. The challenge is obviously to do better than him in the realm of petrol-powered SUVs, ideally the ones which shake the earth while effortlessly conquering it, and qualify as guilty pleasures. To the classifieds!
As the person in this group probably furthest away parenthood, I cannot accept that I will ever need an SUV. I’ve been impressed by many, but never to the point of actually wanting one. If I were forced to though (as Ben will doubtless claim he has been) it would need to have the broadest possible range of abilities - so naturally I went straight to Porsche. And in particular its selection of V8 Cayennes.
The old GTS has so much to offer. 420hp from a naturally-aspirated 4.8-litre V8 equates to a tremendous turn of pace (62mph in 5.7 seconds) and plenty of character, but the car can also be wonderfully docile, especially with the optional air suspension that ensures great ride quality and refinement - which I assume to be key to lulling a newborn baby to sleep.
The deal is sealed by the Cayenne’s famously car-like handling; it’s the most convincing of the big SUVs thanks to Porsche’s brilliant control weighting and a front-end that that defies the near 2.2-tonne mass. This GTS looks cool as hell, too, with a brooding black on black theme that perfectly suits a burbly soundtrack. If you really need Sports and Utility in the same package, it might as well be the most menacing combination.
SS
What’s the problem with SUVs? Actually, don’t answer that. My problem, as someone with poor spatial awareness and a shocking lack of parking ability, is the sheer size of so many of them. You can’t see out, you drive down the middle of the road for fear of kerbing the 22s and you need a TV studio’s worth of camera to park one. All, typically, for another car that has five doors and seats four.
What I needed for this challenge was a small SUV, but one that boasted the performance of something larger. Step forward, then, the RS Q3. Pretty modest as a fast Audi goes (note the single exhaust, subdued colour and the presence of some tyre sidewall) and also, handily, a little rocket ship. From 2016 onwards the Q3 gained a Performance variant, which this car is, with a tweaked version of Audi’s much vaunted 2.5 TFSI five-cylinder making 367hp - sufficient for a 4.4-second dash to 62mph.
And while it would be daft to expect a gritty, rewarding driving experience, I’ve always found that matters less in the Audis that were never meant to be sports cars. That said, I’ve deliberately chosen a cheaper Performance to allow some modifying budget. Revo’s Stage 2 software can bring anything up to 470hp, there are KW V3 coilovers available for less than £2k and I’ll bet a roofbox can be slotted onto those roof rails when the need arises. Ideal. In fact, I’m surprised Ben Lowden didn’t plump for one - it’s basically a TT RS for the nursery run...
MB
First off, I’d like to point out that my recently acquired Kia Sportage is my wife’s car and not mine - although admittedly I chose it. I would have preferred a sensible family estate, but an SUV was compulsory and with a limited budget, I bought the best thing I could with the largest amount of toys possible to distract me from the very fact we now own an SUV. Having said that, it’s winning me over slowly but surely…
Were I buying something practical on my lonesome, it would have likely been a B8 Audi RS4. Most SUVs don’t offer much more practicality than a hatchback so if I was going to bother getting one, it would have to big enough to fit a spare Ford Ka in the back for when Matt Bird decides he wants to panel beat our EnduroKA race car. Using another EnduroKA race car...
Moreover, every time we visit the CarGurus head office in Boston (Massachusetts, not Lincolnshire), I love wandering the streets and hearing the rumble of V8s around me. The majority of the time, it’ll be a Dodge or a Jeep, and a 6.4-litre Hemi is enough to tempt me over to the dark side. This one may not be as well equipped as my wife’s Sportage, but it’ll certainly make the ground around it shake. And it’ll do nicely for towing duties.
BL
In keeping with my colleagues, I’d be the first to admit that I am not a big fan of SUVs. My wife recalls me telling her that if I had to drive one I would crash it into the central reservation because life wouldn’t be worth living. And that was with a new baby imminent. So this choice is tough.
Consequently I’m going cling to the sports-utility brief and choose the one car I’ve had personal experience of (courtesy of a mate who used it as his Swiss Alpine lodge runaround) the Jaguar F-Pace. I’ve deliberately searched for the quickest possible 0-60mph time within budget, and like the sound of the supercharger you get with the V6 version. Running on dubs with two-tone seats only a mother could love, it has the correct climate buttons to use in all weathers and is quick enough to (probably) prevent suicide. Throw in a panoramic roof and some nice roof rails and you can then stare up towards something more thrilling to jump on when you get to where you are going.
Of course that’s probably the purpose of these overweight lumps - to travel above the crowd, in comfort, with something thirsty under the bonnet, so you can eventually head off and do something more interesting at journey’s end.
PD
Having been a guilty member of the SUV brigade for 10 months now I can grudgingly admit to an appreciation of why the segment is now so popular. We chopped our A class in for a GLC last year on a two-year lease deal and its looking likely that we'll make the same choice again at renewal.
A lofty driving position, fine visibility, comfort on longer trips, decent economy and admirable basic road manners have all contributed to a good report card. I'd still argue that you could fit more stuff in an equivalent estate but apparently the wife doesn't want to drive a "hearse".
If I had more of a say in my life though we'd be swapping out of the GLC into one of these: a 5.5-litre 525hp V8 ML, where the shared badge with our current car is where the similarities end. This particular example seems like good value now it’s shed over £60k in 7 years and is at hatchback money with a full service history and a lot of spec thrown in. I'm not sure I'd fancy my chances parking in the village we live in, but for everything else it would be epic; over-engined, impractical, menacing, thirsty and the perfect antidote for the generic, chintzy school-run SUVs we all love to hate and are made to buy.
SL
My choice is also a protest vote, but less against the SUV class itself and more to do with what £35k won’t buy you. Truthfully the best cars in this segment - and regardless of my colleagues whining, there are good cars to be had - have not yet descended to brand-new Kia Sportage money.
While I disapprove of the look-at-me culture it endorses, the Range Rover Sport SVR is a fabulous thing: fast, sonorous, smooth and, yes, great to drive. It doesn't ignore the fact that it weighs the same as a quarry and is taller than Matt Bird; it turns them into virtues. The last one I drove reminded me of a Baja racer and a VW Golf R. All at once.
But thanks to its popularity and the outrageous sticker price when new, the SVR is still too far upstream. So I’ve gone the opposite way and found a car you should only ever consider buying for one reason. Looks, quite obviously isn’t it. The X6 is famously disliked by anyone who isn’t a current owner, and I hardly need remind anyone that it is the model (alongside its X5 sibling) which marked M GmbH’s entry into the SUV segment - a fact which helped earn it a lot of rancour. But it also delivered its redeeming feature: the twin-turbocharged 4.4-litre V8 which outputs 555hp and does it in such a way as to command a sub 5 second 0-60mph time. That made it just about the fastest SUV you could buy when it launched, and the car has lost none of its brash, nose-thumbing indifference to the naysayers. If you're going to do something, go all the way. Or suffer with a Sportage.
NC
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