It must say something about the Motor Show that the only model I actively tried to purchase on press day had two wheels, a chain and some pedals.
I wasn’t being deliberately obtuse or fashionably envirofriendly. Indeed my usual chronic cynicism was being tempered by the company of my wide-eyed eleven year old daughter. As a result I spent much of my time hanging around the hands-on stuff at the event while she got on with the business of enjoying herself...
So it was top marks to Ford for having the longest football table I’ve ever seen and also allowing us to kick footballs through European Champions League stars. Then, in the carpark, more Ford sporting shenanigans where we were allowed to chuck rugby balls through hoops – and load up the deck of a Ranger with sundry rugger luggage. All balls to Ford, then – round ones and squashed ones.
Over at Vauxhall they were getting excited about their Insignia – it was the radio-controlled mini-VXRs that got my youngster interested, as she ran rings around the grown-up hacks. She then insisted that I take the Zoom-Zoom challenge in some full sized Mazdas, which was fun. Interestingly I was two seconds faster around the track in a Mazda 2 than I was in the MX-5, which suggests I may not be cut out for a racing career.
Inside there was plenty of PlayStation action on various stands, but also a rather depressing radio controlled scale model hell on earth operated by Transport for London. Without any prompting Miss Olivia Ruppert ran the lights, stopped in box junctions and triggered speed cameras in her ‘car share’ MINI. And to think: Londoners have paid for this brainwashing.
So whilst all the proper motoring hacks interviewed the great and the good, we looked at a groovy Saab folding bike that they had parked around their stand. Miss Ruppert really wanted one. It took most of the day to find out that it cost £850.
Unlike the four wheeled stuff I saw yesterday it looked like it was worth every penny.