Today I needed to collect this Nissan Skyline R32 GTR from AK Automotive in Rowlands Gill and take it up to my garage in Berwick, ready to show to a customer. It’s a journey of 75 miles or so and as ever, I try and avoid the boring A1 and always opt for the very scenic back roads route up through Northumberland. I’ve been intrigued by these Skylines (thanks to their infamous association with the Gran Turismo Playstation games and of course, the Bathurst appearances)so it was interesting to see whether it deserved the reputation it has as a real driver’s car. Anthony had already warned me that it maybe wasn’t as fast as might be expected. And despite sounding like the big Jap muscle car it is, the first part of my drive through Newcastle traffic was ok rather than mind-blowing though the mountain of torque made it very easy to drive slowly and smoothly. Onto the A1 for a few miles and the acceleration was actually rather good, but again it was easiest to just use the torque to quickly build speed rather than having to change down. So far so good but nothing particularly memorable. Then I turned off the A1 onto a real quick A-road I know, which was surprisingly busy with caravans and trucks plus the usual collection of tourists slowing down every two minutes to look at trees, cows, fields etc. So this time I started to drop a couple of gears at a time to blast past the odd car or two. Dead easy. So I wondered if I could get past may be three or four cars in one quick blast. Just as easy and I’m starting think that this is actually a bit quick and the car was certainly getting better as the oil temperature gauge crept up to a more reasonable level. Enjoying this now. Next its off the A-road and onto a series of B-roads for the last 25 miles or so. These are roads I know very well and they are all but deserted and are full of the most glorious bends, dips, straights, all through fantastic countryside. Outright speed is of less importance than handling ability here and the R32 just moved up a league or two in ability. It really was properly superb. The torque gauge located in the top left corner of the instrument panel hadn’t really joined in the fun up to now, but at last it sprang into life as the clever stuff started to re-distribute the power to front wheels under hard acceleration out of tight corners. You could actually feel it all happening and the sheer grip through twisty bits was quite astonishing. The speed at which it covered the ground was properly mental (I was trying to think of a posher way of putting it, but ‘properly mental’ probably sums its up best). Its composure and balance at speed was just wonderful, really putting my Boxster to shame. There’s no doubt that its abilities at travelling quickly on a twisty road like this are far in excess of what you ever should be doing on a public road. I’m sure this would be sublime on track. So the whole the thing is best summed up by the fact that I started the journey thinking that it was a bit of an underwhelming big old Japanese smoker and finished some 90 minutes later thinking about exactly which post offices I would need to rob in order to buy one. I really am going to need to buy one of these at some point. Can’t imagine how good the latest R35 must be.
Posted on: Mon, 28 Jul 2014 21:28:54 +0000
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