The Mazda MX-5 is a small, fun roadster that’s usually cheaper to run than bigger cars. Here, the host is talking about possibly selling it because it’s not ideal for their back and because they’re doing lots of motorway driving.
Term
motorway miles
Motorway miles means lots of driving on the fast roads. The host is saying that kind of driving makes their fuel costs higher, which is part of why they’re thinking about changing cars.
The Porsche Boxster is a sporty Porsche with the engine placed closer to the middle of the car, which helps it handle well. The host is considering buying one used because they think it could still be a good value if they find a tidy example and improve it a bit.
TFL (Transport for London) is the organization that runs transport in London. The host is saying that for some older cars, the paperwork/data needed for London rules may not be available, which can change how the car is treated.
Homologation is the official certification that a car or engine meets the rules. The host is saying that older cars might not have the same official records in the system, even if the hardware is basically the same.
They’re talking about whether a car is allowed to avoid a fee. If the authorities don’t have emissions data for your car, it may not qualify for the “exempt” status.
The Bugatti Veyron Super Sport is a special, record-focused version of the Veyron. The hosts are talking about how it set an official top speed record for a production car.
Guinness World Records are official record attempts that get verified. In this case, they’re using it to say the car’s top speed was officially recognized.
The Koenigsegg Agera is a supercar that’s been used for top-speed record attempts. The hosts mention it as one of the cars that helped drive the competition to go faster in a straight line.
The Yangwang U9 is an electric supercar that the hosts say has been used to beat other speed records. They’re pointing out that it doesn’t look like it should be that fast.
The Bugatti Veyron is one of the most famous ultra-fast supercars ever made. The hosts are basically saying it still feels special and well-designed even years later.
The Bugatti Chiron is another modern hypercar from Bugatti. The conversation uses it to compare how the Veyron feels and why the owner preferred the Veyron’s engineering.
“GT” is short for grand touring, meaning a car meant for fast, long-distance driving. “Hyper fast GT” just means it’s a GT that’s taken to an extreme speed level.
The McLaren F1 is a legendary supercar known for being very driver-focused and engineering-heavy. In this segment it’s mentioned because it’s another hypercar-style machine, but with practical space for luggage.
“Record-breaking history” refers to a car’s documented achievements—like speed or performance records—that make it notable beyond normal ownership. The hosts frame the Veyron as a “sizable slice” of that kind of history, implying collectible value tied to its accomplishments.
The Porsche 918 Spyder is a very high-end Porsche supercar. The hosts are talking about how it set an early “record” lap time at Germany’s Nürburgring track.
“Paint to sample” means the car was painted using a specific color sample chosen by the buyer or ordered specially. Custom colors can be harder to repaint perfectly later.
The Porsche 918 Spider is a very special, high-end Porsche supercar. Here they’re talking about how the brake calipers’ color can look good—or clash—with the car’s exterior color.
The Honda Civic Type R FL5 is a fast, track-focused version of the Civic. They’re saying it set an extremely quick lap time at the Nürburgring’s Nordschleife, which is a big deal for hot hatches.
“Tire tech” means improvements in tires that help them grip the road better. They’re saying better tires can make a car faster by several seconds.
Term
launch car versus the limited
They’re comparing an early “launch” version of a car to a later limited version. The point is that changes between versions—especially tires—can make the lap time noticeably different.
Front-wheel drive means the front wheels do the work of both steering and moving the car. The hosts are saying that making a front-wheel-drive car feel extremely sporty is harder, so it’s a big deal when it’s done well.
Car
Renault R26R
The Renault R26R is a very serious, track-focused hot hatch. The hosts are saying it was an early example of a front-wheel-drive car that felt like it belonged at the same performance level as a much more extreme sports car.
A world speed record means the fastest speed a car has been proven to reach. The hosts mention it to explain why the Jaguar XJ220 is such a big deal historically.
Sight line is basically what you can see from the driver’s seat. The hosts are saying the McLaren F1’s seating position makes visibility feel especially good.
Ride is how smooth the car feels when the road gets rough. They’re saying the McLaren F1 feels good over bumps, even if some people think it’s not perfect in every respect.
Pikes Peak is a well-known mountain race where cars drive up a steep hill against the clock. The hosts talk about it because it’s where these record times were set.
This is technology that helps the car stay stable by adjusting how the suspension behaves. The hosts think it’s a big reason a heavy Bentley can still feel controlled and planted.
Pikes Peak is a well-known mountain race where cars drive up a steep road to the top. When people talk about a “record,” they mean the fastest time someone has done on that exact route.
Drift mode is a driving setting that helps the car slide more easily on purpose. It usually relaxes the car’s stability control so the rear can move around instead of correcting immediately.
“Tail happy” means the car’s rear can get loose and swing out more easily. It’s basically a way of saying the car is playful and can oversteer instead of staying perfectly straight.
Battery longevity means how well an EV battery lasts over time. If the battery “longevity” is good, it keeps most of its usable energy even after a few years.
Heat management is how an EV keeps its battery from getting too hot. Keeping temperatures under control helps the battery charge faster and last longer.
Hyper miling is when someone drives in a very careful, “stretch every mile” way to get maximum range. It’s often done to try to set or beat efficiency records.
The Volkswagen Passat 1.6 TDI is a diesel Passat that’s built for good fuel economy. In this story, it’s the car used to try to travel a huge distance on one tank.
A single-tank run is a distance attempt where the vehicle is driven as far as possible without refueling. It’s commonly used in hypermiling record attempts to compare efficiency in a consistent way.
The Toyota Prius is a hybrid car known for getting great fuel economy. Here, they’re saying it can hit impressive efficiency records, but buying one new is still expensive.
The Honda Prelude is a two-door car made by Honda that’s meant to feel more fun to drive. It’s not a hybrid like a Prius; it’s more about sporty style and handling. People bring it up because it’s a well-known older Honda model.
“Hyper milling” is an enthusiast term for extreme-efficiency driving—techniques and conditions aimed at squeezing maximum miles out of each unit of fuel. The hosts connect it to cost-consciousness: the goal isn’t speed, it’s stretching range and fuel economy to set records.
“Dieselgate” is the name for the Volkswagen diesel emissions scandal. It matters because it changed how people think about buying used diesel cars from that era.
It’s like: floor it to get as fast as you can, then brake all the way back to a stop. The scary part is you have to do both in a limited area, so there’s not much room for mistakes.
The Ariel Atom is a very lightweight, performance-first sports car. The “3.5” version means it has a bigger engine than the smaller Atoms, which is part of why it feels so quick.
Some car parks have steep ramps, and low cars can hit the ground going in. They’re saying they were worried the front would scrape, but they got it in and out safely.
The BMW F90 M5 is a super-quick version of the BMW M5 line. Here, it’s famous because it was used to set a Guinness record for drifting for the longest time. The hosts also talk about how they managed to keep it going for hours.
A “longest drift” record is about staying in a controlled slide for as long as possible. Drifting is when the back of the car slides while the driver keeps it pointed the right way. The hosts say this BMW set the Guinness record for that.
A skid pan is a special driving surface made to make the tires slide more easily. It helps engineers and drivers test how a car behaves when grip is low. The hosts mention it as part of how BMW set a record.
Car-to-car refueling means refueling one car while it’s still moving, using another vehicle to supply the fuel. The hosts compare it to aircraft refueling because it’s done on the move. They say it was used to keep the drift record going without long stops.
The BMW 5 Series is a mid-size luxury car meant to be comfortable for daily driving. Some versions are built to be much faster and more performance-focused. The podcast mentions it in the context of a high-performance 5 Series model.
An M Sport body kit is basically a set of exterior add-ons that make a BMW look more sporty. It changes things like bumpers and side skirts to give the car a more aggressive shape.
A consecutive doughnuts record measures how many donut-style burnout circles a car can complete in a row without the run ending. It’s a brutal test of traction, cooling, tires, and the driver’s ability to keep the car in a controlled slide for a long time.
The Nürburgring is a well-known race track in Germany. Lap times are just how long it takes a car to complete a full lap, and they’re using it as a benchmark for speed.
A production car lap time is a lap time from a car that you could actually buy, not a special race-only machine. The hosts are saying you shouldn’t mix up those different kinds of lap records.
Brand
Lisière
The hosts mention Lisière as a company that makes small electric cars you can see around France. They’re using it to explain where these “tiny EV” vehicles show up.
A “two-wheel Nürburgring lap” refers to completing a lap of the Nürburgring while only two wheels are on the ground. It’s an extreme stunt because the driver must manage balance through elevation changes, braking/turn-in, and cornering forces—especially on a track famous for being uneven and not flat.
The Mini Cooper S is a sportier Mini that’s meant to feel quick and fun to drive. Here, the hosts are talking about it as a used car you can buy for around £7,995.
The Aston Martin Valkyrie is a very rare, very expensive supercar. People talk about it because it’s built to be as extreme and track-like as possible.
Depreciation is how much money the car loses in value as time goes on. If a car depreciates quickly, it can feel “expensive” even if the purchase price wasn’t crazy.
The Suzuki Swift 5-door is a small hatchback with extra seats for everyday practicality. Some versions are tuned to feel more sporty, which is why people call them fun. The podcast is likely talking about that balance of size and driving enjoyment.
Car
Abarth 595
The Abarth 595 is a sporty, compact hatchback. They’re considering it as a fun used car, but wondering how well it will handle winter and road salt.
The Suzuki Ignis is a small, practical car with a slightly crossover-like shape. In the episode it’s brought up as an unusual budget choice that’s hard to find.
The Ford Fiesta ST3 is a small “hot hatch” that’s meant to be fun to drive, not just get you from A to B. Here they’re talking about its 1.5-liter engine and how it helps deliver power to the road so it feels lively.
The Fiesta Active is a Fiesta that’s styled to look a bit more rugged, with a higher driving position than a basic hatchback. It’s still a small car meant for normal daily driving. The podcast mentions it while talking about different Fiesta versions.
Cylinder deactivation is a fuel-saving feature where the engine can shut off some cylinders when you’re not using much power. When you press harder, it turns them back on.
The Porsche 911 is a famous sports car model with a recognizable look. It’s built for performance and driving feel. The podcast brings it up because it’s a major reference point for Porsche sports cars.
Car
Mini JCW GP
This is a special Mini hot hatch meant to feel fun and responsive. The big deal here is that it has a supercharged 1.6-liter engine and a manual transmission, so it’s more exciting to drive than a normal Mini.
JDM means the car was made for the Japanese market. The hosts are saying that JDM cars can be less rusty because they may not have been driven on salty roads in the UK yet.
The Corolla is a common, everyday car from Toyota. It’s known for being dependable and not too complicated to own. That’s why it gets mentioned as a “solid” option.
VTEC is Honda’s technology that changes how the engine’s valves work. When you rev higher, it helps the engine breathe better so it feels more powerful.
The Honda S2000 is famous for revving really high and sounding awesome when you drive it hard. It uses a system (VTEC) that changes how the engine breathes at higher RPM, which is why it feels so lively.
MPG means how many miles you can drive on one gallon of fuel. If you drive a performance car hard, MPG usually drops.
Term
wet country roads
Wet roads reduce tire grip. The hosts are basically warning that driving a performance car aggressively on damp roads can be risky and harder on the car.
In car talk, “thrashing” means driving aggressively—revving higher, using more throttle, and generally keeping the engine in its stronger power band. The hosts are saying some road cars feel slow unless you drive them this way.
The Alfa Romeo 147 GTA is a sportier, faster version of the 147 hot hatch. The point is that it’s meant to be driven hard, and it won’t be great on fuel economy compared to calmer cars.
The Toyota GR Yaris is a small, sporty hatchback that’s designed to grip well and feel fun to drive. The hosts are comparing another car to it in terms of how capable it feels.
Audi Quattro is Audi’s all-wheel-drive setup. It helps the car put power to the road more effectively, especially when traction is limited. The podcast brings it up because people look for Quattro cars for better grip and confidence.
The BMW 4 Series is a BMW model line that’s meant to feel more fun and sporty than many regular cars. Here it’s just the comparison point for what the host almost bought instead of the Golf.
Term
Q2 diff
The “Q2 diff” is a type of differential that helps the car put power down better. It can improve traction when you’re turning or when the road isn’t grippy.
A press car is a car that car magazines or reviewers get to drive for a while. Sometimes it’s handled carefully for testing, but it still depends on how the reviewers drove it.
The Alfa Romeo 164 is an older Alfa from the 1990s. The hosts are talking about how, even though people expect older Alfas to be troublesome, these two cars apparently stayed reliable.
Homologation is the paperwork-and-production requirement that lets a car race. It often means the race car has to be based on a real road car, in limited numbers.
Car
Caterham 270S
The Caterham 270S is a small, lightweight sports car meant to feel very connected to the road. Here it’s brought up as an example of a car that was used for press purposes.
“Spec” just means the exact setup of the car—what options and features it has. The host is saying they bought it because the features matched what they wanted.
The Volkswagen Corrado VR6 is a classic Volkswagen coupe with a distinctive six-cylinder engine. In the chat, it’s used as an example of a car that had been used for magazine/press purposes.
The Ford Fiesta ST is a sporty version of the Fiesta. In this story, someone drove it and ended up wearing out or stressing the clutch because they weren’t used to driving a manual.
They’re teasing that next week they’ll go to Germany to drive a very fast car in a runway setting. It’s basically a controlled place to drive fast safely.
LIVE
Welcome back to the Gassing Station, the podcast that combs through the Pistonheads
forums. Like my co-host, Sam Sheehan, is combing through the classifies and auctions because
it sounds like the MX-5 might be on its way out.
I've got lower back pain and I know and because it's a five speed it's drinking a bit of petrol
because I'm doing a lot of motorway miles so I'm doing it for health and wallet reasons.
Obviously I'm going to do something sensible because of that back pain by the way just because
the seat's a bit high and I sort of crouch in the car. Love it, it's been so much fun but I thought
I'd do something sensible, maybe sell the Mazda and maybe get myself a Porsche Boxster which is
not sensible. Okay yes no I mean this should be I mean this should be praised because this is
exactly what you should be doing. I have a theory by the way just a slight tangent is that if you're
a car person and you ever go I've had enough of cars now or I've had enough of high bills I'm
going to get something sensible and boring you will go back to a proper car almost immediately.
It's the worst thing you can do. If you're considering a sensible car right now and you've
got something fun, don't do it, don't do it. If you're a car person you simply cannot live
without a fun car which is why a Boxster seems like the sensible. I'm guessing we're talking
986. But I'm looking at Boxstresses because they're you know in the 5k-ish 5.5 to 6k mark for nice
cars over 100k miles but full service history stuff so there's some nice ones out there. I don't
know if they're quite a rock bottom but they can't get much lower so I think if you get one hopefully
if I can find one that's tidy and then I can make it a little bit nicer with a few bits of
just TLC then it will hold its value. One interesting quirk I found is that some of the earlier cars
like early 2000s and before cars even though they have the same engine as the ones that are
several weeks after or whatever they're not you less compliant and the reason is because just the
data doesn't exist. Not because the engines are dirty or not homologated in the same way as far as
the engineering is done. Just don't have the data in TFL transport for London and I'm sure it's true
for the other major cities with stuff like this. So if there's no data then essentially there's
nothing that you know it's exactly that at least they do it's not that way right wait it's not exempt
sorry exempt means it is free it's not free it's definitely not oh really okay that's right because
there's no data you therefore have to pay yeah I made that very confusing yeah okay it is it's
treated like it doesn't pass in terms of NOx it's but it's actually what is you're not
that is yeah it's we've got no data so therefore it must be yeah so it's not you less compliant
which means it's not exempt from the payment you have to pay uh was it 12 50 a day or something
anyway the good news is is that Porsche of all the brands apparently is one of the better ones
at supplying the paperwork you need to prove to TFL that your car does actually conform so it is
possible but yeah my search has been slimmed down because I can't be bothered going through all the
I think that's why there's a fixed rate on car tanks when you import it correct me if I'm wrong
in the comment section but I believe yeah if you import a car it's a fixed rate of it used to be
about 270 because there was no data yeah to you know so there we go well we've got a tax it but
we'll just do a blanket 270 which is you know for a lot of cars now quite affordable if you're in
policy making don't you dare change that yes we would like to import cars that don't
yes that is a good thing silly cars I've got one to bring up later on actually not silly that's
great so you're thinking you're thinking boxer boxer s in budget at all boxer s yeah just just
about so there are some higher mileage ones I mean there are some really nice non-s boxers in there
but I fancy an s it's just got a little bit more poke isn't it and I've had a look I've already
found the set of 18 inch Carrera alloy wheels that I really want and just just a few tweaks here
and there that should make it look nice but because this will be I'll still keep the Clio
my one my 182 so I'll it will be really my daily albeit one that isn't used every day so
yeah wise man yeah using a 986 boxer as a daily driver yeah it sounds very smart they
are fantastic I've never driven one but my brother had one very briefly he bought the cheapest one
in the UK dangerous and then freaked out about it because he obviously had to spend money on
making it not uh completely fall apart but he sent me a video once of him driving around some
country lanes and the sound was just yeah it's nice unbelievably good yeah it's a whole school
flax it's the guttural yeah it's more guttural less less of that high-pitched song that you get in
the modern stuff but it's still lovely well if you're in the market for a new car I might have
just the thing for you it's got more cylinders it's got incredible badge appeal and it's a little
bit more expensive it is a Bugatti variant super sport that's definitely in my budget absolutely
I thought it would be I mean both from the same group yes true yeah same era as well so you may
have seen this on the piston heads homepage recently but we have a Veyron super sport for sale this is
it's actually in the record breaking colors so it's that clear or that glossy carbon on top and
then the orange highlights below I remember when this came out I I didn't really like the orange I
thought it looked a bit tacky and now I loved it and I think it's obviously an overused word is
iconic but it is it just looks absolutely marvellous so you know the big thing about the uh super sport
is that it's set back in 2010 I think the Guinness World Record for straight line car productions
or straight line speed for a production car 267.856 miles per hour which was bettered after that it
was kind of like a tennis match between several people you know like it was there were some American
firms that did it some of which were kind of a little bit like was it legit or not not entirely
sure yeah Bugatti then came along with the Chiron Blitz date Koenigsegg has been you know doing
production speed records with the Ajeras in various forms um then the Bugatti Chiron 300 plus came
along and went over 300 miles an hour which still blows my mind that number just feels so unrealistic
for a car I think it just I think that the thing that was incredible about the 300 plus it was like
wow this is a real it well it felt like for me like this is an incredible moment a production
car has now crossed 300 miles an hour but it didn't have anywhere near the gravity that this had
because this was this was a proper maybe it was because as well James May tried it on top gear
back in the day yeah it was a bit more of a an event of setting this record and then recently
we talked about in the podcast last year the Yang Wang U9 Extreme beating all of them in a car that
really didn't look like it was meant to go that fast but did again didn't have the same sort of
theatre as this so it's it's an incredible piece of engineering you know I think the
Veyron has aged wonderfully and it's I was talking to a Veyron owner recently and they
were saying just just down Tesco's just down Tesco absolutely yeah we're just having a little
chat about that that's Veyron uh and well yeah they had they had actually bought a super sport
and they were saying that they had tried this and a um a Chiron next to each other and they said
the Veyron is just on another planet of engineering yeah perfection everything is just
really quite special and look at the interior like it's actually simple round steering wheel
relatively minimalist design like I know you're not buying a car like this for its interior
as the main point is the engine behind you but it it's quite nice ultimately it was set up as a
hyper fast GT yeah which is sort of what the McLaren F1 was was was aiming to do except this
doesn't have any luggage space whatsoever yeah um but still incredible car uh it is up for
three and a half million pounds which is quite a lot it's to be fair most of these cars you
usually see with a poa attached to them that's a million Tesco mill deals that is a lot of test
well I mean that's what we were talking about in the car park you know you get so this is the same
as a million of those they didn't realize that yeah and they see they hadn't quite done their
mass and they were like they were gutted get rid of all these mill deals yeah um and then they
would have realized that Tesco mill deals are well uh so this one has covered 1447 miles so
it's actually been used well you don't get it and you go oh someone's not put this away in a garage
you guys covered 11 well 1400 miles and then you realize that I mean this was 2013 so it's 13 years
old yeah and so it's it's barely crept in those in those years but um so might need a little once
over if you plan on doing 267.8 whatever miles an hour on an auto barn but as a slice of record
breaking history this is quite quite the sizable slice and quite the significant slice but that
got me thinking samshin what other world record breaking cars can you buy on the piston heads
classifieds and or auctions so I have been doing some quite extensive digging on this yes you have
and you've been going oh my god quite a lot I have been going oh my god because it's we've got
an all we've got a pretty much a a a record breaker for all sorts out there so if you like
that record setters I've got those speed records I've got those ridiculous records yeah you should
do fruit and veg sales down the market yeah he's about to say you want hypermilling records I've
got one of those so for a penny so uh and the great thing is they are available at all sorts
of different price ranges so we're going to start off with probably that I'm going to start off at
least from not cheapest to most expensive I'm going to go from most normal to most ridiculous
yeah you're going to start things off with a Porsche 918 Spyder Visak which
do you remember the record for this no okay first production car to set a sub seven minute
time around the Nurburgring Nordschleife wow I didn't know that I mean that's that's still
fast by today's standards of supercar hypercar as well it is still fast by today's standards
however there are also quite a lot of cars that can do sub seven minute laps now where you go
that's incredible yeah the Porsche 911 GT3 man type that you drove recently yeah that's very
true uh do you know how fast that went around 650 650 okay so it was seven seconds faster around
the Nurburgring Nordschleife than a 918 Spyder yeah that's bonkers in a GT3 which is that's
absolutely bonkers but uh yeah back then an incredible feat and so we have one for sale
right here seven and a half thousand miles you can't say pounds I was like oh that's in my box
to budget I mean it could be missing uh three zeros yeah but uh but yeah so there's a POA
behind this one so we don't know exactly how much this is um but you can expect seven figures I would
at least seven figures um they're going to be quite a bit this one is in uh paint to sample
Mexico blue that's French racing blue sorry you're not having that Mexico yeah that's French racing
blue Mexico racing blue I don't know we'll have to we'll get Sergio Perez on maybe it's slightly
different maybe he might be a bit more accessible now as a as a Cadillac driver on the line he wants
a phone he wants a chat with you this is my color for Christ's sake yeah and for Bugatti's too
but uh yeah so it's in it's in Mexico blue looks absolutely fantastic with
kind of black gray wheels it's good the only problem I've always had with these
918 spiders is that the lime green calipers can clash with the colors of the car yeah which is a
really nitpicky thing but I mean this is pH I can I can hopefully say this the stuff and people
hope well someone hopefully will relate to it but um they look good in silver wouldn't they
those kind of they do look good in silver I think they only really look properly good in silver
however pts blue is fantastic and also I've not seen many pts 918s no so it looks brilliant
um seven and a half thousand miles UK supplied and just absolutely fantastic and another and
that's in the spec isn't it that's the visex so that's that's the record breaking spec and it's
got full full full Porsche uh Reading specialist service history so Porsche Reading is the HQ
for Porsche UK and so um yeah good a good one to buy with quite an obvious record second one
we're going to keep it with the Nurburgring records because this is also blue
and also a car that set an absolutely blistering time around the Nurburgring it is the Honda
Civic Type R FL5 sorry I remember this obviously very very recent relatively speaking which set an
absolutely bonkers time around the Nordschleife so you know the sub seven minute from from the
epic back in what was it 2012-2013 the FL5 obviously a bit more recently but a front
wheel drive hot hatchback a seven minutes 44 seconds now 44 seconds is obviously a lot of time
but on the last part we were talking about the the GT3 Manthey the aforementioned GT3
Manthey and how that shaved five seconds off a standard GT3's time around the Nordschleife
and so really yes it's it's it's a it's a big old track but 44 seconds between a hybrid
million pound supercar and a hot hatch is absolutely mind-boggling it really is I guess
some of this because they always talk about sending the even cars from 10 or 12 years ago out
onto the ring again with new tyres I get I bet a large proportion of the performance the the
FL5 is a fantastic hot hatch as we've spoken about many times but the tyres it comes on are also
mighty impressive that's it so I bet there are a few gained seconds I wouldn't even it would
probably like several seconds from tire tech oh a hundred percent you know it's it's I think
we've mentioned this before even on the previous one the FK8 yeah the launch car versus the limited
edition going from continental to Michelin was a huge huge huge change yeah so the one that we've
got here is one of the more affordable ones on our list but it's not the most affordable I've got
two that are considerably cheaper than this so it's 45,995 that's sort of the going rate for
the FL5 at the minute they're expensive new they weren't on sale for very long almost amazing to
think that you can't buy a Honda Civic Type R anymore yeah 7,250 miles fewer miles than the
918 spider yeah also available in blue what do they call it boost blue pearl again which looked
fantastic french racing blue guys the question is actually Sam so we're just having a look at this
and one of the hatchbacks it beat for its record time was the mark 7 Golf GTI Club Sport S yes
which did it in 47 seconds 747 seconds so it was a three seconds faster this Civic Type R
would you rather have this or the GTI oh this because of the I mean the gearbox in this
for 11 reason and I just think this is a I think I said on the last pod it's that this
straddles the gap between proper hardcore sports car and normal hot hatch yeah and I think the
gulf is closer as exceptional as it is still some to performance hot hatch than it is sports car
for things like steering the gearbox things like that this is another level what would you
prefer though it's quite funny because the Club Sport S was considered the GT3 because it has a
lot of front wheel drive cars that kind of like this is the GT3 of I think the first to properly
do it was the R26R yeah because they came out and said we want to do the Porsche 911 GT3 of
front wheel drive hot hatches in which they did with the R26R and then the mark 7 came along
yeah remove the rear seats netting always a winner started off with the mini GP1 yeah it was dead
cool this the Civic Type R I'm probably on the same page as you as well I love the steering
in the Type R I love the gearbox the gear the change is just unbelievable and you've also
got two rear seats you got two rear seats yeah and rear doors that function so it just feels it's
in the details isn't it the control waiting and all that stuff but the gulf is brilliant but that
that's stretching something to to its maximum its limit whereas this just feels naturally that way
I know it has stretched a base model obviously but there's something about how it's so the details
clutch pedal waiting the shift action the steering the seating position it's all just absolutely
spot on and you know what I was going to say but the the club sport s feels more special
because it was more limited but you know what I mean because they didn't sell many type or
only sold the type half for such a short time in this country I think when I see a type R now it's
there's definitely a head nod of like good for you yeah actually got that next up let's go for
let's go for another speed record this one this is a car that held the world speed record for
all of about five minutes uh it's of course the Jaguar XJ220 we were actually wondering earlier
like was was it legitimate because it was it was in the limelight for such a short period of time
wasn't it yeah because it got stolen by another Brit yes exactly uh one that's held on to the
record for 10 years yes my top trumps card for that one it really won me a lot of games I remember
that one top speed oh got you there mate having having a McLaren everyone in your top trumps was
like you won everything on that one just yeah yeah the the absolute best I was always a big
fan of the XJ220 though especially this one which is in the kind of the dark red maroonie color
yeah cream leather interior just fantastic the important thing to bear in mind though is that
a McLaren F1 today will set you back oh god what's going right of them now 10 million oh yeah gotta be
at least 10 million I think I think some are still going for seven figures
but the good ones are eight plus yeah uh this example however a car that broke the speed record
at 217 miles per hour can be yours for just 549990 I mean in this world just
a smidgen over half a million quid I remember reading about some journalists not saying they
were the easiest car to drive most people who got into a McLaren F1 were just wowed by everything
everything about it you know being in the middle and having that sight line and
the way that it would ride really nicely and I'm sure these ride lovely but though I remember
hearing people say it wasn't the most polished in every way and some of them were quite spiky
I think these are dead cool they're obviously massive I can't imagine them being all that easy
to drive especially quickly but I don't care no you're not going to drive it like that anyway
are you it's it's a it's a piece of history and I dare I say I think it is it has more theater
to an h220 than they make yeah I think you see it and you just go wow especially it's wild I really
like the tail it's I think it's having is it the old rover it's a long tail it's and it's the yeah
long tail and aren't they upturned rover yeah like hidden behind a grill and I just think it looks
kind of like someone peeking out behind um behind the railings or I guess a prison cell
yes he yes he's in here yeah yeah I was going 270 miles now at the m4 so yeah absolutely epic car
and I wonder I wonder if the market is ever going to go we should be celebrating these
more because yeah half million wild next up is a car that was once the fastest production car
uppikes peak the current record is a Porsche 911 Turbo s yeah which did it in sub nine minutes I
believe but before then it was held by the Bentley Continental GT W12 speed the reason I
I wanted to go for this is that I I feel like a Bentley Continental GT holding a speed record up
up a twisty road yeah is more impressive than a Porsche 911 yeah uh have you driven the these
old speeds no I haven't they are mind-bendingly good I've been an annoying bending me good GT
and they're lovely but not a speed I've been in a v8 one it's it's the it's the active chassis
control on this that is just it beggars belief yeah how it can keep so much weight in check yeah
because it's well north of two tons yeah it's it's I must I think it was about two and a half
tons it's a huge thing for a coupé at the end of the day but drives fantastically the steering on
them is actually really quite nice there is it's not brimming with feel but there's a little bit
of texture there um but it really changed my opinion of like oh wow a Bentley can actually
be a really good driver's car when you're on it yeah yeah um and obviously the the record backed
up so it went up the hill the massive mountain pass in 10 minutes and 18 seconds
they did release a pike speak addition that you could buy which had pikes the the graphics down the
side yeah we always usually have one or two available on ph not this time in fact we've
actually had the pikes one of the the pike speak prototypes on here as well wow not very sold
however uh I have found this one instead which I think looks much nicer so the color is kind of
like uh I was going to say a mix between maroon and purple but then the first thing that came to
mind was aubergine yeah well it's a little auberginey but it's a shiny aubergine it is a nice aubergine
it's a polished aubergine no laughing in the back it's it's it's a properly cool car and you know
for the pikes peak record I know that they put in a you know it's full of all safety harnesses but
otherwise I think it was pretty much a stock car yeah so really really cool I think it has to be
doesn't it for the record yeah yeah production car yeah yeah uh but for the 911 turbo ester then
we're going to beat that time by like 20 odd seconds just shows how unbelievably flipping
fast the the 992 turbo s is this is where things start to get a little bit wild so this this next
one is the world record for altitude gained in one run what okay yes so this was done in India
up a up a mountain pass that was so they started at three meters below sea level
and then they went up a mountain pass that was 5799 meters which means that you have a total
coverage of 5802 meters wow one hit and they did it in a Hyundai so I'm struggling to get
get my posh Hyundai Hyundai Ioniq 5 uh which no but you know just to start at Ioniq 5 but I
thought that was far too boring so I went and got found Hyundai Ioniq 5 of course because it's a lot
more fun yeah and if you did that same drive in a Hyundai Ioniq 5 then you'd have way more fun
you would yeah flipping your paddles flappy paddles I mean I've not driven I've still not
driven an Ioniq 5 n oh you got is it are they are they chuckable are they do they like to get
heavy but it's yeah they do well they've got the drift mode I come if it's actually called that
they've got like a oh they do don't they yeah so they're very very tall that can be very tail happy
so uh yeah so you can go if you find yourself an indian you can get yourself a Ioniq 5 n go and
do this pass you'll have a great time I don't know how busy the road is yeah but it sounds like
india's version of pikes peak 43 895 gets you this 2024 car it's black and I've said to you before
I've never really been a fan of uh end colors that any of the end colors aside from the performance
blue yeah the Ioniq 5 n though looks really smart in black with the kind of like red highlights in
the silver it's got the gray yeah it looks really smart 15 500 miles I believe these cars were north
of 60 grand new yeah they were so that's quite comfortably so two years later or a year or 18
months later 43 895 is and I do know from some battery testing I've seen the results of of
other Hyundai Kia models not the Ioniq 5 n um that their batteries do seem to have quite good
longevity as well in terms of like the you know three to five years later down the line they're
still like 98 percent uh capacity or something even if they've been ranked up one of india's
tallest mountain it might be slightly different but they did fit that because of its performance
and the charging speed with some pretty effective um heat management take which is where it's all
at with battery longevity to be fair that was back when the Ioniq 5 was new it would be a good little
pr marketing stunt Hyundai to go and do the same thing with an end and go make it look do like um
you know the travis pastrana like jim carna starley yeah with bentley recently yeah go do the same
thing with the Ioniq 5 n they can jump as well as i think six yeah exactly you're sure you can
find a jump yeah along that you know you've got uh nearly 6000 meters of altitude to find a jump in
um right let's go for the hyper milling record next so a few i always think hyper
milling hyper milling when you say that it makes me think of a mill and there's just everyone running
at 300 miles per hour yeah well yeah that makes sense it's uh i don't really know where hyper milling
comes from please let us know in the comments if you know i don't know the origin of the term
however a few years ago we had joe achilles uh lovely lovely guy uh and epic youtuber who uh him
and his mate patrick wellan went on a mega journey they bought a um volkswagen passat 1.6 tdi and drove
it from morocco up to england on a single tank tank of petrol diesel yeah yeah and then they went
and sold it on um piscinez auctions for charity which was really cool so uh but we had them on
stage at uh what was then ph no it was our first annual service back in 2024 i think and uh it was
just an epic story because not only did they cover 1400 miles on a single tank they then when they
got to england they still had so so much fuel left so they just lapped london basically just
waiting for the thing to run out of fuel um they didn't quite break the record though so the hyper
milling record um was set in 2012 at 1526 miles on a single tank which averaged 77.99 miles per gallon
which is very very impressive but i guess the tank being big as well is what's really because
there are that there are plenty of now hybrid cars that could achieve that but they wouldn't
have the the tank range well that's the thing so uh there has been a there have been cars that have
driven further than that with in a quotes better mpg the Toyota Prius set a similar record when was
it a couple of years ago in 2024 yeah but when i went looking around the um classifies for a Prius
a new Prius you're still spending like 30 grand true which i think is ridiculous because it looks
like in a mouth thing because the whole point of you don't say that if you're from ferrari europe
and you're listening to this um sorry but you know it's well honda prelude as well yeah but it's
kind of like a prius yeah i can't remember who did it first but anyway prius 30 grand the whole
point that you'd be hyper milling is because you're conscious about saving money yeah so i found a
1.6 litre per sat tdi the same spec ish that would have done set the hyper milling record
for just £1,395 you can have a car that is record setting capabilities and it looks really smart
it's in a dark blue um it's got a are we doing black or cream interior it's a black cloth interior
that looks like it's in need of a bit of a scrub or yeah a little bit of a stain in the boot there
but it's fine absolutely someone dropped a bit of flour it's 1400 quid yeah beggars can't be choosers
153 000 miles knocking on the door of 154 but as we know about these cars it will do 1500 miles
yeah without breaking a sweat so and yeah really quite strong so i think when joe got here there
was a little bit of work that needed doing but i think you could you could get it all peachy for
under five yeah yeah yeah uh and then you've got a car that should go on and
diesel gate what huh so that's the hyper milling records the next record we're going to go for
is uh the fastest car to the car to set the fastest time while indoors the fastest speed
i don't know how you would on a rolling road no it was set in the birmingham nec uh where they were
able to get up to uh it was set by auto car magazine they managed to get up to 76.79 miles per
hour in an aerial atom too right for an indoor production car record you have probably got to
think that maybe there's a cars now that could probably go faster yeah it doesn't look like
anyone's tried going quicker so it's basically going from nought to the maximum speed you get to
and then zero again so you don't crash out the into the wall in a confined space absolutely yeah so
there's a real element of danger in there uh the thing that came to mind is that formula
e now races yeah inside the excel center i guess not fully is it does it have to be like
i think they probably get up to 80 of miles an hour by the end of the straight however they're
not production cars and that they're little remote control cars yeah so um uh yeah it was set in an
in an atom two we currently don't have any atom twos for sale on ph but we do have the earliest
atom i could find is a 2015 atom 3.5 look at that scaffolding it's just and it is in beautiful
simple uh atom glory so it's not got the fancy wings on it it's a simple atom 2.4 leads to
supercharged k24 engine this thing is just kind of be so brilliant this one's got sports exhaust
lsd it's just um alcon proper beefy brakes yeah which you would obviously need if you're going
to try and attempt this record true in your living room yeah it's going quickly and then
having to stop obviously before you plow into a wall yeah uh so yeah 38 980 for the fastest car
production car to ever drive inside i mean these things are just spectacular they're you know the
fastest caterings are mind-bendingly fast but then obviously the atom because it's just a much more
modern structure they are just ballistic i don't even think the one i had to go in was like the
quickest thing they make so our god knows what the quickest one's like that bird has just driven the
new atom r is that what it's called the atom r i think so yeah it's uh so we were up when we were
doing our triple test we bought the atom along or aerial very kindly i trailed the um the the atom
up to us there and there are some for a long the road that we were on there was a lot of all the
car parks that were on it were substantially lower than the than the road to access them so you know
that thing where you're pulling in you see like a gravel car park outside of road and you think oh
yeah i can pull into that yeah and then go and indicate over and you go oh god that is so much
steeper and you're just wincing just as you drive the car just hoping it doesn't scrape yeah amazingly
we managed to get the atom in and out of the car parks uh without scraping it can i just say shout
out to matt bird's jumper yes yeah got some glitz in that is that was it was it glittery on the day
it was glistening in the sun was it exactly yeah he was having a great time i'm gonna text him asking
where you got that that looks great he was having a great time but i think after a while in the atom
he did look a little bit he did look a little bit knackered it is yeah i can imagine that was tiring
it looks to me like one of those almost smidgen under the weather which was not oh that doesn't
help yeah okay so that's a pretty ridiculous record but i've got some more um let's go for
another another actually i'm going to save that one until last bmw f90 m5 what record did that set
you might ask well it is the current guinness world record holder for the longest drift what
yep so back in i mean they drift easy 18 ish i think 2019 bmw set a uh a record on a skid pan
of 232.5 miles wow so that's just going round and which you go
oh that's quite a long way right that's a yes but it took them eight hours to do it
what oh so many questions do you how did that what did they have that special Chinese car lose so the
driver didn't pee themselves that's a long time ago around in circles were they did they have to
change direction so they didn't get too dizzy how did they refuel oh okay they did car to car
refueling like you would see on a like like jet fighters refueling they had to do the same thing
look at that there's a guy with a if i if i can put the pictures up and we can you know find them on
bmw's press website i will whack them up but there was a guy leaning out of an f10 m5 with a
refueling rig and a harness filling up the um f90 uh on the go which is epic
i don't know what the driver did or how they changed drivers
wow but yeah that just sounds like a recipe for chunder and i would not have wanted to smell
the inside of that car after no yeah that is actually really my that's possibly my that most
impressive one on the list because of the lap times and stuff you haven't seen anything yet
so so you know f90 m5s to a penny you can go and find them so i was like let's go and find something
it's a little bit more interesting which i have done um i don't know if it is a one of one spec
amazingly it doesn't say that in the um in the in the listing yeah but it is an ultra rare uh purple
silk pearl metallic wow so it is a purple m5 with some of the m sport body kit on it um so it's
got it just looks even meaner than a standard m5 competition i don't hate that very purple i don't
hate that 41995 61 000 miles uh full bmw service history i mean you know if you're going to go in
a car like that and you i mean the thing is is we were talking on the last part about cars that
maybe have a bad rep but they're really good and i think that finish on that car suggests although
it wouldn't be because it's i tell you what from the last what we were talking about in the last
podcast that car wouldn't we'd probably give off that impression now yeah but in 15 years time
definitely 20 years time you'll go that's really nice yeah exactly uh we've got two more tv r
cigars has set a world record uh most breakdowns for the most consecutive doughnuts oh so 71
one doughnuts i believe in one hit for the tv r cigars i don't know who gave up first the driver
or the car but uh yeah tv r cigars i absolutely love them to bits a few years ago i saw um
ben colin's aka the the stig og stig was reviewed one recently and he was not too uh
he was not too kind about it yeah he is a racing driver i was just by saying the next dig and
so he knows there's i always think of it as like there's the way i will drive it and there's the
way that someone like then will drive it and i you know one's not right and one's not wrong
my way of approaching it is like this is how you'll be driving it on the road 99 of the time
yeah whereas ben is going to be the sort of person that can get every single last ounce out of it
and i think a tv r falls over when it's like that but if you're driving it at 78 tenths
is when it's the most enjoyable yeah you know i've driven plenty of cars and i really enjoyed the
tv r cigars and little did i know that i could go and do just so many continuous doughnuts 71
doughnuts um so this one i've found has only got 8 000 miles on it and one previous owner wow no
surprises that it's a p o a does it say doughnut history it does not say i don't think this is a
doughnut days no doughnuts is it in a surprisingly subtle color scheme that's a very dark gray
fantastic tv r that knows how to skid um now we did the some of the fastest
nirburgring times to start this off i've now got one of the slowest times ever
and no it's not the official slowest lap time production car lap time which was set by a lisier
electric box which i'm so confused by because lisier make racing cars let the j s 50 or something
they also make a tiny like g whiz rival i might be wrong maybe i'm just imagining it but i'm pretty
sure when you go to france and you see little friend little electric kind of runabouts i'm
pretty sure a lot of them are lisiers and their teenagers are driving them right i think it's
everybody i just don't think they give a give a damn out yeah they're just like you know i just
i've only got like a 60 kilometer route into into the village to go and get some stuff i'll just
take the lisier um but uh it's not that it is the fastest time set around the nirburgring
on two wheels wow which was slow by four wheel standards but but fast by two wheels but not
motorbike yeah just to clarify so it was a car and it went around the ring in 45 minutes oh
59.11 seconds that's impressive that that is but the the most impressive thing about that
is the concentration that driver han yu uh chinese stunt driver had to have to keep that thing on
two wheels because it's not even just going in a straight line no it is a proper you know
undulations corners the nirburgring is famous for not being a straight line yes it is yeah yeah
and it's known for being famously not flat yeah but yeah an incredible feat and so you can get
a slice of two-wheel nirburgring history for merely 7995 this gets you a really really nice
mini cooper s 45 000 miles two previous owners yeah 7995 and it's in that kind of like cream with the
black stripe so it looks really small i'm just trying to think of something comparable to do
with that to do like that for 45 minutes like you know when you roll down a hill we're even on a
flat and you're pedaling along with your hands off the handlebars and you do it for 10 or 12
seconds maybe yeah i think that was fun but you know it's a bit tiring now i'd rather just hold
it with my hands 45 minutes having to just be like on the seat of your pants feeling the balance
and up against the door wherever he's leaning absolutely insane but uh but yeah there you have
it those are 10 11 if you clue the avail on record setting cars that you can buy a piston
as right now but there are actually loads of different ones that you could get to there's
i found a koenig exe koenig agera koenig zeg agera koenig not koenig koenig i just say koenig
koenig koenig yeah now i'm saying it so many times i can't remember how to say it's been a
long day koenig koenig zeg agera rs yeah i found one of those for 1.3 million quite a lot of money
there's also aston martin valkyries you can find them on piston heads as well yeah all sorts of
and we had a macarena one on relatively recently yeah so yeah loads of different record breaking cars
we're going to go for something a little more accessible i think a lot a lot more accessible
so for our second topic we've got a uh query from big owls thanks
much better name than we had to call out in the last one i couldn't call out in the last one
and so they ask i sold my lovely but expensive in terms of depreciation and servicing
msgc class coupé as it was losing too much and it was also just a bit too nice big yeah
for the 15 miles each way of my twisty open b road roads that 90 percent of my miles are on
the plan was to get a petrol 40 mile per gallon and easy to span a wrong car and buy it with the
intent of doing all the basic servicing myself and as a long-term keeper budgets between five
and 15k ideally closer to the lower end and keep some money in savings for potentially a new
kit car in the future or perhaps even a classic insurance and tax are not an issue as i'm now the
wrong side of 50 the shortlist not what you're expecting mini cooper s uh of around 2017 2018
yeah uh suzuki swift sport booster jet 1.4 these are nice like fun youthful choices i thought he
was sort of setting himself up there for something like comfy and you know sensible but maybe i guess
big ours is a performance related for the b roads big house is cool but he's gone i like fun i think
he's a cool person is our bath 595 similar age of mileage or a left left field choice of a suzuki
ignis at around 7k i don't know if that's a suzuki ignis sport yeah because they are impossible to
find because that's definitely on my dream garage list so far the abarth is winning as i think it
will be more of an event to drive just not too sure how it will hold up in winter on water
soaked roads and don't forget salt yes unless it's like serious flooding though there's nothing
that's going to struggle so budget wise we're looking at five to 15k but remember big out if
you listen to big hours if you listen to this podcast you'll know we're always going to go
towards the upper limit of what you suggest because um it just gives us more options yeah
you've not suggested you've not kind of given us really a hint of what type of car you're
after however the shortlist would suggest something hot hatchy i know you also want something that's
kind of good mpg wise i think sam and i've taken that into account on some of our cars
but we've also kind of gone big on fun because that's what we always do so with all that in
mind sam let's say budget of 15k yeah what have you got well i've gone for a car i i've missed the
one i had i've talked about these on this pod before but i'll bring it up again because it's
the ford fiesta st3 it's the 1.53 cylinder of car so it's the the last one they did um rip
because i love these um most listeners i'm sure and viewers will be familiar with them great motor
punchy 200 horsepower uh does even have the quay limited slip i think they do as well don't they
so they've got a fantastic way of putting the power down because this is an st3 so this is
specced up beautifully so it's going to be fuel efficient oh yeah that's a key thing on this by
you can get 50 miles per gallon if you're very sensible that's annoying because they were i think
they had cylinder deactivation tech and at the very least they were very very frugal so i would be
cruising on the motorway cruise set if you were sensible just 70 you'd be nudging 50 miles per
gallon on a twisty b-road you can probably half that because you're going to be enjoying it so much
but they are fantastic little hot hatches and if i was in this ph's situation this would be my choice
and i mean this one leaves a few quid in the tank as well it's got uh well 12,750 so it's a little
bit over his kind of preferred budget but under his maximum so leave some cash over for the
extras he suggested 63,000 miles three or 63,363 two previous owners so you know it's a it's a
a decent just under average mileage nicely looked after it's gray so it's not the most exciting to
look at but it's that crayoni gray which i actually think looks really quite cool Porsche GT3s came
in this color they did so it kind of makes it cool so yeah you know i like it but awesome yeah
i've gone for something which i think could appreciate i think they are appreciating quite
quickly actually aren't they so actually having said that i did see one a little bit higher than
this recently so they're they're clearly staying around what is at the moment a 13k car this is
a who's makes me laugh when he says mini mini but it's the mini JCW GP this is a GP one so of
course this is i mean it's the one everyone wants right and i think they've aged brilliantly well
just the right level of raciness and you know for this pH's route a little twisty winding road
you've got a supercharged 1600 cc motor manual gearbox i mean this is just engagement to the
max in hot hatch form and because it's an early or a mid-naughties car you have you know steering
feel-ish and these because they're they're pretty good they didn't have tons but they were pretty
good that's 12999 that's amazing 13 grand 82 and a half thousand miles yeah that's really cool
all the right really cool all the right bits on it as well i mean you know it's uh they came well
specced anyway but you can see this one's got got all the the mod cons as i used to say um i've gone
a little bit left fields for my next choice i love these yeah me too and actually funny enough my
my little clear got his MOT the other day and the guy was going god i've not seen one this clean
underneath or it wasn't even in reference to cleo's because they're quite well looked after
those but he was just i'm not seeing cars of this era as clean as this underneath yeah and in my head
i was thinking yeah wait till you see my master that's going to come in you know in a few months
that doesn't look this clean underneath because japanese cars of this era typically rot but that's
not true if they come from japan and live in japan as illustrated by a 12 and a half thousand pound
ep3 civic type r but it's a jdm car and it's just been imported so it's like not been owned by anyone
in britain yet which means it's not been driven on our salty roads not yet anyway these are
a lot more than getting a uk version because they had chassis strengthening they have more power
yeah and crucially a limited slip diff yeah which none of the uk cars got which is strange because
it was built in the uk presumably in swindon let's keep it happening so that i know it's
bloody corolla and now this stuff yeah it's solid here come on guys obviously this is like
from ages ago though so maybe that little bit of power because you both you and i have thought
think of ep3 is a little bit god bless yeah but uh the jdm one i think would be fantastic to drive
and i was i was reacquainted with the two litre k20 vtech engine recently with the
lamin honder s 2000 oh yeah hondas but it's got a little bit more power as well again
has got a bit more power yeah 240 240 even though it has got more power but my god the noise was
just ridiculously good it's like 8500 yes yeah yes and i wanted it there all the time because
it didn't have anything in it but it sounded so good that it was just like yeah all the time
yeah um probably going to be absolutely rubbish for the mpg that he's after but yeah if he's driving
it as as he should do i guess the thing to know is this one is absolutely mint because of the
things i mentioned and if he's driving it down wet country roads you will ruin it um but i mean
you'll have a good time while you're doing it i know i totally agree they do need to be thrashed
and we've said this before like as a road car they just don't feel that quick until you're
ringing the neck of them but there's something about this one having the jdm finish with the
different headlights and the the front grille it just looks really cool it looks a bit more like the
race cars than the road car to me and i like that i've got a cool hot hatch oh sorry but it's true
it's a this is a car that is on piston heads auctions right now but will be ending the day
after this podcast goes live so if you want to this car act fast providing it's not
being snapped up beforehand so this is an alfa romeo 147 gta i mean you can't diss my mpg claim
when you've got that thing there well no but the the only the thing that i have going for me is that
i've got a 3.2 liter yeah uh buso v6 you do and i have some of the best fled arches of the 21st
and just a pretty body shape it is really pretty so this is yeah so it's um for those of you
watching it's in black with silver wheels the interior gorgeous i don't know if you could
get them with like a brownie and creamy interior yeah you could yeah this one however oh yeah
this one does have that yeah so it's got the kind of tan leather interior highlights with
black bolsters either side of the seats but it looks like proper italian leather yeah that's
what i love about some italian cheaper cars of where it's like oh this interior's got a really
cheap plastic interior let's go and slap some really nice leather on and it's just enough to cover up
the the the plastic quality yeah uh it is ridiculously cool obviously we don't know
how much it's going to go for because it's an auction uh but yeah with a budget of 15 grand
you could probably get one i think that's sort of the going rate of gta's now um 53 000 miles and
four previous owners it is oh it's got the q2 limited slip differential too it is literally
go and buy this car that's fixed it because that's that that was the the main issue with them because
i remember my i think i've mentioned this before my car went up against one of these when i was a
budding motoring journalist i hadn't quite made it into the industry and i thought oh i know what
i'll do i'll offer my car when it was requested on twitter um for a magazine and they can use it
and mike dove drove it he was the freelance who wrote the piece and he drove my car versus a 147
gta and there was another car as well in the lineup which i forget what was it i can't remember
anyway these were the two stars and so um i know it was just these two it was just these two okay and
i remember what he said when he came out of this was he said amazing engine beautiful car but you
know can't put the power down as effectively as i wanted to and obviously it's a bit nose heavy
but a diff would fix 50 percent of that yeah famously the it's the q2 diff just solves a
lot of its problems this one's got it if that doesn't do it for you we've got an nds one which
is kind of a little bit of an underappreciated hot hatch i think because these were all-wheel
these are tiny little things yeah all-wheel drive 231 brake horsepower from yeah two liter turbo
engine i think these are really smart looking things i've not driven one so i don't know how
engaging they are but i can't imagine that the mpg would be terrible on them it's a manual isn't
it yeah i've driven a manual yeah i was about to say i've only driven the manual i thought they were
brilliant and they were you're right they were underrated i think the the the cool the key car
mags respect to them i'm pretty sure ph would have had a good right a right on these but yeah they
kind of didn't get noticed as much and i guess it's because they're relatively subtle um and they
weren't you know raucous or loud but great to drive good handling you know it's an oudie so it was
steering feel wasn't massive at of that era let alone now and so yeah at the controls it wasn't
the most engaging but the chassis was really good the all-wheel drive system was really good
in a way it's like oudie really yeah it's actually and it's kind of like a gr yaris of the day
without all the mulligation and stuff it was just just a cool all-wheel drive all year round quick
car it was definitely a you know in the same way that a gold far can keep up with a super car on
the right road this could definitely keep up with a proper sports car on the right road this just
seems like it's got it's just kind of like proper does everything in a really small little package
12 990 and also a much cheaper way into quattro a1 ownership so they did the quattro sport or the
a1 quattro whatever it was called which was epically called but also yeah it's going to cost you like
50 grand yeah if that doesn't do it for you the sensible option and probably the best option
yes is a is a mark 7.5 peak golf um i mean it's just it does everything i kind of
a part of me was really wanting to get one of these instead of the four series
i'm still glad that i went for the four series in the end because i got the nice motor but
i just i love this idea of having a golf and then just not worrying about it just kind of you
get in it and you go oh this is this is fun like it's yeah yeah it's it's a car that just does
everything so well and as you said many consider it to be peak golf this is a 2019 example in white
with the tartan interior manual 11 650 74 000 miles i mean that is peak in the sense as well
because obviously the golf bar of that area was very good too but but a golf is yeah like you said
like it's sensible but still good and this is that you know a golf bar is pushing it they're all
pushing things in different directions and this sort of sits nicely in the middle it's it's sensible
fuel efficient enough but also fun and looks good practical it ticks every box in a very
golf way i would have the alfa romeo of all this well it's the it's the emotional purchase this is
the person the head isn't it uh yeah yeah if it was my money i would that that alfa romeo is um i
adore it yeah i think it looks i think it's great and black and it's got the q2 diff and it looks like
it's been really well looked after that's the car i want however i'm going to be sensible
because i think a it will by the time that people will be listening to this podcast it may have
sold so that's a you know got a bit of that in mind and second of all is that the big owls is
after something with the half decent frugality yeah with the good fuel so i'm like i think it's
going to be the golf you'll never be disappointed by a golf so you know i'm going for the golf gti
oh that's tough now because the golf is so good because i was thinking my head purchase is the
st it's weird saying head because obviously it is a fun car the fiesta std yeah but the gp1
is my heart purchased out of that list but i think i'll go with the fiesta because again
like i said at the very start this is the car i thought of first yeah and i think it's it's a
great little motor well that's good because i have more cylinders than you know so that's that's
something to go over the same age as well so if you like my car or sam's car better you can
that both of us did a terrible job then you can go on to my article on the piss and head home page
click on that click on the link to the topic put your suggestions in and then just say how rubbish
sam and i are there's still time to sign up to piss and heads on the beach we are taking over
bright and seafront for one of our most epic sunday services ever we've never done something like
this before and i'm really excited about it so go on to piss and heads home page go and click
events go sign up to piss and heads on the beach we'd love to see you there it's just going to be
yeah a really really cool little meet uh it'll be may the 24th we're not parking the cars on the
sand are we imagine that that'd be a lot of rosson cars that would be a real mess yeah don't
worry they're not going to be out in the in the sea long enough yeah to fully rot
speaking of dodgy cars uh this last one comes from ricks and it's called would you buy an
express car and they say went to see a used performance car this afternoon a reasonably
rare car so opportunity to have a look at one locally popped up so i had a nose well priced
and for context it's just over a year old and below 10 000 miles not totally my ideal spec
but i was tempted came home to look at some videos of the model and to my surprise found
the exact same car on the first vid that popped up complete with a scene of smoking tires googling
the red shows that it has done the rounds with some of the big car mags and has now come on the
market not so much concern while in my ownership as would be under warranty but come resale maybe
others would be put off would you so furbo says this has been discussed many many times on piston
heads the definitive answer has been determined to be and if you go in the forum it says spoiler
alert if you click on it and it just fades in maybe maybe not as with anything helpful very
conclusive however i was trying to find some people that had said like oh yeah i bought a press car
and it blew up guys if there's not many people saying it's also earth well i said i bought an
x bmw press car a few years back which had been featured in all sorts of magazines it was nine
months old had 3000 miles on it and a mega spec it was like new when i got it even had brand new
tires all around fully warranted from a bmw main dealer it was also cheaper than a less suspect
older models too because of its press history had it for four years 50 000 miles and it never
missed a beat and never a fault i'd do it again but i wouldn't buy blind yes which is probably
a good idea yeah i mean just buying a car without having any looks at you yeah probably not the thing
to yeah i would say to that is it the model type matters in that because if it was just like a
nice middle spec bmw like most journalists we you know you're not doing skins in those as much
true it's not as necessary yeah it's only especially when you're doing video or photography and
you're in a performance car where the photographer or videographer is like can we have some more
angle please and you go right okay let's do that again like i i got a a fiesta st sport line at my
previous job many years ago and i mean it's not an st so you're not ragging it ragging it yeah it's
fun but not like i would in a proper st so that's a good point 30 59 says back in the 90s my business
partner and i bought a pair of alpha 164s which had been run by the importer turns out his was an
x fleet demonstrator and mine an x press car both were in excellent condition and turned out to be
very reliable which for a 90s alpha unbelievable pretty impressive what is more believable is this
the main difference was that the press car was miles quicker presumably having been nicely loosened up
by the antics of the road testers entirely i think it's probably more likely that the
i mean i'm i don't i'm not basing this on on any concrete information but it may have just been
that you know yeah the press cars back then were you know what they wanted to show them in the best
possible light i think that's right i mean there have definitely been rumors of and it seems to be
some of the italian brands uh in earlier years you know this is pre our careers oh big time this is
back into i guess the noughties where sometimes they would be turned up a little the wick would be
turned up a little bit supposedly and then a certain motoring journalist purchased one of the cars
or the same model that he had previously written reviews of and when this doesn't drive like the
cars i drove it's press cars interesting but um yeah i don't think that can happen so much now
because i think it's much harder to you know the homologation stuff etc i think yeah just
and also cars now they don't need to do it exactly they're all so good now um mostly the stuff that
comes onto ph typically yeah kenti in werdale says i did direct from catering the press 270s sv
though it wasn't in any way the deciding factor more than it was a spec i was happy with and available
when i had the funds no regrets from me though i did wonder and still do whether its status adds
more or detracts from its value i think with the catering it kind of adds to it because it's cool
i think so yeah and they can take it they're not it's not like a big heavy you know two ton thing
doing drifts where you're like okay there's diffs getting very hot there and there's there's
in that a catering can be chucked around all day long that's fine uh events manager adam betteridge
here at mason heads is is formerly of uh catering's marketing squad yeah and is responsible for a lot
of the really of the of the specs of the marketing and press cars from the last 10 years or so
and uh yeah i mean so if you if you've bought a catering based on a certain spec you can thank
him for it because he was he was really good at speccing them up i would happily own a catering
car that's that's express because honestly yeah you said they're well spec they would have been
you know oil changes everybody week yep they'll be in great condition oh yeah 100 percent it's just
ad says my old corado vr6 was an express car i didn't know that when i bought it only found out later
when someone told me it was the cover car of a magazine didn't bother me actually thought
it was quite interesting i think that's probably i think a way for a lot of people to go about it
i think maybe not to sound like an auction shill but sometimes if you're selling through auctions
it can it can be part of the story yeah because then as well like on ph for instance you can
obviously talk to the seller so if you're like well it's an express car has it been ragged it
can be that it's not caused me any problems but you'll know that when we go and pick up a press car
you'll get your you know either turn up at the garage or it's dropped off at your house it is
always in oh 99 percent of the time showroom spec yeah like it's absolutely like it's just come
out of the show yeah yeah absolutely my car by the way i mentioned it just a minute ago by clio
being in the mag it has been driven by motoring journalism royalty mike duff of course yeah
but also someone came along to help out on the shoot uh jethro bovingdon oh cool and i still
remember um when he and i don't know if he listens to podcasts if he it's unlikely but he might be
listening i still remember jethro if you are listening he's a hero of mine but when he reversed
he crunched reverse oh i'll never forget that so uh also motoring journalism royalty jack scarlett
yeah we know yeah he drove my fiesta st and completely ranked the clutch because he hadn't
he's been driving so many bloomin electric cars that he hadn't driven a manual for a while and
yeah it ranked the hell out of it and he's also very tall so he must have been like against the
yeah i don't know if he had just adjusted his driving position beforehand but yes i think the
the space was quite challenging for him but yeah i think that my view on on press cars has always
been that yes they do sometimes suffer at the hands of some journalists i think i think now
there's a lot of journals out there that it is a very very very hard industry to get into and if
you're not if you know if you're not good at it or you're not a good driver you're going to get
found out quite quickly and probably not going to get cars so a lot of the people that do get it
most of them are yeah look after it i think there's that's the thing as well of like
we all have a degree of mechanical sympathy yeah and so if you are driving it you know that it's
like it's not necessarily that we're thinking of the people who are going to buy it later on it's
more the people our press relations you know we don't want to hand a car back that's been absolutely
ragged and they go like what's happened with the with the tires the dismaking noises exactly yeah
the the clutch is completely screwed yeah so i think most of the good journals not that i'd
consider myself among them but most of the journals that will will try and be like you
have a degree of mechanical sympathy but would you buy a an expresso it's all to do as i said
earlier it's all to do with what type of car it was if it was um something like a hot hatch or
something and i knew it had been used for track day shootouts probably not even though i know cars
can take it and they really can just just inevitably it means it's been driven hard from the off um
but if it was something like a you know i don't know a nice a ms80cla whatever or something then
yeah absolutely because it's just been they won't have been reviewed in that way um and would have
had the best maintenance i'm not saying that those cars that are driven on track are driven in a bad
way it's just not many people on track days can do drifts in there you know whatever a 9-11 or
something all day because they won't let you do that on a track day whereas they will do if you've
paid thousands of pounds in your magazine and they're letting you shoot there all day so they
are just driven harder because they can be and they make good videography and photography yeah
and you know obviously if they do get driven hard uh there's you know some press garages
where i remember calling them up and being like oh can i borrow this car and they'll go it's only
just come in can you give us a few days we need to check it because they need to check it over
and they need to validate it and they need to replace any parts that like it's just the attention
to detail that's it so many are is astonishing that's the key thing isn't it it's nothing goes
through and in these workshops that the people in these workshops are like they're the top you
know it's not like when you go down they go oh that'll be all right that'll be fine oh yeah see
any minor mark or wear anything it's replaced a hundred percent so and a lot of them will also be
managing it's not just the press garages that they're managing they're also managing you know fleet
cars as well they're they're Porsche Reading for instance they'll manage the press cars but they're
also the number one you know they're Porsche UK HQ so they're managing all sorts and then but when
i was i was there a couple of years ago and there was a bloke who turned up in a 918 it was his
second 918 that he had bought along you bought his the other one along a couple of days before
wow they were servicing both of them one of them had like 17 000 miles on it and the other one
had barely moved so he's got identical specs so you have one that was his the one he used and one
that was just same spec but it probably offsets the money he's making on one it's it's a different
different world sam sheen different world and on that note it's time for us to end another
episode of the gassing station podcast thank you ever so much for listening if you enjoyed this
episode of the gassing station please give us a five star review maybe some nice words because it
just lets us know that we're doing the right thing and also spreads the good news the good word of
the gassing station out to more people um so anything you'd like to end on before we wrap up next
week after the bank holiday i'm going to germany to drive a very fast car on a runway that's what
i'm gonna say um and i'll reveal all in the next episode interesting when on that note see you next
tuesday
About this episode
From London compliance paperwork to “sensible” car regrets, the hosts kick off with used-car shopping—especially a Porsche Boxster 986 and a £15k hot-hatch shortlist. They then zoom out to record-setters across top speed, Nürburgring laps, hill climbs, and even acceleration-to-stop tests, before circling back to what you can actually buy for the money. The episode ends with a listener question: would you buy an ex-press car, and how press-car prep compares to track-day wear.
The Bugatti Veyron changed the supercar world forever — and now one of just five World Record Editions is up for sale, finished in the same spec as the 267mph record car and with a £3.5m asking price to match.
That got us thinking: what other record-breaking cars can you buy for rather less? From the Honda Civic Type R to the Jaguar XJ220 and some properly oddball entries, we pick our favourites.
Plus: the best £15k hot hatch, and whether buying an old press car is really such a bad idea.
🏎️ Sell your car on PistonHeads auctions: https://www.pistonheads.com/sell/auctions🎟️ Get your Annual Service 2026 tickets: https://www.pistonheads.com/events/annual-service
Chapters:
0:00 Intro
4:35 Best used record setters
39:10 £15k hot hatches
54:18 Would you buy an ex-press car?
TOPICS:
Bugatti Veyron Super Sport for sale: https://www.pistonheads.com/news/ph-spottedykywt/bugatti-veyron-super-sport-spotted/51147
£15k hot hatches: https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&f=255&t=2140621
Buying an ex-press car: https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&f=255&t=2139472
CARS:
Sam's Ford Fiesta ST: https://www.pistonheads.com/buy/listing/20240773
