Land Rover was already sitting up high as king of the hill in the luxury SUV class. Now, the automaker is adding a new sport tuning to transform some trim levels of their vehicles from smooth all terrain transport to outright high performance machines.
The SVR tuning package takes the already rock solid Land Rover designs and makes them speed machines worthy of tackling times at the world famous Nürburgring circuit in Germany. The resulting work on the 2016 Range Rover Sport SVR has Land Rover citing its Nürburgring time as the fastest SUV run in the track’s history.
The standard 2015 Range Rover Sports offered a 3.0 liter V6 engine putting out 340 horsepower. For 2016, Land Rover took that vehicle and re-tooled with a 5.0 liter, supercharged V8 engine putting out a comparatively immense 550 horsepower. That sets a zero to 60 time of 4.5 seconds and a top speed of 162 mph.
When you blend those numbers with a vehicle originally designed to be a luxurious urban cruiser designed to handle off-road terrain with equal ease, you end up with a very unique vehicle package.
Automotive journalists gathered in the heart of Manhattan recently for a day-long test of the new Range Rover Sport SVR. The planned route would take them from Soho, through Midtown, over to the Hudson Parkway uptown and out of city. A rip into the Bronx and a run through Yonkers eventually led to the open road up the Hudson River toward the foothills of the Catskills Mountains.
Related: Land Rover Discovery Sport
That might seem like a reasonable automotive excursion, presenting the chance to test a vehicle under both city and highway conditions. But, it showed confidence on Land Rover’s part. There aren’t a ton of auto press events that use New York’s confines. The city is perpetually under construction, leaving uneven pavement scarred by potholes young and old. Traffic is a constant, and the rules of the road are mere suggestions to NYC cabbies — making sudden moves necessary. It can make for a brutally uncomfortable drive and threaten the wellbeing of the test vehicles.
So, to put a $111,500 premium performance SUV in that kind of environment proves that Land Rover believes this SVR version had the strength, power and maneuverability to navigate out of the automotive rat’s nest that is Manhattan.
This Range Rover handled the hostile territory with surprising quickness and agility for a vehicle of its size. While big city driving didn’t allow the SVR edition to unleash its refined power, there were enough breaks in the traffic to employ some bursts of its quickness.
Once out of the city, this Range Rover ate up the miles with that same gliding ease any Land Rover know all too well. It’s rare to find any vehicle that hides such speed and performance capabilities underneath a personality of smooth comfort.
All of the Land Rover models live at the top of the SUV food chain to one degree or another. Up and down the make’s line, the vehicles give the SUVs at Mercedes-Benz or BMW something to shoot for when they release their annual class entries. The 2016 Range Rover Sport SVR takes one of Land Rover’s most successful all around vehicles and adds power and agility, creating a very special (and very expensive) motoring experience.
