Our cars: Range Rover Evoque - September

Range Rover Evoque 2.2 SD4 Prestige 4WD

Week ending September 28
Mileage 11,700
Driven this week 150 miles

Range Rover Evoque review

As I've been away in Paris for a chunk of this week, Mrs Mac had a chance to give a female perspective on the baby Rangie (apart from showing it off to her workmates).

Her view? The Evoque is surprisingly small when you're driving it, even down narrow country roads, but surprisingly large when you're trying to park it in a tight space.

'I couldn't see enough out of the rear window,' she said. I reckon familiarity, and trusting the rear view camera, would help, but she's right about the narrow rear window - it's tiny.

By John McIlroy
John.McIlroy@whatcar.com

John's Range Rover Evoque on video


Week ending September 21
Mileage 11,550
Driven this week: 200 miles

Our Evoque is out of sight (although not out of mind) at the moment; a colleague desperately asked if it could be used as her wedding car, so it hasn't been seen in the car park for a couple of days.

The request reminded me that a) the Evoque is still a massive head-turner and b) despite record sales and a flat-out production run, it's still a relatively rare sight on British roads. I am seeing more examples on a week-by-week basis, but there's still a double-take when I glimpse the distinctive daytime running lights and chunky front end.

I also love looking at parked-up examples and checking out their interior options. Not one other car has our tan interior, I've noted; have I got something badly wrong?


Week ending September 14
Mileage 11,350
Miles this week 360

Something has finally broken on the Evoque. I squeezed a large gas canister into the boot the other day and it appears that the parcel shelf didn't like it very much. One of the hooks that secure the supporting string has broken off completely. I look forward to seeing how long it takes my local dealer to source a replacement.

The cabin also has a new rattle, this time in the front passenger door, near the main speaker. I blame the fact that I've recently managed to hook up my phone's Spotify app to the stereo via Bluetooth. I may have cranked up the volume a bit too high during an early test run and blown something out of the back of the speaker. How very rock, rattle 'n' roll.

John.McIlroy@whatcar.com

Week ending September 7
Mileage 10,610
Driven this week: 231 miles

Last week, I said that one of my biggest frustrations about taking the Evoque for a holiday in Europe was that the speedo didn't display the speed in kmh. However, it appears there is a solution. Reader Mark Oldfield emailed me to say that he encountered the same problem last year, but used the sat-nav to display the speed in kmh, thus keeping him fine-free!

Overall, though, I emerged impressed with the Evoque after my two weeks' holiday. It was a comfortable motorway mile-muncher for me and my partner in Europe, and when I was playing in the CIJB World Championships, it was able to ferry around the full five-man England team in total comfort.

As I've mentioned before, my biggest gripe was the car's fuel economy. I never drove the car hard - on the contrary, most of the time, I was ambling gently from place to place - yet it returned only 33mpg on my trip. Very disappointing - albeit pretty much exactly what our True MPG tests said it would do.

Andy.Pringle@whatcar.com