Road test review: Range Rover Sport SVR Carbon Edition

Wednesday, 5 May 2021

A simple video of the Range Rover Sport SVR going quickly. Everywhere.

RANGE ROVER SPORT SVR CARBON EDITION
Base price: $234,900
Powertrain and economy: 5.0-litre supercharged petrol V8, 423kW/700Nm, 8-speed automatic, AWD, combined economy 12.7L/100km, CO2 292g/km (source: RightCar).

The Range Rover Sport SVR crouches down mighty low on its air suspension in Track mode, and it certainly helps with the corners. Not so much here though.

Vital statistics: 4879mm long, 2073mm wide, 1803mm high, 2923mm wheelbase, luggage capacity 780 litres, 22-inch alloy wheels.
We like: Brutal performance, obnoxious noise, impressive handling, superbly comfortable.

The Carbon Edition adds a flagrantly extravagant exposed carbon fibre bonnet. And that’s just the start.

We don't like: Brutal thirst, obnoxious amounts of carbon fibre.

What happens when you add a conspicuous amount of exposed carbon fibre to the already-in-your-face belligerence of the unapologetically supercharged V8 Range Rover Sport SVR? Well, rather obviously, you get a very fast SUV, but also a deep moral conundrum…

Do you mean you are struggling to balance the SVR’s superb performance and sound with its disastrous effects on the planet?

No, that’s not it at all. The Carbon Edition of the Sport SVR tears me in two very different idealogical directions at once because every time I hear the mighty supercharged V8 explode into life and roar like a disgruntled bear as it accelerates obscenely off the line, my bogan side giggles like an excited schoolboy. Every. Damn. Time. It is awesome. I love it.

The mighty 5.0-litre supercharged V8 also gets a fancy carbon fibre cover.

Just in case you thought the top of the bonnet looked like a sticker (which it does), that’s real, unadorned carbon fibre.

* Jaguar brings something Special to F-Pace SUV

* Is this the most un-PC car on the planet?

The Sport SVR is brutally fast and handles remarkably well for something roughly the size and shape of a block of flats too.

* Jaguar F-Type SVR goes over the top and then some

Is there really such a thing as too much carbon fibre? The Carbon Edition answers that with a resounding ‘yes’.

But every time I look at it, my anti-establishment anarchist side just wants to set it alight and laugh at the owner’s anguish as his ridiculous display of over-compensation is reduced to a smouldering pile of aluminium, carbon fibre and unpaid parking fines.

Basically, I love conspicuous displays of power, but despise conspicuous displays of wealth. It’s my curse.

The Range Rover Sport SVR is obnoxious, outrageous and awesome.

The Carbon Edition adds the optional carbon fibre exterior pack and exposed carbon fibre bonnet ($19,650), carbon fibre interior trim, ($2850), a carbon fibre engine cover ($3850) and larger 22-inch gloss black alloy wheels ($3200) to the Sport SVR, taking something that is already borderline offensive, but absolutely awesome (a huge noisy V8 SUV that costs a vast sum of money and goes very fast) and adds an extra layer of obnoxiousness in the form of a literal layer of glossy carbon fibre.

All of this carbon fibre will set you back a healthy $20k over the standard Sport SVR – which is a relative bargain considering how much each pack is separately, but it still doesn't anything tangible, apart from letting everyone know you had a spare $20k to waste.

Okay, and it is terrible for the planet too, but, man that V8 is something else…

So it sounds good then?

It sounds superb. But then that mighty 5.0-litre SVR V8 always has in everything Jaguar Land Rover choose to wedge it into.

In the Range Rover Sport it isn’t quite as feral-sounding as it is in a Jaguar, but the belligerent bellow it emits under full-throttle is hair-raisingly primal, with that deep-down lizard part of your brain being triggered into a fight or flight response every time you hear it. Which is handy, because the Sport SVR will happily fight and fly.

But there is another level to the noise, because if you decided to go full “my neighbours hate me” by slipping it into sport mode, it gets even more aggressive, with a barrage of bangs and pops on the overrun that borders on utterly unnecessary. It both is and most definitely isn’t utterly unnecessary, of course, which is the beauty of it.

The mighty V8 also offers simply mind-melting performance, with the feral roar accompanying eye-widening acceleration that doesn’t ever seem to let up before your nerve does as it rockets from a standing start to 100kmh in 4.5 seconds, and then well beyond.

You do have to remain aware of its sheer heft heading into a corner, however, as the Sport SVR is still a very big, rather tall chap – even hunkered down almost alarmingly low on its air suspension. It handles impressively well for something so big, tall and heavy, but a slow-in, brutally aggressive-out approach is required. Luckily, the SVR also has spectacular brakes.

So it sounds brilliant, goes like hell and actually handles relatively well. You do like it then?

Yeah, except that other part of me still wants to spraypaint “c..k, p..s, Partridge” along the side every time I catch a glimpse of the excessive carbon fibre. Which, as mentioned earlier, is literally everywhere, and is totally pointless.

Now, it’s not carbon fibre in particular that I have a problem with, it’s what it represents here – this isn’t a hypercar that needs to save every ounce of weight in the pursuit of speed. There’s no extra performance and the weight savings are negligible on something this big anyway (everything the carbon fibre replaces is either aluminium or plastic), so the sole purpose is to simply spend more money making something already quite obnoxious into something completely obnoxious.

So you do hate it then?

No. Despite my eat-the-rich pointless posturing, I still love it, because everything about driving it is just so awesome.

I can’t, however, see the point in buying it when the standard SVR is every bit as awesome, yet also cheaper and is not going to make you look like quite such a massive knob.

Oh, then of course, there is the fact that the sheer conspicuous consumption of a 5.0-litre supercharged V8 in a vehicle weighing more than two tonnes is offensive to anyone who breathes air. But that is a whole different idealogical struggle, and one that you really should be having if you are wealthy enough to waste an extra $20k for carbon fibre bits on your $200k-plus SUV…

Any other cars I should consider?

Despite the rapid rise of EVs, there is actually no shortage of brutally fast V8-powered large SUVs that cost more than $200k.

There is, of course, the 460kW/750Nm BMW X5 M Competition (and its silly ‘coupe’ twin, the X6 M) that lands here at $225,900 ($231,900 for the X6 M), the 450kW/850Nm Mercedes-AMG GLE 63 S (and its silly ‘coupe’ twin as well) that hits at $234,100 ($240,200 for the silly coupe) and the 441kW/800Nm Audi RS Q8 that costs $243,900, all of which are equally obnoxious, equally fast and sound equally fantastic.

It just gets excitingly more expensive from there, with the likes of the Porsche Cayenne Turbo, Aston Martin DBX, Lamborghini Urus, Bentley Bentayga… the list goes on…

Of course then there is the smaller Jaguar F-Pace SVR with a detuned 405kW/700Nm version of the supercharged V8 in the Rangie for $169,900, or you could buy the forthcoming Tesla Model X Plaid that is cheaper ($209,990), much, much faster but has all the aural charm of a blender and, unfortunately, still looks like a Model X.