First Drive: 2012 Jaguar XKR-S
It was set to be a hot week. The forecast was for between 37 and 40 degrees C, with the sun living up to its end of the bargain. While one side of the country was drowning in monsoonal rain, this side was baking. And baking properly.
Photographer Jan was already sweating when we turned up to our test track, the RAC Driver Training Centre.
“Just don’t go silly straight away,” he said. “Try some easy laps first so we can get some shots and then we’ll do the fun stuff afterwards.”
Yes, sir. But the temptation to fry the rear rubber is just a bit too much for a journo to bear when there’s an empty track, 550hp from a supercharged V8, stiff suspension and rear-wheel-drive. Apparently self-control is required. Whatever…
Teamspeed had just been handed Jaguar’s latest and greatest creation, the superbly quick XKR-S. The big cat gets a few extra additions of the standard XKR, namely an extra 40 horsepower, suspension revisions, stability control enhancements and it now has a whopping 502lb/ft of torque. All of that is good for a 0-60mph sprint of 4.2 seconds.
Jaguar says that the “XKR-S is the ultimate expression of Jaguar’s long held duality of purpose: GT luxury with incredible performance.” We’ll be the judge of that, thank you very much.
When we arrived, the outside air temperature was already 38 degrees C, and climbing. The instruction was to don long pants and long sleeves. And then a helmet. Oh, goody. Thankfully, the XKR-S’s aircon works well, but there was plenty of water handy, just in case.
“Windows up,” requested Jan, and I pulled out onto the track. The Jaguar had already impressed with its brilliant Adaptive Dynamics suspension on the way there, soaking up regular bumps with ridiculous ease, and giving a ride that a car of this calibre is not supposed to have. It’s firm but never ever crashy or thumpy and Jag’s tortuous testing at the Nurburgring has truly paid off. But now the suspension was being tested in a very different light. How well would it get on with a tight, twisty one-mile handling loop?
The first couple of laps were sighting laps. Getting braking points noted, ensuring apexes are recognized and feeling the camber. I’ve driven here several times, but always in an entirely different style of car. The XKR-S is a GT with deep reserves of ability, so would it be out of its depth?
Building speed, the first thing you notice is that the Adaptive Dynamics system understands what you’re doing and all of a sudden, understeer is almost completely dialed out. Coming into some of the tightening radius corners, the back end is starting to come around with a simple lift of the throttle. This thing is tightening up beautifully, and is shrinking around me.
At first, I thought the steering was too light. A little more heft would have been good I thought, and if it felt like the Vantage S it would be perfect. But the more I hammered the Jag, the more I appreciated the lightness. It still has plenty of feel and resistance but the way you could counter steer quickly, especially in weight-transfer directional changes, you start to understand why Jaguar hasn’t firmed it up too much.
But it’s those sharp snaps when the car is sliding you have to be careful of. The XKR-S has an active differential, so while you can drift it easily, with both back wheels smoking like a chimney, it prefers smooth driving and not coming into corners backwards. With the traction control fully off, you have to have your wits about you.
One corner at the back of the circuit is a long sweeping righthander which tightens up, then relaxes just before a sharp 90-degree left. I had the Jag sliding smoothly and as it straightened before the left, the car gripped and back end flicked out to the right. The light steering came into its own so I could correct the car and keep the slide going around the left-hander but if I wasn’t paying attention it could easily have become a tank slapper and the XKR-S would have turned into the world’s most expensive lawnmower.
Drive it using the front-end grip, however and the Jaguar shows just how well it can do. It will scrub only in the tightest of corners and that can be undone by either a simple lift or feeding in more power carefully. With 550hp at your disposal, it’s easy to get the car sliding around, so it does require judicious use of the throttle, but do that and you get a super-quick car.
We timed a run with one of the instructors in the car (who also happens to be a rally champion) and it knocked out a 1min 02 second lap. The fastest car on that circuit (a fully prepped club car) did it in 58 seconds. With street tyres, the Jaguar is surprisingly fast.
But the speed is one thing. Quality is another. The XKR-S is extremely well appointed. It’s no stripped out track special. There’s lashings of leather with contrast stitching (even the roof lining is leather), textured aluminium, climate control, sat-nav, iPod and Bluetooth connectivity and piano-black and chrome highlights. It’s a beautiful interior with a good, usable bootspace and build quality to rival plenty of more expensive brands. The seats (which are 16-way electrically adjustable) are nothing short of fantastic, and you can spend literally hours in them without fidgeting.
Making it even more livable is the superb ZF six-speed automatic. Sitting behind that snarling V8, it offers extremely smooth shifts in auto mode and quicker shifts using Sports mode with paddles mounted to the steering wheel. Some of the most fun is downshifting from third to second around 60mph where the exhaust seems like it’s home to the Rice Bubbles family – there’s a fabulous snap, crackle and pop.
But then, it happened. After several laps and some sideways action (just enough for Mr Glovac to get his shots) I came out of turn one, piled on the throttle and there was nothing. It started with the aircon shutting down. The cabin became extremely hot, and the engine felt like 200 of its horses had bolted out the gate. Down the main straight at a snails pace the car was painfully slow. Then, a warning on the screen – “Engine temperature too high”. Great. This is all I need.
We’d booked the track to test the Jag’s potential and we were going to have to idle it back to the start. So, we pulled into the pits. Outside temperature was 40 degrees C. The hood was lifted and we let the car idle in the shade, to try and cool it down. Switching it off would have created heatsoak, so no chance of that. Ten minutes later we decided to try again.
The car regained its lost power and all was good again. For a lap and a half. Then, it went into limp-home mode. The warning came up again on the dash – it was inevitable: we were going to have to call it a day.
A quick phone call to Jaguar and the local dealer quickly rushed out to collect the car. Soon after was the phone call.
“It appears that something lodged itself in the cowling and stopped the fan from spinning. As a result, the fan fuse blew, it stopped cooling the car properly, which is why it overheated.”
To its credit, the dealer had the part in stock. It was replaced and the car was delivered back to me the next day. The good thing is the car did all it could to prevent an engine meltdown, but obviously the timing couldn’t have been worse. Still, I’d rather know that the car will protect itself should there be a fault of some sort, rather than write-off that beautiful V8.
We were able to still exploit the Jaguar XKR-S’s abilities and realise that this is definitely the best modern-day Jaguar on sale. Sure, the back seats are a laugh, and it may lose some of the regular XKR’s beauty with its aero package, but in the French Racing Blue of our test car, this is one good looking vehicle.
That it can rock up to a track and put in a seriously good time yet drive home in absolute comfort and luxury means that “duality” that the company speaks about is right on the money.
Letting “the cat” out of the bag has never been so much fun.