During the course of this job, we here at Motoring get the chance to drive some very notable cars. Yes, that's our job; yes, it is pretty cool.
Of course, the job also entails relating our thoughts and feelings about them to you, our educated and enthusiastic readers. After we put each car through our extensive testing programme (which pretty much means we drive the tyres off of it as much as we can) you can read our reviews on mo3 and other pages in our section.
But sometimes, our time behind the wheel isn't really enough to make it a full review of the car, and we wouldn't want to cheat you with a full story. Yet, we still don't want to waste our experiences, so here is a collection of cars I've driven over the last little while and a few initial thoughts on all of them. Watch these pages in the future for more full reviews.
Nissan GT-R
I had four laps around the Losail track in Doha - hardly enough to even become acquainted with the circuit, much less the power and all-wheel-drive prowess of the Nissan supercar. But what a car it is; raw fury, with its tail wiggling under hard braking, then pulling extreme lateral g's going through a corner. And with AWD, you can hammer on the 530hp at the apex and it roars out the exit, but give it too much and that tail starts to get light again. This short time spent with the GT-R makes me want more; much more.
Oullim Spirra
I had my doubts about this Korean sports car; I had never even heard of it before I stepped into the tight cockpit for a drive around Dubai. It wasn't much of a route; pretty much straight lines in traffic, but I was able to feel the acceleration punch me in the back. But the sound of that turbo waste gate as it releases its pressure sounds like a jet taking off, until it really kicks off and it actually sounds like a whip snapping; it will raise the hairs on the back of your neck if you like turbocharged engines.
Cadillac CTS-V Coupe
I really like the look of this American two-door; very sharp and angular. It's a 556hp screamer, though for some reason you don't really feel that power as furiously as you'd expect when you stomp on the throttle. But going around the Yas circuit revealed a bit too much understeer, something I've found with many American cars.
John Heinricy, Cadillac's test driver who was in attendance that day, said he left the six-speed transmission in automatic as he set the speed record for production saloons at the Nürburgring last year. But I found the downshifting to be a little slow, to be honest. Overall, a very hot car, though I'm not sure it's still up to par with the German saloons and coupes.
