Feeling A Little French

For reasons unbeknown to me I’ve been feeling somewhat French lately. This isn’t a bad thing of course, I’ve wanted to re-learn the French I forgot since school, so this phase of contintentalism is steering me in that general direction.

Back at school I studied French and German but dropped French as I was more interested in pursuing a career in the car industry, and when it comes to cars no one does it better than the Brits, Germans and Italians – I’ve wanted to learn Italian as well but that can wait – so German was the logical choice.

For some reason, I’ve always liked the French language. I enjoyed learning it at school and I still know a tiny bit here and there but I’ve wanted to become almost fluent in both French and German (strangely, I know about the same in both languages).

Last night, while watching the tennis with Dan from Lusso, I found myself being sympathetic and sporting towards Gasquet and increasingly cross with the Wimbledon crowd. I still wanted Murray to win but was rooting for Gasquet too. The banter we had while watching was as exciting as the match itself, only much funnier!

To top it all off I’ve been listening to Superbus since a friend of mine – who lives in France – sent me a video of them on YouTube. As it happens, I’m currently listening to their album. I have no idea what she’s singing about 98% of the time but enjoy it nonetheless.

I think I need to start taking French lessons…

New Ferrari 799 Mugello

As promised, I said I would put up a link to the article I recently wrote for Lusso Magazine and it is now live. Here is an extract on the NEW Ferrari 799 Mugello.

It’s a Lusso exclusive as far as I know and I’m happy to have written it. So check it out. Digg it, Stumble it. Tell all your friends, this could be big news!

During the last 20 years the car industry has seen an injection of SUVs from marques that, before, had spent their time honing sports cars and family cars. If you wanted a luxury 4×4 there was really only one place to look: the Range Rover. It still tops my ‘sought after’ list. However, a gap in the market was found and began to develop into a gaping chasm.

As such, many of the aforementioned marques started to build cars to fill this chasm. This luxury SUV Grand Canyon was so popular with consumers that even Land Rover released the Range Rover Sport.

In 2008, we now have a smorgasbord of luxury SUVs to choose from: BMW’s X5, Porsche’s Cayenne, the Range Rover Sport, Audi’s Q7, to name but a few. The model I want to draw your attention to is Porsche’s Cayenne. BMW had the 3, 5 and 7 series so they had done the family car for years. Porsche, on the other hand, had only managed a 2+2 in the shape of the 911, which was a great family car until your children grew past 4ft tall. This was what made the Cayenne the most surprising SUV I think. They strayed from their norm and, ignoring aesthetics, made a fantastically fast 4×4, which handled as well as most saloons.

If I may, at this point, scream a question many of you may be thinking, “…but what about the Italians?”

To read the full article, click here.

digg story