Formentor e-Hybrid looks great and will save you fortune on fuel
I am a great fan of the Cupra Formentor.
The last one I drove was a demon on wheels with a formidable engine sound.
This one, however, is more likely to please the eco- warriors among us – and the business users for its benefits in kind.
It is the plug- in hybrid Formentor with a 12.8kWh battery driving an electric motor while a 1.4-litre petrol engine makes sure you never run out of power.
Plug it in at night for an electric range of about 32-34 miles when you wake up and, if that’s all you do every day, then you can drive forever on one tank of fuel. Cupra reckons you can probably do about 176 to 188 miles before needing to fill up. With fuel the price it is at the moment, that’s what I call a saving.
Cupra, for those who are bewildered by the name, is the performance brand of Spanish car firm Seat and has been rolling out great cars recently.
This Formentor e-Hybrid is a very good-looking crossover/ hot hatch with a sculpted bonnet, roof rai ls, lovely copper-tinted alloys and neat rear tail lights.
What I like most about it is the copper detailing. The Cupra logo looks a bit like a bull ’s head and sits on the neat grille. Twin tailpipes are also outlined in copper and more copper design cues feature on the rear and are then reflected inside.
The VZ2 model on my driveway boasts beautiful petrol blue leather seats – really comfortable too – with copper stitching and copper outlining the central console, the air vents and, my favourite, that bull’s head again on the steering wheel.
From it hang two buttons – one to turn on the engine with the default mode being electric and the other to motor you through the driving modes. These start at Comfortable, Sport, Individual and the one that’s most fun, Cupra drive.
In electric mode, for city driving, it is quiet and wellmannered but put it into Cupra elsewhere and it takes off, showing its pace.
It is nippy on corners and delightful on the motorway. It handles well and is easy to park because of the excellent reverse parking camera.
I loved the adapt ive headlights that made driving in the dark so easy, especially on quiet country roads. It was like driving into a tunnel of light.
And the other very well thought out thing was the blind spot alert. Now, there are many different iterations of this, from the light on the side mirror to a video on the instrument binnacle, but the light that f lashes on a line in the door of this Cupra is, I think, by far the best. It alerts without terrifying you.
For tech, there is a 12in nav screen, four front and rear USB sockets, wireless Apple CarPlay and wireless phone charging.
Space is ample – 345 litres in the boot – with various shaped trays in the front for keys, phones and the sort of rubbish we all travel with these days.
For those considering moving slightly to electric, this is a good halfway house with performance and looks to match.