Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution VIII MR FQ-340 sedan
Key specifications:
Engine:
Two-litre, turbocharged four-cylinder, quad-valve; 206kW at 6500rpm, 400Nm at 3500rpm.
Gearbox:
Six-speed manual.
Performance:
0-100km/h 4.4sec, top speed 250km/h
Price:
£33 000 (about R382 000 at 15/03/05).
Don't you find all these Mitsubishi Evo Turbo Nutter Bastard IIIs and Subaru Impreza Rally Wazzocks terribly trying? Are you bored by their graceless, earnest, anorakish quest for speed? Well, you wouldn't be if you'd done what I just did.
I'm writing this at 3.28am, having made it home from the most exhilarating drive of my life in the latest Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution VIII MR FQ-340 (the 183rd ever made, according to a little plaque on the fascia).
Woken by my mobile phone vibrating under my pillow (momentarily disconcerting, but it left the rest of the house none the wiser), I left at 2.40am, started up the Evo and made for a ribbon of road that crosses the South Downs not far from where I live here in southern England.
It's a clear stretch with sinuous curves and high, humpbacked straights followed by miles of hairpin bends. There are no speed cameras, no houses and no traffic.
Conscious of the constraints of responsible reporting, my duty as a role model for young drivers and various other legal implications, let us just assume that I kept within the speed limits and drove with due care and attention.
Hypothetically, let's imagine that I have never hammered a car quite so savagely in my life; but the Evo kept coming back for more. We were airborne twice (still hypothetically), shredded some very expensive tyres and greatly alarmed a dozing horse.
The Evo's chassis, seat and steering telegraphed its every crevice, camber and curve as the tarmac flowed by, inches beneath my soles. It was as if I were driving the road rather than the car and, in the course of 25 minutes or so, I came to realise that this is (with the possible exception of the even more bonkers Evo FQ400) the fastest, most capable production car, point-to-point, in the world.
I've driven cars with a higher straight-line speed, of course - the Ferrari 612 I reviewed the other week, for instance - but none has been so easy to place on the road, none has harnessed such power so effortlessly and none has offered the reassurance of such unbreakable, gecko-like suction as the Evo VIII.
Certainly none has been able to seat five adults and carry their luggage.
A Pagani Zonda might be quicker, but it doesn't fit anywhere, you can't see out of it and, actually, in terms of acceleration, even that was left trailing in the Evo's sonic boom during a recent Car magazine duel.
A Lotus Elise might be more agile but you sit too low and there's not enough grunt to really scare the horses.
From a standing start the Evo slingshots to more than 100km/h in 4.4 seconds: mash the throttle and your neck jerks like you've been sucker-punched, your eyes bulge and your innards go all squiffy. Your buttocks clench so tight they could crush ice but you soon discover that you rarely need to back off.
The Evo simply operates in another realm.
Of course, it looks like the back of a fridge with bolt-on ironmongery, bodywork riddled with air vents and an interior which, aside from thigh-squeezing front seats and a Momo steering wheel, is straight out of a mass-produced Lancer saloon.
If it were a meat pie, you just know it would be packed full of Sudan 1 colouring.
Then again, I think we can cut a five-seater family saloon that can trounce a supercar a little aesthetic slack, don't you? As for me, I'm off to bed. Or perhaps just one last yomp. - The Independent, London
- The Misubishi Lancer Evo VIII will be released in South Africa soon and motoring.co.za will be there - this was just to whet your appetite.
Local prices will be announced at the time of launch.