It would seem that they’ve removed the massive rear wing. But as the good people of Prodrive unload their curious new car from a trailer into the depths of central London, I’m not sure that has left it much less conspicuous.
Heads turn. Cyclists stop. Runners take pictures. Questions come. What? How many? How much? How fast? Has Fisher-Price made a 4x4?
First, then, to what. This sand-coloured blob, this “Ferrari of the desert” (as per Prodrive boss David Richards), this 1:1 Tamiya fever dream turned reality is the Prodrive Hunter, and it barely fits onto the trailer it has arrived on.
Length isn’t its problem: at only 4.6 metres, it’s shorter than the BMW 3 Series. Nor is height: at 1.85 metres, it’s lower than the Range Rover.
But it is 2.3 metres wide, which is 100mm wider than an original Hummer, and you will remember how wide that was. Sean Connery couldn’t drive one around San Francisco in The Rock without “hitting every f***in’ thing in sight” and there’s considerably more space there than in Knightsbridge.
Anyway, the Hunter isn’t much narrower than the biggest trucks that are allowed to conventionally ply Britain’s roads, plus it’s left-hand drive, the tiny door mirrors don’t adjust, the side windows are small and there’s no rear glass.
Nevertheless, it seemed a bright idea to bring it to London, because the capital is occasionally home to ridiculous supercars and the ridiculously wealthy (although fewer of them than usual soon, perhaps), and this would seem just as incongruous.
Wouldn’t it be a giggle, then, to drive this car around some of the most absurd places that it could be driven, it was suggested, by somebody who clearly wouldn’t have to actually do it. Ha, yes, that sounds like fun etc. Then I get in, and it doesn’t any more. I’m quite scared.
Before we set off, I should give you the back story. Prodrive makes good competition cars, as I’m sure you’re aware. GT and rally cars, most notably. Sébastien Loeb took one of the latter to second place in the Dakar Rally in January. And this effectively is a road-going customer version of that car.
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I read this after a Car and Driver article, from the sublime to the poitless.Any chance of just writing about the car without all of the waffing and 6th form poitics?
About £800 to fill the tank at current prices.
But with that suspension articulation it would be ideal for driving through a modern city with all the stupid bumps councils put in.
I like it.