Metro Plus
Bangalore
Chennai
Hyderabad
The flying machine
|
The new Nissan GT-R is powerful, fast and everything a sports car should be
|
My heart beat fast, there were butterflies in my stomach and I was trying to breathe with difficulty, I whisked around the Sendai Highland Raceway in Japan seated in the new Nissan GT-R. The reason for my heightened state was the fact that the car I
was in has 473bhp. 200bhp is fast, 300 needs your undivided involvement and every 50bhp after that is a big, big step up. Green light on the pit lane exit? Time to place the beautifully-made accelerator pedal into the carpet.
The GT-R flies off the blocks and reels in the short straight — whaaam! It’s at the end of the straight even before my brain can catch up, and I pedal back a bit for the next few corners. Still, even when using only 80 per cent throttle, the GT-R is tearing towards the next corner, the rate of acceleration continuously flying up and up, never peaking, as the dual-clutch gearbox pre-selects the next gear and shifts up with zero let-up. It slams you back in the seat and pins you there, as you ride the stream of never-ending jet engine-like thrust! This sledgehammer performance is concentrated to the upper reaches of the power-band; the performance of the GT-R after 4000rpm is so strong, your gritty grin is part fear, part thrill. There is no way I’m using maximum available power.
The twin-turbo 3.8-litre motor that powers the GT-R has been tuned to spin hard and fast and as a result, the car has brilliant straight-line stability, can get from 0-100kph in just 3.5 seconds and can go as fast as 312kph. In addition, the fact that it has a lightning-quick, DSG-style gearbox is also part of the reason for the fantastic pace this car has. Given the massive power this car possesses, it is a good thing that you won’t be able to flick it around from corner to corner as you would small or lighter car. Despite the fact that the GT-R is 1,740 kilos, you don’t feel this weight while hurling it around a track.
Even when I arrived at a corner, hard on the brakes, at increasing speeds, the Nissan remained composed and this in turn gives you the confidence to push harder and harder into corners, speed constantly increasing and even once in the corner; the GT-R rolls very little, the weight distributed evenly over the four tyres, each getting their claws into the tarmac and holding on for dear life.
Then comes the magical part — as you push down the throttle smoothly, release all that atomic bomb-like power and are shot towards the exit of the corner with the tail creeping wide onto the kerb, the GT-R pulls hard enough to arrest your natural breathing. And you can do this corner after corner, lap after lap.
Though you might experience some scrub from the front wheels and some understeer; Nissan has offered a solution for this. You can neutralise this by getting on the throttle early and when you do this, it enables the four-wheel-drive system to balance out the torque and send more of it to the rear to counter the understeer.
When driving the GT-R on Japan’s public roads, I discovered it has a harsh ride. It also tends to tramline and follows groves in the road.
The interiors are not going to leave you spellbound either. What the Nissan does have going for it is the fact that it looks brutally aggressive and quick, but it drives and handles beautifully, and is so well-mannered that anyone could drive it.
Of course, the biggest disadvantage is its price.
While the Japanese can enjoy this vehicle at a Rs. 24 lakh, which is how much is costs in Japan, to get one of these beauties in India will cost you Rs. 60 lakh (estimate).
No, it isn’t fair, but neither is life.
SHAPUR KOTWAL
Printer friendly
page
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
Metro Plus
Bangalore
Chennai
Hyderabad
|
