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Suzuki Swift Sport › Alfa Giulietta › Peugeot 208 R5 & GTi

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We look at some sexy, sassy, stylish performance cars aimed at women in the know

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C ars designed with female buyers in mind who like a bit of poke under their right stiletto are pretty few and far between. And whilst we’re

not saying the three we’ve picked to feature in this month’s Road Magazine are either (a) exclusively feminine or (b) the only ones, it’s a good selection.

We’ve picked three sports hatches, or ‘warm hatches’ if you’re being cynical. But in this day and age, even a ‘warm hatch’ has more performance & packaging than any so-called-classic hot hatch from decades back, and look at the cult car status they now hold. Are these three future classics?

First up is the recently re-vamped, best-selling Suzuki Sport Swift – a great value car with a proper rally pedigree, offering no frills, all spills. Can it still deliver the goods, dynamically speaking, and from the supermarket? We also look at Guy Wilks’ awe-some Super 1600 Swift, flying high as ever.

Next up there’s the Alfa Giulietta – as marketed by our cover girl, Uma Thurman. Undeniably sexy (both car & star), but is the Alfa actually up to much and will it make your mates jealous? We find out.

Finally, with the Peugeot 208 GTi about to let rip and attempt to fly the French flag for hot hatches again, we look at the 208 Feline THP – a top-spec, turbocharged, great value package. Will it make GTi purchasers think twice? And we also look at the ace new 208 Type R5 rally car in testing and reveal a racing experience to die for – the Nürburgring 24Hr in a 208 GTi. Enjoy the ride ladies! And gents!

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Cheap ThrillsSuzuki’s Swift Sport is a perfect modern machine – practical, economical, cheap to run and, best of all, simple, fun and rammed with rally DNA.

I’ve long had a golden rule with buying cars; pick any car homologated, or at

least used for motorsport, especially rallying (the clos-est motorsport DNA link to road cars) and you’re almost certainly guaranteed a great driver’s car.

It’s worked for me with many a motor – guaran-teeing you a dose of race or rally pedigree running through its spinal cord (even if somewhat anaesthetised for road use), providing the fundamentals for driving enjoyment, like happy han-dling, sorted suspension, beefy brakes, sound steer-ing, an exciting engine and other alliteration.

And anyone who knows anything about the ace Su-per 1600 rally series will be familiar with the sight and superb sound of Guy Wilks getting air over crests and keeping his foot hard in on the way to many a podium finish, in his bright yellow rally Suzuki Sport Swift. It’s the FWD rally pocket rocket.

The road-going Swift (Su-zuki’s first global strategic model) has now shifted three million units since it launch late 2004! The £13,749, 136PS, 1.6-li-tre, 121mph flagship Swift Sport we have on test here has been on sale in its new spec since last year. And the Swift has shifted 6,000

units since its launch in May 2006, in the UK alone. Pop-ular is not the word.

But unlike some cars that are popular for their badge, unjust pub myth reputation or other spurious reason, the Swift Sport is popular for just one – it’s amazing.

Raw, simple, sexy and charming in equal meas-ure, I defy anyone not to be hooked on this car – if not from the off, seduced by its perfect proportions and likeable looks, then certainly after a spirited B-road blast, guaranteed to make you feel like Guy Wilks on a charge.

Suzuki have poured their rally-winning expertise into the Swift Sport – upgrad-ing the engine, suspension, braking and perhaps most importantly, steering – and it shows.

From the moment you get inside, you know this car is about the drive. There’s

nothing superfluous to de-tract or weigh down inside – just the basics (which are enough, like Bluetooth, push start, auto air con, rear privacy glass etc.). And that means the money’s gone on the important stuff – ride, handling, throttle maps, ignition advance, damp-ers, brake pads, steering columns, bushes. And one quick drive instantly reveals this to be so.

Whilst the M16A, 136PS/118 lbft 1.6-litre Variable Valve Timing (VVT) engine is not a real power-house, it’s super keen and, crucial to the success of any FWD sports hatch – it loves to rev until the valves dance like a sweating raver on whizz. It’ll knock out 0-62mph in 8.7 seconds and crack onto 121mph though, which is quite rapid – and it feels quick.

The reason? Weight. Su-

zuki have applied the ‘light-ness is power’ Lotus mantra here, as the Swift Sport only weighs 1,045Kg – which is the weight of the old Peu-geot 205 GTi, and we all remember how great they were, right? And the Swift Sport has more grunt and a better chassis. Go figure.

Of course, to be a perfect sports hatch, FWD B-road gem like the 205 GTi, you also need sharp, lively, ex-citing, fun handling. And, the Swift Sport has certainly got that in abundance. The new model’s stiffer front springs, well-developed rear bushes and uprated steering sub-frame have combined to make a perfect FWD cocktail. Turn-in is ac-curate and sharp, the rear end is playful (with a swift mid-bend lift) and the over-all package is composed, capable and comical fun. Showing the wide track,

short wheelbase Swift Sport a back road becomes highly addictive stuff.

And, unlike the majority of hot hatches – powered by thirsty two-litre turbo lumps – Suzuki’s warm hatch is normally-aspirated, not only offering sharper throttle response and more redline hunting thrills, but it’s a ton more economical and green. In fact, the new Swift Sport can offer as much as 44.1mpg, which is excellent (and up almost 5mpg over the outgoing model). It also only produces 147g/Km CO2 (down from 165g/Km), which is also excellent.

Sporty, sassy, stylish, simple and swift by name and nature, the Sport is a definite modern classic. And with all Swift models VAT free until the end of March, there’s just no excuse not to buy one and fall in love yourself ladies, or gents.

Flying HighGuy Wilks may have moved to Peugeot now, but we have fond memories of the 2004-2006 Junior WRC seasons in his Swift.

Wilks almost won three JWRC’s with Suzuki. Happy days!

Podium finish in Finland

http://www.forgemotorsport.co.uk

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Style over substance?

Alfa’s Giulietta – difficult to spell. Difficult to love?

When an A-lister movie star, of the ilk of the stunning

Uma Thurman, gets brought (sorry, bought) in to promote a new car I’m filled with a mix of emotions. On the one hand, it’s a treat to have such a stunner in the promotions hot seat, replacing the usual crowd of Joe and Jo regular folk filling up our multi media channels. But on the other hand, as a car tester, Uma’s sexy presence makes me nervous and my cynical brain kicks in asking ‘is the A-lister taking my attention away from what is a sub-standard product?’ I guess there only one way top find out… drive

Alfa’s pretty Giulietta.First impressions of the Alfa

are extremely favourable. Sitting there in hooker’s nail polish Alfa Red, the £23,450 2.0 JTDM 170 Veloce five-door looked seriously smart, from any angle. It looks ex-pensive too – but it’s not re-ally, compared to its Audi A3 and BMW 1-Series rivals, with the huge 21 car range start-

ing at £17,760 (1.4 TB 120 Turismo), up to £25,520 (TBi Cloverleaf).

All the cars in the range are turbocharged too – giving great grunt, whether from the 118bhp 1.4-litre right up to the flagship 231bhp 1.7-litre, which is certainly going to be quick enough to worry the top hot hatches. Even the turbo diesels offer between 103bhp for the 1.6-litre to 168bhp for the 2-litre. Points there then… sort of.

You see, to me, an Alfa’s heart should be its engine. Even ugly old Alfas (yes, there are some), like the 75 had cracking V6 lumps that sounded like mini Ferrari

engines at full chat, and with the right exhaust. And I know times have changed and V-engines (certainly petrol pow-ered) are dying out thanks to CO2 politics, but I expect – ney, demand – that an Alfa engine is exciting. It should sound like a cross between war and sex. And, despite the fact the 170 Veloce turbo we tested was far from slow and was still economical, it wasn’t special… nor did it sound great, and I expected that from Alfa. And Uma.

What about ride and han-dling then? Surely, being an Alfa it’s got to corner with the urgency and accuracy of an illicit lover making tracks through the streets of Venice with an angry hammer-wield-ing husband in hot pursuit?

No! The handling may be quite sharp, but the ride is on the irritating hard spring-un-der-damped side and worse, steering feel is practically non-existent, meaning driver involvement is too. You might be on the edge of grip, going flat out, with the inside front wheel spinning up frantically, or just pottering, a mile from lift-off oversteer… you’d just never know. Which is another

real shame, because the Giul-ietta’s chassis is definitely a good one, deserving of accu-rate steering, good feedback and better suspension.

A big plus from Alfa though is the cunning, excellent and user-friendly D.N.A Vehicle Dynamic Control system (as fitted on both Alfa MiTo and Giulietta ranges), enabling drivers to select from ‘D’ (Dy-namic), ‘N’ (Natural) and ‘A’ (All-Weather) driving modes at the simple flick of a switch.

It snowed a lot while we ad the test car and in All-Weather mode, the ASR (Anti Slip Regulation) system continu-ously monitored tyre grip, yaw and steering angle – decreas-ing the throttle opening and

applying brakes to individual wheels to maintain stability, whilst also boosting the VDC (Vehicle Dynamic Control) system and DST (Dynamic Steering Torque) feature (pro-viding steering torque move-ments to prompt natural correction of oversteer). That sounds confusing, but what it means is –it works a treat and is dead easy to operate, at the flick of a switch. The Dynamic mode is great too, really sharpening up throt-tle response, for some more oomph on the open roads.

Like the other cars in this issue though (and surely the reason Uma Thurman was brought in, to inspire women motorists not make men per-

spire with desire), this is a car aimed mostly at women. It’s sexy, stylish, has great interior mirrors and comes in a range of fab colours. And my wife, as with all the other ladies I asked to review the car would (a) never touch the DNA but-ton, ever… (b) not care about the ride, handling, sound of the engine or indeed most of what I’ve been waffling about.

Is the Alfa Giulietta a case of style over substance? Maybe. I think so; it’s a good car let down. But what do I know? It’s good value. It’s got a very wide range. It got great lines. It’s sexy. It looks hot in bright colours and it’s difficult to park… just like A-lister, Uma Thurman!

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Pumped-up Kicks Peugeot’s 208

Feline offers a high-spec, sleek looks

and a potent turbo engine. Better than a

GTi?

Peugeot have been at the forefront of FWD sporty hatches since

the iconic, lift-off-overs-teering champion 205 GTi. The 208 GTi is now on its way and we will test that soon, but right here and now, what we have to test

in the ‘warm hatch’ arena is the 208 Feline 1.6 THP – a fully loaded, 156bhp turbo-charged bargain of a car, for just £16,985.

And when I said fully loaded, I mean, full loaded – huge twin-tone alloys filling the flared arches,

twin exhausts and a roof spoiler set the car off out-side, while inside there’s climate control, cornering lights, parking sensors and the piece de resistance, the huge panoramic glass roof, which is fantastique. Our test car also came with the

very reasonably priced £400 sat-nav upgrade with touch-screen, which dominates the dash and worked better than some posher systems worth twice that.

Whilst the interior and exterior package of this pumped-up Peugeot cer-

tainly is generous, don’t be expecting Teutonic build quality. Like the Citroen DS3 the 208 shares an engine and many other bits with, quality is the compromise for price and equipment level. On first glance, it all looks tip top. But day to day

tactility reveals some pretty nasty plastics and some design issues – like the miniature, pointless glove-box, difficulty in viewing the (superbly lit and designed) dash through the (sport feeling) super tiny steer-ing wheel and the slightly

crammed feeling (if not re-ality) caused by the huge thick door pulls.

Aesthetics aside, dy-namically, you’d expect the Peugeot to be superb. It’s French. It’s a Peugeot. It’s got to be, right? Well, sort of…

The THP engine is excel-lent. The twin-scroll turbo is so fast to spool up, if it weren’t for the glug of mid-range torque on tap, you’d think it was normally-aspi-rated – such is the speed of the throttle response. And, despite sharing the engine with the Citroen DS3, Peue-got ECU boffins have man-

aged to drag another 20Nm torque from it, taking it to 260Nm, which you can feel. Part of this pace of course is down to the weight – with the 208 weighing in a few Kilos over a tonne, and be-ing lighter than the DS3. All of this adds up to a speedy 7.2 seconds to 62mph and an engine that’s keen to deliver its grunt – back road blasting, or motor-way cruising. It even has a good sound track, with mild boost whistles, mini back pops when the exhaust is hot and you lift of suddenly and a good rorty exhaust and inlet note.

The unexpected trouble area is how it all comes together. Neither the slighty sloppy gear change (which I felt I could break in my hands, were I rallying it), vague steering, nor the sus-pension feel quite right. And all of these factors – steer-ing, handling, transmission – have got to be right to make a perfect package in this sports hatch arena.

The 208 Feline might look good, it might be generous-ly specced and have a few party pieces, but as a pack-age – however good VFM it is – it’s just not quite right. Does this spell trouble for the 208 GTi? I fear so.

http://wheelwright.co.uk

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Peugeot’s 208 Type R5 is go

Replacing the 207 Su-per 2000 rally car is Peugeot’s new 208

Type R5 – shown here being put through its first gravel test of a gruelling 10,000Km of loose and tarmac testing.

The R5 was first unveiled at the 2012 Paris Motor Show in September and is the first car built in compli-ance with the FIA’s latest ‘R5’ regulations to have broken cover and turned a wheel in anger.

The 208 R5 had its first gravel stage test in the southeast of France (Ri-boux) where it completed a four-day programme in the hands of Bryan Bouffier and Xavier Panseri.

“That first run was a key step,” says Alexis Avril, technical manager of Peu-

geot Sport’s customer com-petition department. “We still have work on our hands – putting as many kilome-tres on the car’s clock as possible in order to validate its reliability. After that, we will be able to turn our at-tention to the optimisation of its performance poten-tial... focusing on the sus-pension & the turbocharged engine which are the two chief factors of the global performance package.”

Bryan Bouffier said: “The car felt good out of the box. I was happy with its overall balance and I was comfort-able behind the wheel. It seems to be a strong basic car and I particularly liked the turbocharged engine... easy to use, and that’s a big asset on loose surfaces.”

To celebrate the launch of the new Peugeot 208 GTi, Peugeot is

giving eight lucky drivers the chance to race in the epic ADAC Nürburgring 24 Hour Race in May 2013. How mega is that?!

Eight European countries (UK, Germany, France, Bel-gium, Spain, Italy, the Neth-erlands and Switzerland) invited drivers with race licences to register on the internet, between 16th Jan-

uary and 3rd February 2013 via www.208GTiracingexperience.peugeot.com.

Peugeot say: “This com-petition is aimed at driv-ers, from 18 years of age, who hold a valid full driv-ing licence and have held a national (Grade A) or Inter-national Race Driver Com-petition Licence for at least two years.”

The national pre-selections will take place between 18th and 28th February 2013, se-lecting five candidates from each of the eight countries, from over 400 possible can-didates.

The five winning candi-dates, from each national pre-selection event, will then be assessed on 4th March 2013 during an inter-national final at the La Ferté Gaucher circuit, in France. So, from the 40 national winners, eight (one from each of the eight participat-

ing countries) will be se-lected to drive the 208 GTi in the Nürburgring 24 Hour Race. It’s the racing experi-ence of a liftetime.

To make it even more amazing, the eight lucky winners will gain familiarisa-tion with the Nürburgring-Nordschleife circuit during the first three races of the VLN championship, be-tween 23rd March and 27th April 2013 – getting them ready for the epic Nürbur-gring 24 Hour Race 2013 in May in the new 208 GTi Peugeot Sport (pictured). This car has been specially developed for this endur-ance event by Peugeot Sport, using the latest tech-nology designed for the 208 R2, 208 Type R5 rally car (as featured in this issue) and the RCZ Racing Cup.

You can follow the story here in Road Magazine, on the blog (www.roadmaga-zine.blogspot.com) and via Twitter with the hashtag #208GTIRacing.

Bon chance everyone! Get ready for a wild ride...

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Festival of Power Adverts 2013:Road Magazine 05/02/2013 15:47 Page 1