JETHRO BOVINGDON

Lotus fans really didn’t like evo’s take on the Emira, as Jethro discovered

‘Anything negative about this car is lies, peddled by the corrupt’

ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY IS A VERY DIFFICULT thing to come by, for me at least. Death, taxes and Mcdonald’s ice-cream machines breaking every time the sun shines is about all I can be absolutely certain about in life. Oh, and that no matter how late my copy is, I’ll always look like an angel compared with Dickie Meaden. Sometimes I feel like I’m alone as I muddle through life, half-remembering people and places, always finding nuance in arguments and actually enjoying that the world is full of shades of grey. Other people seem so bloody sure.

Especially people who love Lotus. They know. For sure. Not even a shred of doubt. evo is biased. Jethro Bovingdon is biased. The Emira is faultless. The V6 engine is a screamer, the manual ’box makes a Ferrari F50’s six-speed feel baggy, the chassis is so good you could drive straight at the English Channel and hit France without so much as a treadblock getting wet. The Emira conquers all, walks on water, and its ECU is, probably, curing cancer as we speak.

None of these people has driven an Emira, of course. I doubt many have been within 300 yards of the new Lotus. Yet they know to their very core that anything negative written about this car is lies, probably a message bought and paid for by other manufacturers and being peddled by the egregious and corrupt. I’m the very worst offender. And naturally I’m writing this from my sprawling Brewster Green hideout in the Black Forest, surveying a courtyard full of rear-engined press cars, euros tumbling from every storage compartment.

If you didn’t see our magazine review of the Emira or the video on evo’s Youtube channel, then here’s a brief catch-up. We all love the way it looks and the way it feels inside. Here’s a Lotus that appears a bargain instead of a stretch beyond credibility. A kind of mini-ferrari look and feel at a price that lots of people can genuinely aspire to achieve. On the road, Henry found it to be fluid and communicative but ultimately let down by a front end that doesn’t want to really bite. A car you can’t hustle and attack in. On track our test car – an Emira with the stiffer Sport chassis but fitted with Goodyear Eagle F1 tyres instead of the Cup 2s – felt slightly clumsy and lacked precision. Furthermore, none of us was blown away by the supercharged V6 and six-speed ’box. In fact, we’re all really excited about the arrival of the lighter four-cylinder car with that crackling AMG engine and dual-clutch gearbox. Doesn’t sound too bad, does it? Loads to like, tons of potential, some disappointments (including a measured weight of 1486kg with a full tank of fuel) and a recognition that an old Toyota engine and gearbox (originally from a US market RAV4 and Lexus IS200 diesel respectively) don’t quite cut it in 2022 in this sector. Our review felt pretty balanced to me and, on video in particular as it’s all caught live and in the moment, it’s hard to feign intense love or a tinge of disappointment. It is what it is. The Emira – in pre-production form, at least – is good but didn’t blow our minds.

Yet some were outraged. In their world there’s no room for debate. Any opinion different to the one they’ve formed with no actual experience of the car is unjust and highly suspicious. They cite other reviews – many more glowing than ours – as more evidence that evo and I are deeply biased. The other reviewers have no more qualification than our team, but because they reflected and reassured they were taken as gospel. These people didn’t want reviews but affirmation.

And you know what? After initially being taken aback by the bile that poured forth, I soon came to realise this could be a force for good. I’ll never understand naked tribalism of this kind, but I do recognise it’s essential for the likes of Lotus to survive. There will be plenty of rational human beings who buy the Emira and realise it’s not beyond the realms of logic that a company with vastly bigger resources, unbroken experience, fantastically talented engineers, dazzling test drivers and an unrivalled motorsport pedigree might just be able to build a car that’s a match for the Emira. They will accept the Emira’s quirks and love it for what it is. But for every normal human who becomes a customer, Lotus could do with two or three lunatics for whom no other car can compete. Their money is good and their spreading of the gospel is even better.

So thank god for tribalism. Lotus, Mclaren, Alpine… they all need this kind of support. Even the likes of Ferrari and Porsche. And whilst the loyalty of the blinkered is not enough to build an entire business model around, the fanatic is still a valuable commodity. Absolute certainty about complex issues will always be an odd concept to me but I am jealous of how simple it must make life’s big decisions. For now, we’ll keep our minds open and prepare for more run-ins with believers from one cult or another. They’re nutters, but we love them, and the industry – particularly the British car industry – couldn’t function without them.