Month: April 2013

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Monday Car Courreges

Jessica We have reached Le Mans and it feels like I have been cocooned in a Courrege car, the all off-white interior with black trim feels luxurious, and a little futuristic (as it may have looked from the sixties).  The spirit of Courrege and his engineering background not only reflect the interior of the BMW but the spirit of invention, daring and technological prototyping that is intrinsic to Le Mans.  It is a fitting coincidence that we have this particular car in black with a white interior for this trip.

Jessica and BMW 640d Convertable at Le Mans

Opening the roof is pure Stanley Kubrick as the whole car takes charge with a series of window moves, automatic folds, lifts and sounds of hidden mechanisms, where you the driver become infinitely secondary to proceedings.

So far I am throroughly enjoying this car, it is intuitive, feels safe despite the speed possibilities and is far removed from what you would imagine a diesel car to be and if you consider Audi won Le Mans in a diesel hybrid there is definitely more to come.

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Sunday – Le Mans. Twinned With Bolton

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Jeremy After a day at sea yesterday, CarCouture has swept in to Normandy, home of the greatest motoring endurance race in the world. The Le Mans 24 Hours will celebrate its 90 anniversary this June and we’ve brought the BMW 6 Series Convertible to any petrolhead’s favourite French city.

To be truthful, the outskirts of Le Mans has little to recommend it. The 6 Series stood out like a diamond necklace at a fairground. With British number plates, it wasn’t always a welcoming smile either. However, the centre itself is incredibly beautiful. A walled Plantagenet city on the side of a hill, the BMW squeezed through narrow streets originally designed for horse and cart with surreal grace.

Jessica has a sore back after being bundled over by a runner on a pavement in London last week, so we’ve travelled down from Cherbourg with the 6 Series suspension on ‘Comfort’ mode. I’m itching to slip into ‘Sport’ because the 640d obviously packs a mighty punch for a large car. It is such a sophisticated touring machine, I could have quite easily carried on driving across Europe until we reached the Med.

Favourite features so far? Head up display on the windscreen, which can be usefully programmed to project our speed in KPH, rather than MPH, auto-dip headlights and the shape of the convertible roof. It has flying buttresses, like Le Mans Cathedral itself.

BMW hasn’t won at Le Mans since 1999 but tomorrow we are going out with a pro driver around the Bugatti Circuit in something interesting. More when I’m managed to settle my stomach afterwards.

And yes, Le Mans is twinned with Bolton. Not even the tourism office here knows why…

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Friday – Conflict of Interest

593863_P90102781_highResJessica There are a range of contrasting emotions evoked by the Mini GP ….

On one hand, it sits there looking the epitome of a boy racer toy, something that a young lad would aspire to which, as a parent, would fill me with cold dread. On the other hand, it is a Mini and it does look rather dashing with its sporty flashes of red and matching mini spoiler with gimmicky wheels (move over Herbie).

Does that make me a secret boy racer? Or have Mini managed to make a ridiculous car appealing to a wide range of speed merchant tpyes?

Once inside, I feel a little mutton dressed as lamb. Especially as I strap myself in with the racing red seat belt and see the vast Mini centre display with red stitch detail around every part of the dashboard, presumably to make me feel it is worth spending £29,000 on a little car.

It certainly takes me back to friends of my youth, who had old Minis as first cars. I seem to remember then that everything seemed fast and they certainly did not have anything like the power of this little monster.

I must say though that driving it does bring a smile to the face. It is remarkably like driving a go-kart (in a great deal more comfort) with super responsive steering and handling. Yes it is fun, I could not keep the grin off my face … The great thing is it feels like you are going fast without breaking the law, so there is little need to test the impressive speed available.

Ultimately, I feel I should be a disapproving parent but the GP is fun. I should also be a little over the hill to be enjoying the frivolity of it all but ridiculous though the car may seem on first viewing, it is a little gem. I’m rather sad I did not have my enough time for own Mini GP adventure with it this week, a missed opportunity…

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Thursday – Too Many Horses…

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Jeremy I’ve spent the day interviewing Pippa Funnell – the equestrian rider who is probably Britain’s most successful, three-day event sportswoman.

Driving the Mini GP 100 miles to her Surrey stud was hard work, especially on the motorway stretches where noise levels are high. Then snow started to fall and the hills around Forest Green are riddled in deep, back crunching potholes. Not pleasant in a car with such robust suspension.

Exchanging the GP’s 215bhp for one horsepower should have been a more relaxing ride, except a highly tuned dressage horse is even less forgiving than an F1 car. At least the horse and the GP have one feature in common – an excellent heated seat.

The GP is heading back to Mini UK tomorrow and CarCouture will be exchanging keys for a BMW 6 Series Convertible, with the sublime, high-powered diesel engine. As we’re fed up with British weather, the plan is to take it over to France and check out the delights of Le Mans…

You can read about my riding exploits with Pippa in next weekend’s Financial Times Magazine.

 

 

 

 

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Wednesday – Gripping Stuff

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Jeremy One fact about driving a Mini – you are always going to meet an enthusiast who just wants to talk. I’ve just filled up for a trip to Sussex tomorrow and a guy with a gleaming white, original Cooper cornered me at the fuel pumps. I thought ‘classic’ Mini fans loathed the current version but he proved me wrong.

Not only did he own the Cooper, he also had a John Cooper Works GP from 2006. And to prove it he fished out a photo from his wallet. My GP looked a whole heap better, with a much lower, squat stance and those red air intakes in the front sill. The latest GP is some 20mm lower at the front than a standard JCW version (and £6,000 dearer!).

The GP’s trademark, four-spoke alloys look sensational and wrapped in Kumho Ecsta tyres, I can’t imagine it ever losing grip. On the twisty lanes around Longleat, the handling is simply sensational – virtually on a par with a Caterham 7. The slightest adjustment on the steering wheel and the Mini responds without hesitation.

I’m even starting to believe I could cope with a GP as an everyday car! It’s a creeping, overwhelming fever that is only caught by those who drive it…

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Jeremy So was today the first day of spring? It was still cold enough to have the heated seats on full blast in the GP – only the brake discs were warmer after an enthusiastic drive through the Wiltshire countryside.

I’m surprised the £29,000 GP doesn’t have a rear wash-wipe like the rest of the Mini clan. The rear screen is covered in dust tonight and with a setting sun behind the car, there is zero visibility. Tricky for tight parking spaces and motorway driving. I ended up using my spotty handkerchief to clear it.

I’m also finding some of the retro switches and dials in the Mini not as easy to operate as they could be. Let’s hope the new, 2014 model will improve what is at times, a complicated and tricky centre console.

Those gripes still don’t stop the GP from putting a smile on my face every time I wind up the revs. I imagine that if you can squeeze 10,000 miles from those 17-inch wheels you would be doing very well indeed…

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Easter Monday – What Is That Mini?

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Jeremy  With new Minis being launched all the time, the appeal of the GP may have been a little diluted. I say that because every time I stop at a filling station or car park, nobody seems to register what a special little car this is.

Today, a couple of ‘yoofs’ in a Vauxhall Astra managed to string a sentence together and ask me what I was driving. They thought it was a model I had ‘created’ myself – adding the roof spoiler and red detailing in a mid-life crisis.

One feature I couldn’t have added myself is the ‘Sport’ button, discreetly tucked away in front of the gearstick. Of course, a button like that has to be pressed and the result is a swifter response from the accelerator and slightly stiffer power steering – ideal for track days but not much use on Bank Holiday roads.

On the few occasions I have been able to escape the rest of Bank Holiday Britain, the GP has been tremendous fun. When pushed hard, the car has a tendency to scrabble for grip as you change up through the gears. Traction control then cuts in and automatically reduces engine power. To overcome this, Mini has fitted a “GP Mode’ switch which eliminates the problem and gives a much smoother ride.

It’s taken five five days to get to grips with the 215bhp of power from the 1.6 turbo engine but now I’m really starting to enjoy myself….