Inhaltsverzeichnis für December 03/10, 2025 in Autocar

Genesis will offer a full family of variants of its forthcoming mid-engined Magma GT – including a drop-top and a hardcore GT3 road car. Unveiled in concept form, the Porsche 911 and McLaren 720S rival will arrive later this decade as the basis of a new GT3 race car. But while homologation rules for the class require only 250 road-legal versions to be made, Genesis creative director Luc Donckerwolke confirmed that the Korean brand is planning a substantially larger production run. The GT will be the only Genesis vehicle that is offered purely as a hot Magma model from the firm’s new performance line – and Donckerwolke said the version shown so far is “the base model”. “We will add S, GTS, roadster, lightweight, club sport, a GT3 road car,…

ABARTH IS CONSIDERING a return to petrol power with a hot hatch based on the new Fiat 500 Hybrid (driven, p24), the boss of its European arm has told Autocar. Abarth currently sells only electric cars, having discontinued the petrol-powered Fiat 500-based 595 and 695 in August 2024. But customer feedback about the Abarth 500e and 600e has prompted the brand to reconsider its strategy. “The Abarth [customer] wants a combustion engine not only for the power but because Abarth customers fundamentally buy the car and then modify it with their own hands,” said Gaetano Thorel. “On the electric one, you cannot, so for them it’s a limitation. That’s why the Abarth club are not very happy with us.” Indeed, Abarth’s sales have fallen significantly since it discontinued its petrol…

SCOOBY DON’T Ollie Gheerbrant suggests that dogs suffer from EV acoustics (12 November). My 10-year-old Labrador would disagree, riding calmly and quietly in the back of my Volkswagen ID 4 with no ill effects even on the twistiest stretches of the A83, which we drive monthly through Argyll. By contrast, my 2018 petrol Subaru Outback brought on panic attacks marked by high distress and constant hyperventilation. We tracked this down in the end to the Outback’s tendency to pitch very slightly fore and aft on its springs. Perhaps it was the suspension of Ollie’s BMW iX1 that caused his dog problems and not its electric drive. Angus McLeod Via email REALITY BITES The cover of the 13 November 2024 issue featured an Autocar image of the ‘2026 baby Bentayga’. It…

The very existence of this new 500 Hybrid is tantamount to Fiat breaking the emergency glass. Having finally discontinued the petrol 500 in August 2024, it had expected the new-shape, electric 500e to pick up the mantle. What happened instead was an utter collapse in sales, as buyers defected to petrol alternatives such as the Kia Picanto or something larger. That forced the Mirafiori plant – Fiat’s crown jewel, in its home town of Turin – to idle for months, building precisely zero cars and furloughing workers while dealers cleared their surplus of 500es. With the power of hindsight, Fiat Europe boss Gaetano Thorel calls the electric-only move “suicide”. To right the ship, Fiat opted to perform the unprecedented and convert a bespoke EV to ICE power. That meant both…

Four years ago, Cupra tested the bounds of its brand and the market’s appetite for pricier and rarer examples of its wares when it launched the Formentor VZ5. This range-topping, fire-breathing, fivecylinder, high-rise alternative to the Audi RS3 was announced at Cupra’s third birthday party. Martorell built a run of some 7000 of them – but sadly none in right-hand drive. Next year, however, the second coming of the VZ5 will include steering wheels on the right. The run will extend to 4000 this time, an estimated 250 of which are expected to come to the UK. That isn’t a great many cars to move through Cupra’s dealer network but, with prices expected to start at around £60,000, this will be one of the most expensive cars that the brand…

If recent trends are a reliable indicator, we will buy fewer box sets of Christmas cards this year but more individual cards. Following recent increases in the cost of stamps and a growing aversion to posting dozens that will only end up in the bin, box sets of cards are being replaced by email and text. But an electronic message doesn’t really cut it with close family and friends, so to them we’re likely to send a hand-picked card. Amanda Fergusson, head of the Greeting Cards Association, says: “Sending cards is definitely not a dying tradition; it’s a changing one. We’re seeing people put more effort into choosing individual cards for people they love and spending more on them.” Lee Lacey, founder of hansenfineart.co.uk – an online gallery devoted to,…

It’s not long after Paul Aron, Alpine’s Formula 1 reserve driver, arrives in the gym at the team’s Enstone factory that I realise I’m in trouble. “What’s the record?” he asks as the first exercise is explained to us. Turns out Aron is 21, ultra-fit and hugely competitive. Of course he is: he’s a racing driver. Racing drivers are competitive at everything, even when taking on a random car journalist in a fitness challenge. Win? I just want to survive. With hindsight, this was never going to end well. The basic idea was that both racing drivers and car journalists drive cars for a living – and some people insist that you don’t have to be very fit to drive a car. So we wanted to find out how important…

2025 in review 1 Which long-time car maker CEO left the automotive industry this year to lead fashion group Kering, which owns brands including Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent? 2 With which British car maker did bold new EV start-up Forseven merge in April? 3 Which car broke Autocar’s road test acceleration records this year, achieving 0-200mph in 13.0sec? 4 Who took over from Carlos Tavares as CEO of Stellantis? 5 Which Spanish 4x4 brand is making an unlikely return with Chinese backing and a plug-in hybrid pick-up truck? 6 Which two Chinese brands whose names both begin with C were introduced to the UK market in September? 7 Audi launched a new ICE-powered A6 in March, but what was it originally going to be called, before the firm abandoned a…

MILEAGE 2801 WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT Is this the best cheap EV on the market? If you have a scientific background, please look away now. Go on, turn the page; Alex has written about cheap Bentleys. For those of you who are still here, I’m about to deploy some man maths. In my first report, I posited that the Puma Gen-E, currently available from as little as £132 per month with £1800-ish down, might just make fantastic financial sense. Its cost-effectiveness allows you to pump capital into other things. The best bet is probably an S&P 500 index tracker. But maybe you’ve got your eye on a new kitchen or that 2006 Aston Martin V8 Vantage you’ve been stalking on Autotrader. And it struck me as I parked up at…

Dave Partridge bought his Peugeot 106 1.3 Rallye to compete in motorsport events – and then the rules were changed. “I bought it 14 years ago for £450 with the aim of going sprinting and hillclimbing in the up-to-1300cc category,” he says. “I renovated it and fitted Bilstein Group N Tarmac suspension to it – everything I could do in the regulations to hillclimb it. Then they changed the regs and increased the class to 1.6, so I never took it racing.” Perhaps that’s a good thing. The 106 Rallye is a genuine modern classic, sought after by enthusiasts and collectors. Dave’s is a 1995-reg car with 160,000 miles on the clock. “When I bought it, it had blacked-out windows, LEDs in the windscreen washers and a giant spoiler at…

CITROEN SAXO VTS 2000, 46,000 miles, £9990 The VTS was a closer rival to the 106 GTi but is as light, agile and fun as a Rallye. Most Saxos of this era have either been written off or heavily modified, but this one is said to be original. It has had only two owners from new and has an MOT until next April. ROVER MINI COOPER RSP S 1990, 11,500 miles, £26,495 RSP (Rover Special Product) Mini Coopers are rare, S Pack versions rarer still. Cooper S cars eke more power from the 1275cc engine with the help of an extra SU carb, beefier cylinder head and upgraded exhaust. Owned by the same person since 1991, this one looks immaculate. RENAULT CLIO WILLIAMS 1995, 109,000 miles, £21,950 “The Williams is…

Porsche is preparing to adapt its next-718 Boxster generation and Cayman platform to accept petrol engines, in an abrupt U-turn on plans for the models to go EV-only. Production of the fourth-gen Boxster and Cayman ended last month, with new bespoke electric versions due this year. But with EV demand waning, Porsche had already announced it would continue selling “top” variants – tipped to be the RS and GT4 RS versions – of the current models. That was part of a “strategic realignment” that included Porsche rolling back a number of EV plans, taking a £6.65bn hit in the process. Now, senior sources at the company’s Weissach engineering centre have told Autocar that Porsche is also working on returning the petrol duo to the line-up by reverse-engineering the EV-only PPE…

RENAULT IS CLOSE to signing off a four-wheel-drive version of the 4 for production, having engineered a working prototype of the 4 Savane 4x4 concept car. Indeed, Autocar has driven the concept on a beach in Denmark and can report the model already feels fresh from the factory and ready for a place in Renault showrooms. Few details of the prototype have been revealed since it was first seen at the French Open tennis tournament in Paris in the spring. However, the still-unspecified additional, rear motor is smaller than either the 118bhp or 148bhp units that normally power the 4’s front axle. The tracks are 20mm wider, ground clearance is raised by 15mm and there are wider, 215mm tyres. A subtle bodykit helps to further distinguish the 4x4 Savane from…

A PROTOTYPE OF the Mercedes-Benz ‘Little G’ has been spotted testing for the first time. Due in 2027, it will be the new entry point for a wider G-Class range being created in a similar vein to JLR’s Range Rover and Defender brands. These latest images of a camouflaged mule reveal just how much smaller than its siblings the ‘Little G’ will be. The difference in height is especially notable because the test car appears to be shorter than the 1718mm-tall EQS SUV pictured alongside it in one of the spy shots. The standard G-Class is 1969mm tall. As a result, its size could position it as a direct rival to JLR’s incoming Defender Sport, a similarly conceived entry-level SUV. In its design, the ‘Little G’ adopts a similar blocky…

A COOL NEW WAY TO SLASH RAPID-CHARGING TIMES A NEW INVENTION not much bigger than a fizzy drink promises to revolutionise EV battery technology by dramatically reducing rapid-charging times. Independent testing by the Warwick Manufacturing Group (WMG) has demonstrated that Dectravalve – a patented, new liquid-cooling technology for EV batteries developed by British start-up Hydrohertz – can reduce the time taken to charge a 100kWh lithium-iron-phosphate (LFP) battery from 10% to 80% at 350kW from 30 minutes to just 10. For an EV with a battery of that size achieving 3.5mpkWh, that would mean adding around 245 miles of range in the time it takes to grab a coffee. The designers call the system “incredibly cost-effective” and a fraction of the cost of developing entirely new battery packs. They also…

A VISIT TO the Guangzhou motor show recently threw up an important question: does China’s accelerated development point to the future of automotive globally or merely its own? China is leading on battery tech but its gung-ho, bitterly fought and highly cash-intensive battle to appeal to local customers in other areas is widening the gulf to Europe’s car industry. Many of the new models at the show were massive. For example, the new IM LS9, a mid-market, family-oriented, plug-in hybrid SUV, was almost 5.3m long. Chinese cars have always skewed slightly larger, but the gap is growing. The show also laid bare the scale of the race to be first to offer full autonomy. My drive of the current Xpeng P7+ liftback using its supervised ‘guided pilot’ feature demonstrated how…

ROAD TEST YEARBOOK We look back at every single car road tested in 2025, revisit landmark newcomers and reveal our best – and worst – moments of the year WHAT GOES ON AT A CAR LAUNCH – AND WHY? It’s an expensive, complex and high-stakes business. We lift the lid HOW TO SAVE LOTUS Forget electric SUVs: we’ve hatched a plan to make Hethel great again LONG-TERM AWARDS Our writers pick their top cars of 2025. Expect a V12, SUVs, EVs, a tandem two-seater, a van… MOTOR MYTH BUSTING Did a monkey really win a Nascar race? We tackle some of the car world’s biggest mysteries…

It’s strange how national tastes can differ. While the Peugeot 308 is quite a strong seller in Europe, topping best-seller lists in certain countries, Brits don’t seem to care for it. And we can’t just blame it on SUVs: while Volkswagen shifted close to 30,000 Golfs here last year, Peugeot sold only around 4000 308s. That’s despite the 308 being available with the full gamut of powertrains: petrol, hybrid, plug-in hybrid, electric and even diesel. And it being available as both a hatchback and an estate. Is a facelift going to turn its favours around? Probably not. After all, it was a pretty good car before, possessing plenty of style and the sort of fluid ride and handling that we don’t usually get from Stellantis offerings. What has changed? First…

Dacia is replacing the manual, mild-hybrid, four-wheel-drive version of the Bigster with a hybrid (and doing the same with the mechanically identical Duster). Thinking logically, you might assume that to create a hybrid 4x4, the engineers would take the existing hybrid and add an electric motor to its rear axle, because that’s how Toyota does it. But you would be foolish to assume the company that created a hybrid system around a clutchless, four-speed dog ’box would do the logical thing. Instead, the new hybrid 4x4 has been given the same mildly hybridised 1.2-litre turbo petrol triple as the other Bigsters but mated to a six-speed dual-clutch automatic ’box, sending 138bhp to the front wheels alone. Then on the rear axle there’s a 31bhp, 64lb ft motor with a two-speed…

Take advantage of our Christmas offer and buy a gift subscription, or treat yourself from just £38.99, saving £26 on the shop price. Crafted exclusively for those who live and breathe cars, Autocar is the present that will rev up their festive season. SAVE £26 ON THE COVER PRICE 13 ISSUES FOR JUST £38.99 TIME-LIMITED CHRISTMAS OFFER ENDS 29 DECEMBER Order today Call 0344 848 8807 quoting X25STPA Visit www.themagazineshop.com/X25STPA/aca TERMS AND CONDITIONS This is a UK-only offer; for overseas offers, please visit themagazineshop.com/X25STPA/aca or call +44 (0) 1604 251 461. All savings are based on the UK cover price of £4.99 and are correct as of December 2025. Please allow up to 35 days for delivery of your first issue. Direct Debit rates are valid for one year, after…

For the car enthusiast, Christmas is a time of giving – to oneself. And what better gift than a quality used car? To kick off, we’ve suggested five dream motors with which to indulge yourself, but so friends and family can’t accuse you of unseasonal selfishness, we’ve selected a further 20 cars, arranged across four categories, that should cast you in a more charitable light. FORD MUSTANG BULLITT 2019-2020 Hollywood is ripe for car-buying inspiration, and having watched Frank Bullitt give chase through San Francisco, who hasn’t lusted after a ’68 Mustang GT Fastback? You’ll pay around £60,000 for one today. Take the plunge but save it for fun runs, then for your daily driver blow £40k on its modern equivalent, the sixth-gen 5.0 Bullitt special. Beware worn front suspension.…

While Autocar’s road testers exchange exotic key fobs over Christmas lunch at some richly upholstered ale house at the crowded end of Britain, there’s no such indulgence for those of us in Scotland. Here, the mountain must visit Muhammad, because photographer Max Edleston and I have been tasked with sourcing every ingredient of our own, three-course Christmas feast – plus refreshments – direct from its maker north of the border. We have two days to do this, but the where and the wheels are down to us. Accordingly, I’ve lined up visits to some of Scotland’s finest producers of festive fayre. But what to drive? Following earnest discussion, we can’t really be stowing our turkey in a Morgan Super 3’s side-mounted luggage bungees: we need space. On this schedule, a…

A Austin Ant In the late 1960s, Mini creator Sir Alec Issigonis turned to developing a small 4x4 that was intended for military use but which would also spawn a civilian version. Small, tough and designed for military use? You can see why Ant was the perfect name. Sadly, in 1968 British Leyland management canned the project, which was deemed to be too close to the Land Rover. B Mazda Bongo The Japanese one-box van that was launched in 1966 is named after not a drum but a striped African antelope. Fun fact: the bongo is the world’s third-largest antelope and the only species of tragelaphus in which both sexes grow horns. The Mazda Bongo was never offered with horns. Only a horn, operated via the steering wheel, or a dashboard button…

Three years ago, Nissan celebrated building 250,000 Leafs at its Sunderland plant by using one to power a giant Christmas tree, complete with reindeer, outside the factory. There was snow (real, not fake) on the ground too, making the whole scene look very festive – well, as festive as a grass verge next to a chain-link fence and a security hut can look. To use an EV’s drive battery in this way requires the vehicle to have V2L (vehicle-to-load) capability. This enables it to convert the DC current that powers it back to AC, the form it received it in the first place unless it was provided by a DC fast charger. The AC power is drawn via a special adaptor, one end of which plugs into the car’s charge…

Alpine releases so many off-the-wall concepts that they deserve to be turned into something with real-world dimensions. This would be an epic big brother to the A110, making use of what Alpine must have learned during its endurance racing programme. In terms of design, I think the standard Micra falls way short of the Renault 5 from which it’s derived. But if you give the base car an unashamedly shouty Nismo bodykit, then I think it can hold its head up high. Here I combined Subaru’s electric rallycross car with its fairly mundane Sport Mobility Concept, which I thought would provide the brand’s new EV face. I was wrong, but I thought it looked fresh and cohesive, and I loved the idea of a tiny Alpine A290 rival with a…

Where our long-term test cars have been and what they’ve done “It seems to have an integrity to it that the old 3 Wheeler didn’t match” WHY WE RAN IT Because it might just be the most fun car you can drive at any speed Driving a thousand miles a month is normal for a car. It’s not normal, though, for a car like a Morgan Super 3. This car (or rather tricycle) was designed for high days and holidays and fun adventures, not for hopping in and out of and integrating into one’s daily routine. Unless, that is, you just can’t help yourself; can’t resist spreading the joy whenever you nip to the shop. That’s the kind of use I’ve given Autocar’s Super 3 over the past few months,…

The first product of a newly German-owned Bentley needed to be the best in years and it needed to be authentic to the brand. Thankfully, it was both. Having acquired Bentley in 1998, the Volkswagen Group set about reinventing the storied but staid British brand as a thoroughly modern and highly profitable luxury marque to rival Rolls-Royce and Maybach. Bentley now had easy access to up-to-date chassis and powertrain technology and could profit from huge economies of scale. Traditionalists may have baulked, but that was a big factor in making the Continental GT (2003-2011) the most affordable Bentley in a long time – its £110,000 price made possible by shared architecture with the Audi A8 and VW Phaeton. But was it a real Bentley? The figures from our 2003 test…

Porsche’s decision to re-engineer the PPE Sport platform for the 718 line-up has immediate strategic implications for sibling Audi, whose next-generation TT, previewed by the Concept C (below) at the 2025 Munich motor show, is planned to use the same architecture. If Porsche concludes that electric sports cars face limited global demand and that internal combustion remains viable, Audi may face pressure from within the Volkswagen Group to adopt a dual-drivetrain strategy as well. Audi is unlikely to use Porsche’s flat six but several Audi engines – including a four-cylinder, a five-cylinder and potentially a V6 – could theoretically be packaged in a mid-rear configuration using the same structural modifications Porsche is now developing. For now, Audi maintains that its TT successor will be electric-only. But Porsche’s reversal creates a…

The new Genesis G90 Wingback concept previews a wild high-performance estate that is set to go into production as a BMW M5 Touring rival – if there is sufficient demand. The bold reworking of the flagship G90 is officially a concept that demonstrates the abilities of the Korean firm’s One of One bespoke programme and shows how limited-run products could benefit from the new Magma performance arm. The G90 Wingback concept is based on the running gear of the standard 5.2m-long G90 saloon, which was launched in 2021 and is sold in a number of European countries but not in the UK. The G90 is powered by a 3.5-litre turbo petrol V6 with 375bhp or 409bhp, but any Magma-badged production version of the Wingback would be likely to receive a…

Ford is preparing to launch a chunky new ‘Bronco’ SUV in Europe, inspired by its iconic US-market 4x4 flagship. Plans for the model were first discovered by Autocar (3 September), and Automotive News Europe has now reported that the new American-flavoured crossover will be produced in Valencia alongside the closely related Kuga. Ford’s Spanish plant will build the new electrified crossover as an indirect replacement for the Focus hatchback/estate, which was retired last month after 27 years. Now further details have been revealed about this crucial new model, which is due in 2027. It could be the first new car launched by Ford under the leadership of recently appointed Europe boss Jim Baumbick, under whom the company said it will look to “develop products relevant for European customers and drive…

The UK government’s new pay-per-mile tax on electric cars will also apply to plug-in hybrid cars, chancellor Rachel Reeves announced in her long-awaited Autumn Budget. The new charge is set to cost an EV owner who drives 8000 miles around £240 per year, compared with about £480 in fuel duty that an ICE car owner will pay. Reeves also confirmed an end to the 5p fuel duty freeze, changes to the ‘luxury car tax’, extra cash for the Electric Car Grant (ECG) scheme and much more, as we explain here. NEW TAX TO HIT EV AND PHEV DRIVERS The new pay-per-mile tax, called eVED, is being brought in as part of an effort to claw back lost revenue as drivers transition away from ICE cars. The levy is set at…

I’ve been reading with great interest your long-term test of the Volvo EX30. I’d wanted to try an electric car for a while, but the right opportunity never seemed to come up. My previous car, a Macan (my fourth Porsche), was brilliant to drive but far less enjoyable to own. When I began looking at electric options, the Porsche dealer couldn’t have been less interested. The numbers didn’t help either: to match my old Macan’s specification on the new electric version would have cost more than £80,000. Less said about a used Taycan with painful depreciation and killer finance rates. That combination of dealer arrogance and spiralling ownership costs pushed me to look elsewhere – and I liked the look of the EX30. Its cost exposed me to less risk…

It may have had something of a meteoric rise but, given its commercial success especially, few could now doubt the status of Cupra as a leading Volkswagen Group brand. It looked like an experiment back in 2018 – a punt, even. Now, though, it has very much arrived. This year, the group has built its millionth Cupra-branded car. After the launches of the Tavascan and Terramar crossovers, year-to-date production volume for 2025 has surpassed 250,000. And Cupra isn’t just increasingly commercially successful; it’s even being trusted with big strategic product development projects now, doing work on behalf of the whole group. The Cupra Raval is the proof of that. This is the first of four new supermini-sized EVs to be launched over the next year or so, based on a…

LIFE IN GENERAL is more expensive than it was a few years ago. That terrible coffee I had in the airport is £6 I’m not getting back. But there is one thing that’s getting cheaper, and that’s EVs. There’s a fierce price war raging, spurred on by the new grant. When the Peugeot e-308 was launched just two years ago, you didn’t get any change from £40,000. Now we’re driving the new and improved version and it starts at £30,245 – just a grand more than the petrol version. Visually, the changes are much the same as the ICE versions of the 308. Mechanically, the EV also benefits from an upgraded battery. Thanks to denser cells, its usable capacity has grown from 51.0kWh to 55.4kWh, which is similar to what…

You’ve probably clocked a recent rise in BYDs on the road – something that’s no doubt explained by its staggering 547% year-on-year increase in UK sales over the past 12 months. In total, the Chinese giant has shifted around 35,000 cars here in 2025, while last month’s sales helped its market share creep above 2%. And that’s not all, because it also has taken a 7.24% stake in the plug-in hybrid and electric car segment. Impressive for a brand that only landed in the UK around two years ago. Now there’s another new addition to the burgeoning BYD ranks: the Seal 6 DM-i. Not a catchy name by any stretch, but the good news is that it’s an affordable new family car that – hurrah and huzzah – isn’t a…

Christmas is a time of comforting traditions, isn’t it? In our household, Christmas begins in early December with a showing of The Muppet Christmas Carol while we wrestle the Christmas tree into place, before sitting down for baked Camembert and garlic bread. It’s my favourite day of the season. There is, however, another tradition that heralds the true beginning of the Christmas period for us here at Autocar Towers and that is – of course – the road testers’ Christmas lunch. In previous years, we’ve gifted a surprise car to fellow lunch attendees, with mixed levels of gratitude. I’m not sure that road test editor Matt Saunders has yet forgiven me for giving him a brown Volvo estate a few years back. This year, we’ve decided to keep it simple.…

A cough. A splutter. A jet of flame for good measure and the Merlin is prised from its slumbers and into rambunctious life. Many of you, perhaps even most, will have heard one of these engines, at Goodwood or an air show. But unless you’re physically strapped into an aircraft boasting one, you can never claim to have felt one too. But I have. For I am in a Supermarine Spitfire, parked on the grass that forms the infield at Goodwood and, very shortly now, I shall be flying it. We know the Goodwood aerodrome for the wonderful Revival and Members’ Meetings it hosts, but before any of that, it was RAF Westhampnett, a Spitfire base and, indeed, from where the double-amputee flying ace Douglas Bader departed for his final…

It’s 5pm on a September weekday in Guildford, Surrey. For an hour, members of Surrey Police’s Vanguard Road Safety team have been stopping motorists to warn them about the dangers of driving under the influence of drink and drugs, when they strike ‘lucky’ and nab a drug-driver. Clues? His car reeks of cannabis and there’s a box of the stuff on his dashboard. The driver’s saliva is found to contain illegal levels of THC, the psychoactive component of cannabis, set at two micrograms per litre of blood. In light users, THC can remain in the blood for up to seven hours, but in heavier users it’s at least 24 hours. Some users constantly microdose, so the drug never leaves their system. The roadside test, which takes around eight minutes to…

With impressive understatement the John Deere website refers to its 9RX range of agricultural machinery as “high-horsepower tractors”. We always like it when the Christmas road test has a unique claim to fame: the biggest, the newest, the fastest or whatever it might be. And this year’s Christmas road test subject takes that ‘high horsepower’ to a level not seen in – ahem – its field before, because it is the most powerful series-production tractor in the world. Here we have the John Deere 9RX 830, the ‘9RX’ referring to its series model name, with the numeric suffix bearing a loose connection to its power output. There are also 640, 710 and 770 tractors in this range, although they all make more than their named and rated horsepower, because on…

A Nissan Skyline Turbo Super Silhouette racer barrels into the first corner at a hair under full throttle, its comically outsized rear end just beginning to spin out wide as its super-sticky slick tyres concede to the laws of physics and lose grip on the glass-smooth track surface. For a fraction of a second, it looks as if its steely-eyed pilot can pull everything back in line and send the Group 5 icon scrabbling towards turn two at full pelt, in pursuit of another blistering lap record. But then, disaster: the Porsche 911 RSR endurance racer on the inside misjudges its pace on corner exit and careens haphazardly across the track, slamming into the opposite barrier and eventually coming to rest on its roof – whereupon it is brutally impacted by…

I’m a big fan of the Jaguar Type 00 concept that was initially sketched by Massimo Frascella, but it missed being featured here by just a month (I’m sure he’s gutted). However, I believe his TT recreation embodies the design direction in which Audi should be heading. The Concept Three’s taut, sculpted surfaces and crisp lines were intended to appear like they had been shaped from a single sheet of steel. Something this compact and with running gear from the Ioniq 5 N could be an awesome combination. This appeared on my radar after I delved deep into Skoda’s history, as celebrated in our recent Skoda supplement. I think this digital-only concept balances retro and futuristic design with some really characterful styling touches. With some designs, you need only one…

MILEAGE 3442 WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT To see how Volvo is keeping this decade-old SUV relevant I’m afraid I perpetrated rather an annoying crime on Kris Culmer by asking to borrow his new long-termer as soon as he had taken custody of it. It’s just not cricket: he will never get that silky new-car feeling back. But I had real need for a spacious machine with considerable wafting capabilities so sheepishly whisked the gleaming XC90 anyway, returning it 13 days later with 3000 miles added to the odo and fingerprints all over the touchscreen. Apologies, mate. Averaging 230 miles daily for nearly a fortnight is a foolproof method of flushing out the weaknesses of any car. This near-£90k Volvo has some of those, for sure, as well as several strengths,…

AN OWNER’S VIEW BEN RICHARDS “I’ve owned my ’06 GT for four years and have clocked up 25,000 miles, pushing it to 75,000. I bought it knowing the running costs would be astronomical – and they are. My yearly maintenance, even at an independent specialist, is about £4000. But the feeling of the W12 pulling on the motorway is intoxicating. Nothing else feels so solid, so rapid, and so effortlessly luxurious. I’d do it again.” BUYER BEWARE… ■ WATER INGRESS The most notorious and costly fault involves water ingress in the front left-side footwell, which houses large sections of the wiring loom and ECUs. Any evidence of damp, a musty smell, or flickering electronics could mean a massive, £15,000-plus wiring loom repair. ■ AIR SUSPENSION The multi-mode air suspension is…