Please leave your SEATS and move to the Cupras

Spanish brand SEAT may be no more – in New Zealand anyway – but the brand has seen a rebirth, BORN again you might say, under the Cupra (pronounced Coo-prah) badge.

OK, yes, Cupras have been here before, but never quite so aggressively as they are now. Having eaten the SEAT brand, the Transformer badged Cupras are now ready to stamp their copper plates on the Kiwi car scene.

So, at the major brand overhaul/unveiling this year, we saw some SEAT friends being reintroduced under the Cupra name: meet the Cupra Leon hatch, the Cupra Leon Sportwagon and the rather appropriately named all-electric Cupra Born, AKA Jason or Matt Damon, whichever you prefer.

And now you see why Born was capitalised in the first paragraph.

The all-electric Born is the star of the show by virtue of its powertrain. It has also been a highly anticipated addition to the lineup with those who follow the international motoring scene fizzing with anticipation for its arrival Downunder.

Born is billed as a hot hatch with an electric motor and in terms of acceleration, it’s kind of what Tesla would come up with if Tesla could build a stylish, city smart hatchback while curbing the impulse to fill it with gimmicks.

Born is – and this sounds strange, but in the words of Billy T James, nah nah, shuddup – a sensible hot hatch, which does attract the right sort of attention because it follows on from the Cupra design ethos of being aggressively sporty in a humble sort of way.

Where once carmakers were all about curves in the bodywork, today its more about the angles, and the Born has so many of them – all good looking by the way IMHO – you almost don’t know where to look first.

Born is striking to look at, but easy on the eye at the same time, which is almost as interesting a dichotomy as having a sensible performance hot hatch.

It’s good looking on the inside too, but you’ll have to wait for our comments on that and its performance in the next issue, because joining Born were two other Cupras, probably better suited to the fleet market.

First the Cupra Leon hatch – which was collected two days before going to print and launched about a month and a half before. Hatches are sort of cool today because they are dwarfed by SUV sales, which makes a hatch stand out and all Cupras stand out, but in a subtle way. The Cupra Formentor for example, is one such Dark Horse, but I digress.

The Leon hatch also takes advantage of Cupras healthy obsession with chiselled lines giving the overall look of this being a car you shouldn’t mess with.

It’s aggressive, can deliver both the goods and the erm, goods, and yes, you’ll have that sense of “I’m driving something special” which is as much a standard feature as is that seriously cool Cupra badge. And it IS cool because I’m the editor and you’re reading my opinion, so it must be true.

More on the Leon hatch next issue. The last member of the trio is one dearest to my heart as a fleet manager, which I’m not, but I like anyway. This is the Cupra Sportwagon.

Any carmaker confident enough to come to New Zealand with a wagon gets gold stars in my book.

I’m speaking for the country now, but I believe we are closet wagon fans – in the corporate car space anyway – and the Cupra Sportwagon should come up very quickly on fleet buyer radar.

It looks hypercool in black, delivers all that a wagon should – metaphorically and literally – and while being Cupra’s most practical offering from a fleet manager’s point of view, does not compromise on that power plus panache formula which I think Cupra should adopt as a catchphrase since all its cars deliver on the promise.

Oh, and I might have forgotten to mention the insanely clever fuel saving tech which sounds so weird when you talk about how performance-oriented the Cupra vehicles are, but rolling down the highway with the engine in standby and passing other cars while you’re doing it is, well it appeals to my sense of smart and sporty motoring.

So Cupra is here, its time is now and if you have even the slightest hint of appreciating intelligently practical and smoothly stylish cars, THIS is the brand to add to the list. It should be at the top by the way, not an “oh yeah…that brand” afterthought.