Mercedes is both beauty and beast

OVER the years I’ve taken part in dozens of Top 10 car polls.

You know the ones, like Top 10 Iconic Classics and Top 10 Roadsters, that sort of thing.

They’re always an interesting exercise we all love.

But one I’ve never seen is Top 10 Cars That Are Pig Ugly But Really Good.

Should I chance to come across one in future, I already have my Number One sorted.

And the first name on the team sheet will be the Porsche Panamera. A quite brilliant car to drive, but revoltingly ugly and rather too big to park and feed through city traffic. I believe the Panamera is the reason for this week’s test car’s very existence.

If rival Mercedes needed an expensive and very powerful alternative to Porsche’s four-door Panamera then it’s created it in the AMG GT four-door.

It’s also a lot better looking. Let’s face it – Mercedes isn’t short of extremely powerful four seat/four-door machines.

The E63 S saloon for example, and the CLS63 S both fit the description, especially the latter which is billed as a four-door coupe and is as stylish as the Porsche isn’t. But these cars have

apparently not been sporty – or expensive – enough to draw people away from the Panamera.

All that could be about to change. You might assume, as I did at first, that being called the Mercedes-amg GT 4-door means it would be based on the GT coupe, Merc’s super stylish aluminium twin-turbo V8 motor.

But no, it actually uses the same platform as the E-class and the aforementioned CLS. It does, however, use the same 4.0-litre V8

Fantastic news for youngsters who want to become a mechanic. Ferrari is offering 12 apprenticeships at dealerships around the country which will lead to a full-time position in servicing or sales. Applicants need at least 5 GCSES and must apply before March 6 at two of the dealers and March 9 at the rest. Go to ferrariapprenticeship. co.uk to find out more about the jobs.

The cost of financing a new car has shot up over the last year, mainly because of the pound’s poor performance against the euro.Price guide and buying experts at Parkers have discovered a BMW 1-Series bought through a PCP deal last January, costing £200 a month, would now cost £298 – which means that over a four-year contract period it would add an extra £4,606 to the price.I predict that a lot of people will stick with their current car and not jump to renew leasing deals. It could be a bad year for dealers.