When you’ve built the most beautiful car ever made, what on earth do you do for an encore? It’s taken Jaguar fifty years to answer that question, but at last the F-Type is here. The Jag launches into a tough market, and one of biggest rivals is the new Porsche Cayman. And it just happens to cost 20,000 pounds less One of my earliest memories was riding in my dad’s E-Type Jag when I was just 3 years old.
And that’s what got me really hooked on cars. This F type is the V6S. It’s the mid point of the range between the V6 and the V8. With 375 brake horse power on tap, it hits 60 miles an hour in less than five seconds. Well my dad only had a Volvo estate. As a kid growing up in the ’80s, it was Porsche that was the real embodiment of sports cars. To me, nobody does it better. Last year, Tim said the Porsche 911 was the best sports car in the world.
I bet now he’s saying that the Cayman is just as good to drive, and it costs half the price. And this Cayman’s just over half the price. It’s also nearly twenty thousand pounds less than the cheapest F-type. I’ve been right now, Tim’s trying to tell you the Porsche is a really good family car. Well I’d been more than happy to the school run twice every morning in this. look at the F-type. It looks like it’s doing 100 miles an hour standing still. In comparison both Porches just look a bit dull. Okay okay. So this standard Cayman is about a second slower to sixty miles an hour than the F-type. But forget about that It’s handling that matters most. Where the Jaguar’s got its big heavy engine out in the front, In this car the engine is right behind me, banging the middle, and that gives it near perfect weight distribution and great balance for cornering.
But the F-Type is like an old-fashioned muscle car, and I love it for that. The steering is really direct, and the back end is almost too willing to slide out. I wouldn’t bank on the back tires lasting very long. Old-school or not, it’s extremely fast. But Dad’s old e-type wouldn’t have come close. Back in the real world the Cayman is more practical than you might think. There’s room for luggage in the front and in the back. back, and the combined volume is more than a Ford Fiesta. Compare that to the shallow slot you get in the F-Type. Jaguar was below average for our reliability and the latest Which car survey, the largest of its kind in the UK. Porsche was better and was also it’s at top for owner satisfaction. That’s all very sensible, but on the road, the Jag just feels more special and it’s 8-speed automatic gear box really lives up to its quick shift name. I’ve always preferred a manual gearbox in a sports car, but most people will pay 2 grand more for this PDK dual-clutch auto, and I can see why. It accelerates quicker and is more economical.
So what do you reckon then Claire You’ve waited fifty years for this car. Not quite 50 years. Okay not quite 50 years, but a long time. Was it worth the wait? Definitely. It’s the best thing to come out of Coventry since the E-Type. I think it’s the best car of the year. It is a fantastic car, I’ll give you that, but. But you’d take the Cayman? You already know that. I think it’s better to drive I’m confident it would be better to live with and it’s so much cheaper. But it’s so predictable. Well the fact is that I can’t even nearly afford either of these cars. So I’m gonna be in the cheap seats for the way home. Are you coming? No thanks, I’m off to take dad for a spin!
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