Classic Defender revived as 567bhp road-legal rally-raider

The classic Land Rover Defender 110 body shape will be revived for a new high-performance, rally-bred machine from off-road specialist Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) subsidiary Bowler that will represent the “ultimate expression” of the design.

Codenamed CSP 575, the road-legal 4x4 will be based on a reworked version of Bowler’s bespoke high-performance rally-car chassis topped  with L316-generation Defender 110 aluminium body panels and powered by JLR’s range-topping 567bhp supercharged V8 engine.

It will be the first road-focused vehicle produced by Derbyshire specialist Bowler and the firm’s first project since it was bought by JLR last year and placed under its Special Vehicle Operations (SVO) umbrella. Bowler continues to operate as an independent entity, although now with greater co-operation from SVO, and has been given a licence to use the Defender 110 body.

Michael van der Sande, the boss of SVO division, promised the new four-wheel-drive machine will be “a wickedly fast rally car for the road” with a planned 0-60mph time of around 4.0sec.

The vehicle will be hand-produced in small numbers – likely around a dozen a year – at Bowler’s factory in Belper and will cost £200,000.

“This project marries three things: the rally experience from Bowler, the powertrain and capabilities from SVO and the iconic Defender shape from Land Rover,” said van der Sande. “It’s clearly something customers want; there’s a lot of customising of the L316 Defender going on, and this is the ultimate performance iteration of that shape.”

While performance details haven’t been disclosed, van der Sande promised that the CSP 575 “will be very fast”. He added: “Because it’s rally-derived, it’s also in the handling and the way it drives that you’ll see the excitement. We can promise it will look like a Defender but will have race attributes coming from Bowler.”