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Wheel to Wheel Action

6/18/2018

Volvo V90 police car at CCIA

Lots to write about today on the subject of motoring. The weekend before last saw me enjoy the Daventry motorcycle festival, last Wednesday saw me attend Company Car In Action (CCIA) at Millbrook Proving Ground and yesterday I went to an AACI event at Billing Aquadrome (I had a great time too, though I’ll have to write about that experience in a later post).

So, if you are ready, buckle up and let’s get this journey underway!

Motorbikes
The annual motorcycle festival in Daventry took place on Saturday 9th June. I have written about this event on a number of occasions (previous reviews below) and it followed the format established in previous years.

The ride-in arrived like a noisy swarm of insects at 10am and the bikes eventually settled around the town centre.

To me, it appeared that the festival attracted a greater number of businesses into the town than in prior years, the concessions covered a lot of the space that bikes were parked in last year. I couldn’t make my mind up if the number of bikes on display had gone down or whether they had just been displaced to other parts of the centre. I suspect the latter.

As in previous years, I wandered around for a couple of happy hours taking photos and I share some of my favourites below. The town centre was packed with visitors and once again I reflected that it is probably Daventry’s busiest (and from my perspective, the best) day of the year.

My thanks go to the organisers and Daventry District Council for being supportive.

Cars
Company Car In Action is an event organised by Bauer Media, the publishers of “Fleet News”, on an annual basis and held at the Millbrook Proving Ground in Bedfordshire.

I went to this year’s event and had a good/interesting time. Among other vehicles, I drove a Volvo V90, a Renault Koleos and a Toyota Mirai.

Volvo V90
As a driver/advocate of estate cars, the V90 was on my radar for a test drive. Upon barrelling up to the Volvo stand, I asked if a) they had and b) I could drive a V90? The answer to both questions was “yes”. “Happy Days” thought I. There was a caveat though, and I kid you not … the V90 was a fully liveried panda car.

It was out on a test run when I arrived at the stand and when the car came back, it was unmissable and completely at odds with the rest of the, decidedly more understated, vehicles on display.

I am not a shrinking violet and so I was game for a laugh. But as soon as I got in the driver’s seat, I was advised that I’d be sent home if I started playing with the blues and twos. Still I didn’t need the extra attention grabbers, I was well and truly obvious already.

After I completed the hill circuit and the high-speed bowl, I asked one of the Volvo representatives to take my photo because I didn’t think anybody would believe me when I said I’d driven a police car.

Renault Koleos
The next CCIA experience that I will share is about driving the new Renault Koleos Initiale off road. The vehicle was nicely equipped overall, but I especially liked the air-conditioned seats, it was a hot day and they added some real value.

I was accompanied by a Scot who allowed me to take the Renault all over the off-road test site including through deep water and over some seriously steep, rutted and uneven terrain. I knew I was going to be in for a treat because of all the instructors, his vehicle was the dirtiest. I was advised that the colour of the car was “Amethyst” but I am blowed if I could tell through all the muck.

I spent more than twenty minutes having a great time. At one point, the official photographers were even taking photos of me putting the Koleos through its paces. If I get to see the shots, I’ll share them with you.

For a standard vehicle on standard road tyres, what you can do with the Koleos is remarkable.

From the ridiculously good fun to the oddball – the hydrogen fuel celled Toyota Mirai.

Toyota Mirai
I wrote about my interest in this car in August last year so when the opportunity to drive one presented itself, I was keen to take it.

I’ll be frank, the car is quirky looking (if not plain ugly) inside and out, but the technology is fascinating and the potential significant, even when the car world is fixated on electric.

I can report that the Mirai was a perfectly good car to drive and that I’d like to have spent more time testing it out. It was a proper size (not like the Renault Zoe I test drove), it didn’t have the range challenges of some electric alternatives, it was quiet, its performance was fine.

I was accompanied throughout my test-drive by a Toyota representative and I challenged her on the availability of the hydrogen gas necessary to power it and the hefty price tag for the car - because when it comes to what to spend your £60,000+ pounds on, you might well opt for a Tesla instead.

The feedback was that the Mirai is really still an experimental, though advanced, proof of concept but that it will ultimately do for hydrogen what the Prius did for hybrids. Toyota has invested millions and what it needs is more people to be familiar with what hydrogen power can offer and the fleet industry to give it a fair go. I think that Toyota’s challenge to the relentless march towards electrification is a positive one and I hope that it will be successful.

I am optimistic. If the price was halved, I’d have one as my company car. The challenge for Toyota is how to achieve a scale of production that can enable savings to be used to reduce the price tag. Still, a manufacturer like Toyota has to have better odds of being successful than much of the rest of the motor manufacturing industry.

From the Mirai to a Gremlin
Toyota served up another delight in the form of a sporty Yaris GRMN. I was lucky enough to be taken out on a couple of hot laps of Millbrook's handling circuit with a professional driver (crash helmets required).

Whilst squealing and sliding around, I asked my pro-driver if “he raced for a living”? The answer was an emphatic “yes”, it turned out I was being chauffeured by Martin Donnelly an ex F1 driver. I felt honoured.

As should have Fernando Alonso, a recent Toyota racing driver, for his latest gift.

From Gremlin to Grumpy
I am not an Alonso fan and I get bored stiff listening to people, singing his praises and blowing smoke up his arse. I don’t think he’s one of the best drivers in F1, in fact I think that he’s one of the more divisive.

I read an article the other day on Planet F1 where he was quoted as saying “I will not be happy if I have many trophies at home and people think that I don’t deserve them. That would be even harder.”

Is his inference that someone better, like Lewis Hamilton or Michael Schumacher for example, doesn’t/didn’t deserve theirs?

Alonso was part of the team that won at Le Mans … not a surprise bearing in mind Toyota were the only works team in the LMP1 class and, unless the car broke down, a win for the team was a guarantee. Alonso was in effect gifted the second jewel on his triple crown quest.

I don’t doubt that Alonso added value to the Toyota team and the kudos of the 24-hour event, but come on, no Audi, no Porsche … no real competition at all. Is he a great because he was part of the team that won this race? In my opinion “no”.

From Le Mans to Billing
This one is done but keep an eye out for my next post, the American Automobile Club International meet at Billing Aquadrome on Father’s Day. It was fine fun and I’ll be sharing some of my thoughts and photos as soon as I’ve had time to do the write-up.

Bye for now.

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