AutoX 5th Anniversary Special Issue (November 2011)

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C50 | VOLUME 6 | ISSUE 1 | NOVEMBER 2011

ANNIVERSARY ANNI IVERSA IV V E R SA RY SPECIAL

1948 Morris Eight, Call +91 94503 25758

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he ‘A Drive’ was Audi’s way of allowing us to drive the entire A-range of saloon cars that the German luxury carmaker sells – and, at the same time, get some driver training under the watchful, and ever enjoyable, guidance of Audi driving ace Mark Allison. The purpose of the drive was simple, you choose a car (ranging from the A4 3.2 right up to the A8L 4.2), and drive to a destination approximately 50 kilometers out of Jaipur city – where Audi had setup a driver training course on a closed off piece of tarmac, along with the necessary infrastructure. Since the start was relatively early in the day, we were saved the trafďŹ c rush when heading out, which was a blessing as the general condition of the road, till we got to the highway, was quite poor. On reaching the destination, we were ďŹ rst treated to a short product brieďŹ ng by Michael Perschke, head of Audi India, where he laid out for us the key features and technologies that differentiate the brand and its products from its competitors. After the brieďŹ ng, Mark Allison took us through the basics of the exercises that we would be treated to, along with another tutorial on the importance of having the seat and

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come to discover that it’s more than just taming this powerful machine – it’s very much a case of asking the AMG, ‘take it easy on me, I’m a ďŹ rst-timer’ (with an awkward smile of course). Its starts with powerful a rumble, and then there’s just more of that. It’s raw and animalistic. It’s acoustic addiction. Taming the G55 would’ve been a massive mistake. It’s one of those wild things that are born and live free, and they are happy leading their lives. It’s got power, it’s got strength, and my God it sounds brilliant. It’s not just a grunt from that V8, it’s the roar – and a big one at that too. Mind you, it is not easy to drive this thing. A few weeks driving the G55 and you’ll be as muscular as Sylvester Stallone. With the stiff suspension, there’s a lot of bouncing around in the cabin. But it certainly does have speed, and it follows the philosophy of ‘the faster you get cover terrain, the easier the drive.’ With 700Nm of torque, this beastly dynamite is a powerhouse of action. It believes that nothing can stop it, and it’s simply going to take on the unconquerable. It leads you into believing that you can get away with anything, and if you throw it around a bend (not a wise thing to do), the G55 growls mad – as if to say, ‘who’s this idiot at the wheel?’ Having enjoyed putting my hand in the mouth of the monster, I didn’t want the fun to end. But, well, all good things come to an end. We reached Leh, and the chill in the air was a stark reminder that the drive to Pangong Tso will be

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CA0E4; tents. Except for the irregular crackling sound of the ďŹ rewood and the rhythmic lapping of the river, there was an all encompassing silence. The river sparkled like a thousand diamonds in the velvet night and as I looked up, I saw the stars punch a million holes in the dark canopy. Across the river again. We had to cross a rather long and imsy bamboo bridge and it sure was a little scary. Across the bridge was a little shed which was the toll booth (yes, we had to pay a toll of C20 per bike!) We rode on till we came across a capsized ferry and then found that there wasn’t any ferry plying to Lakhimpur. There were only small country boats plying across the narrowest part of the river and they looked rather unstable. It was the scariest 30 minutes of my life! The bikes were heavily loaded and the boat rolled like a pendulum. Well, we made it to the other side and I said, never again! After about riding an hour through narrow village road, we hit a lovely highway at North Lakhimpur and made our way to Nameri Eco camp at Tezpur. The Eco camp is way off the main road and inside a village and it is just fantastic. The river behind the Eco Camp draws a large number of anglers for the huge Masher and the jungle is a bird watcher’s delight. Early next morning we were at the police checkpoint at Bhalukpong, the border town between Assam and Arunachal Pradesh. Formalities of Inner Line Permits over, we push onwards to Dirang – 145 kilometres away from the border. It is just a bamboo barricade that separates the two states, but there is a world of difference in the people, houses, culture and topography. It had rained the previous night and the freshly cut road was a total mess. Vehicles of all description were stuck and it resulted in a huge jam. And we were the worst off. In the shin deep mud, there was no way we could put on the side stand and so we carried on, slipping and slithering, till we came across some ďŹ rm ground. Thankfully we hit better roads and at Durga Mandir, the small tea shop beckoned. The fog at Zero Point delayed us for 30 minutes. Visibility improved after some kilometres and from atop the Nag Mandir, the view was simply breathtaking. We swept down the lovely road to the cantonment town of Tenga, crossed the army areas and started climbing again towards Bomdila. It was close to sundown and we stayed at the Monastery Guest

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Turn 7 is a wide hairpin left that leads onto one of the longest straights on the F1 calendar (on which, believe it or not, we had to follow a speed limit). Turn 8 is a double-apex left hander that then ows nicely in the opposite direction – allowing you to carry some speed onto the start-ďŹ nish straight once again. Well, that’s 3-odd kilometers of the North Loop, which is used by the Racing School, on which we were running. The full track is 21 spectacular corners and 5.5 kilometers. The purpose of our test was to compare the relative performance between full-blown racing cars – like the Maserati Trofeo GranTursimo, Aston Martin GT4, and the Yas Supersport SST – with some serious performance machines for the street – such as the Maserati GranTursimo MC Stradale and Audi R8 V10 Spyder. Now, the aim wasn’t to set lap times to gauge the performance differential – we had neither the time nor the permission from the track – but it was more to gauge just how these machines differ in character, and also how much of that race-car feel you actually get in a driver focussed modern sports car. And we had quite the collection of machines. Yas Marina was kind enough to allow us use of their two race cars from their Driving School – the Aston Martin GT4, which is a completely stripped out and lightened version of the V8 Vantage with its 4.7 litre engine producing well in excess of 400bhp, while the SST is a Radical that’s every bit the mini Le Mans racer, with its 200-plus bhp-per-ton. Maserati was equally kind in bringing its Trofeo, which is another thoroughbred race car used in a onemake racing series in Europe (and now also in the Middle East), as well as the MC Stradale, which is the most driver focussed road car they make currently. We also brought an Audi R8 V10 Spyder along for the ride, as it’s a phenomenally capable sports car, and one that’s imminently usable on a daily basis – not to mention the fact that it

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