Cropley meets Capri: First ride in Ford's new headline-busting EV

At 10am on Saturday morning I slid into the semi-sporting front passenger seat of a new Ford Capri EV, the already controversial coupe-SUV the company launched a few days ago and wants to sell in healthy numbers beside its sibling, the Explorer.

The car was extremely noticeable in the yellow hue the company has clearly chosen as its launch colour, and to my eye it looked great. Big and tall — which is the cause of the controversy — but great. Roomy inside, too, just like the Explorer, with a minimum of showy architecture but a practical, quality feel. Very Fordish.

The task was to drive as fast as possible up the Goodwood Festival of Speed hillclimb, and my driver was the kind of bloke who’s perfect for the job: well-known stunt specialist and former auto test champ Paul Swift, well accustomed to performing at a high level in front of crowds without “dropping it” as someone had inconveniently done the previous day in a Lotus Evija.

Swift’s plan was to do a timed run this time (yesterday’s with football “icon” Eric Cantona aboard had been a bit more of a Friday drive). The plan was to bust 70 seconds, which would be very brisk, even for a 335bhp 4WD EV with 402lb ft of torque on tap. I hadn’t the heart to tell Paul, but for this errand he probably should have chosen a passenger who hadn’t had quite so many breakfasts. Still, he did his best to compensate by driving this thing as hard as it would go.

On the green signal our Capri erupted out of the blocks as abruptly powerful EVs tend to do, but with nary a squeak from the four driven tyres. We bolted up the start-line straight until I was starting to wonder, in the jaws of that first, fast right-hander (overseen by tens of thousands of eyes) whether we’d get around it. We did. Our cornering pic shows a bit of well-contained body roll; Swift's hands on the steering wheel displayed the car’s impressive handling neutrality. The stability I could feel through the seat of my own pants.

Onward we sped, and it was a breeze. The car was quiet and quick. It stayed in line (which didn’t please my driver, who’s used to oversteer he can provoke with a big lever to a powerful hydraulic handbrake). We also avoided two wheels, another Paul Swift speciality.

In fact, the car felt planted, docile and quick. On the last section of the climb, and on the way back, I remembered to clock the ride quality, which some will know is an obsession of mine in EVs.

Using only a few roadside ruts and surface ridges for judgement, this Capri seemed to have the makings. It seemed supple, quiet over bumps and (as far as I could tell from being a passenger for the grand total of 1.16miles frenetic miles) very promising. But I decided there and then I’ll want to do plenty of driving in this car for pleasure, especially since they’re promising a range of around 350 miles on a charge.

Naturally, on the Paul Swift ride, the already rampant that’s-never-a-Capri controversy raised its head. People kept poking their heads into our windows to tell us so.

My view: of course it’s a Capri. Ford can call it what they like. And they’d never have raised so much consciousness of a simply styled, nicely proportioned car any other way.

We’ll get used to it soon, as we already have with Explorer and Mustang Mach-E. The complainers won’t be the target buyers (I can say this because Ford won’t) so what they think hardly matters.

If there was a mis-step, it might have been the advertising promise that The Icon was returning. It isn’t. This is a different, much bigger car with a pleasantly familiar name.

And none the worse for that. Ford is sensibly simply sweating its assets, to make and sell a successful European EV. And to judge from a one-mile passenger ride (which isn’t much, but it’s much better evidence than the average armchair critic) I’d say they deserve a rousing success.

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