The new Range Rover Evoque looks good, but can it handle the great outdoors?

The range rover evoke has always been the poor man's range rover. The model you only buy if you can't afford the real thing, sure some people say it's a car you buy if you want a smaller model. But the reality is you generally only buy one if you can't afford the proper thing. But seven years down the line, Land Rover has designed a brand new Evoque that's so advanced that it might just be the pick of the bunch. One of the biggest reasons for it's coming of age is the design. The original car was attractive, but it did have a slightly busy toy-like aesthetic that wasn't necessarily to everyone's taste. The new car has been simplified slight and looks better for it, borrowing styling tips from the Velar, particularly at the front and rear. However it is still recognisable as an evoke, especially in profile thanks to the falling roofline and rising beltline. Under the surface, the new evoke is based on a new mixed metal architecture which makes it 13% stiffer. It has more advanced suspension than before along with better engines. Land Rover promises it can tackle almost any terrain in comfort, at any speed. And hold its own against any rival. To properly test the new revokes of roads though, you have to compare it to something truly capable. And more better than against the ultimate off-roaders, in a lap a round our very unforgiving off road circuit. [MUSIC] Yes ladies and gentlemen, I of course will be driving Range rover evoque, and I be up again the running king of the off road world, this goats. Both have all wheel drive, both are extremely rigid but, they can only be 1 champion. You ready? All right. 3, 2, 1, go. See ya. All right. Our first stop's the cool big splash. Where are they? Right. Goats are crafty. They're actually quicker than they look, these things. I've got to stick to the road, whereas they have the advantage to be able to go vertically up the side up hills and then head first down again. Whoops. A bit out of shape. Whoops. It does like to get sideways. Okay, now I am in the P250 Evoke. This isn't the most powerful, but it does have two 149 horsepower over 350 Newton-meters of torque. It'll do nought to 60 in 7 seconds. That's hot hatch territory. And it is just lovely to drive. It's got a great balance to it. This thing. Wow, fully sideways there. [LAUGH] I know what they're doing, they'll be taking a shortcut, guaranteed. [BLANK_AUDIO] [SOUND] [MUSIC] But I had a few tricks of my own. This car has a couple of really clever technologies. One called active Drive lane. It's basically a torque vectoring system that can move the torque around from the front to the rear axle on demand. When you're cruising around, it's essentially a two-wheel drive car. But when you start to lose traction, like around this corner, the rear axle fires into action and I get four-wheel drive. And that wasn't all I had in my favor. Adaptive dynamics. Another great system on the Evoke. Now every 100th millisecond, it changes the responsiveness of the dampers. The minute the road gets rough like out here, or I'm going around a corner, the whole thing allows me to flow with the land like a goat [SOUND] This basically a rally stage. I mean normal cars can't come up here, not at this speed. Let's go, let's clear these goats. Come on baby, full power up here, full power. The gear changes in this thing are just seemless. I've got a nine speed semi automatic vehicle [MUSIC] It is like butter. This is a great demonstration for anyone who thinks the Evoke isn't capable of rouge. Have a word with yourself, really. Come on. [MUSIC] Yes, here's the finish line, they're still there, I've lapped them, I've lapped them! I've won, yes, [BLANK_AUDIO] You can't stop progress. I'm the goat now, grazeable time. [LAUGH] [BLANK_AUDIO] The Evoque is an impressively capable vehicle off road. Possibly far more capable than any of its buyers will need it to be, but it's nice to know that when the going gets rough it really does get going, but this being a Range Rover, the Evoque's off road shocks are only half the story, it needs a velvet glove. To match the iron fist. When people thing about cars that are very capable off road, they often make the mistake of assuming they're not very advanced. But that couldn't be further from the truth with the new Evoke, because this thing is absolutely packed with technology. One of the coolest thing here is Land Rover's Touch Pro dual [UNKNOWN] system. It's basically a multi-screen setup. You get one screen on a dashboard an another one down here on the center console. The lower screen gives you access to your climate control as well your various driving modes for on and off road, plus an expanded view of your media controls. The upper screen meanwhile gives you access to your navigation as well as your main menu. I'm not gonna lie it is a bit fidley a bit too complicated for my liking. But you can connect your mobile phone and use Apple CarPlay or Android Auto. One of the smartest pieces of new technology in this car is a smart rear view mirror system. In the old Evoke, people often moaned about the fact that it was hard to see out the back, because the window was so small. Land Rover, though, have come up with solution. They didn't want to change the shape of the car, so what they've done is they've fitted a camera system that looks out the back, and on the rearview mirror is a screen. And so you flick a switch, and boom, you see a high definition wide angle picture of what's going on behind you. Very clever. One thing I've noticed is that quite often, cars tend to use technology as a kind of band aid to cover up the fact that they're not very good to drive. But that's not the case in the new Evoque. This thing is actually a laugh. First of all, that two liter engine- It's a bit of a peach. It loves to rev out, it will go up to about six and a half thousand RPM, and as for the gear box, well, it's an automatic mode speed unit, and it will just get on with things by itself quite happily. But, what I've found is, I actually like to get involved with the gear changes myself, because the car loves to rev out, not using the petals behind the steering wheel. Will by using this stick on the centre console. As per handling well there's a little bit of body row but it's aggressive, it's linear and you can actually lean on the car through the Benz. When you are about to exit 250 horse power well that's not to be sniffed at and when you're done lock it back to auto relax And it's a Range Rover again. Now the new Evoque is great to drive and very high tech, but also needs to be practical and very luxurious. Why? Because when we think about the full fat range Range Rover, we often think about the fact it's great for transporting very important passengers, footballers, dignitaries, royalty. See, and this is an area where the previous evoke wasn't up to scratch, so we must ask. The question is, is it the new evoke any better at transporting precious cargo? Costadina you okay back there? Wow. Okay, so of course Dina is clearly heavily pregnant and I need to take her and her unborn child to the nearest medical facility. Okay, so one of the new things about the New Evoke is that it's bigger inside, you got 20 millimeters more leg room. [FOREIGN] Okay, yeah, you've got more foot room as well, there's- [FOREIGN] What, I don't know the weight. [FOREIGN] Also, I don't know if you fancy hearing this but there's a new air ionization system which means that the cabin air is filtered, it's really polluted outside but in here, it's Is basically show- [FOREIGN] Yeah, you can have your baby in here if you wanted to, I mean, don't, but- [FOREIGN] And when you have your newborn baby, there's actually two ISOFIX point and I don't know if you've got a [UNKNOWN] or something already, I'd recommend a [UNKNOWN] or something They're really good but in the boot you've got 591 litres of space and if you fold the seats down no it kind of really makes sense as a family car. With Costa Dina really likely to pop right there in the back seat it was time for drastic measures [FOREIGN] Okay I know what you need you need a Towels here, I don't know if that would help. Now. [UNKNOWN] pained shreiking was all Greek to me, but somehow eventually I found my way to the hospital. Okay, this is it, this is it, all right, cool. All right, jump out, go, go, go, go, go, go. Good luck, all right? All the best. [BLANK_AUDIO] [FOREIGN] I honestly feel good about myself. I basically, I mean, with the help of the [UNKNOWN] helped to bring a new life into the world. [FOREIGN] Got a nice, warm, fuzzy feeling inside now. [BLANK_AUDIO] On the haul, it's very difficult to not be impressed by this thing. The vogue used to play second fatal to the full fact range rover, but I think it's clear now that this new model stands proudly by itself as a car worthy of consideration. Not just because of the badge, but because of it's capabilities and clever design. It's fun to drive, it's spacious, it looks good, it performs on and off road. And at around ��35,000 is also good value for money. This is a hell of a car. Sure, the big Range Rover might be better in many respects, but, all things considered, it's me, the [UNKNOWN] is arguably the smartest choice in the entire range. [MUSIC]