It takes a lot to impress the country’s top drivers. Yet three of them honked their horns and gave me the thumbs up as they drove the extraordinary all-electric MG Cyberster GT, a true people’s supercar.
Whether with the roof up or down, this sleek, sporty, high-tech convertible is proof that the legendary British brand MG still has affection in the UK and beyond, even if the company, currently celebrating its centenary, has been Chinese-owned for almost 20 years.
I share that soft spot for MG, having driven a much-loved MG Midget in my early days as a journalist.
Red flag: The stylish MG Cyberster has plenty of oomph on the road, accelerating from rest to 62mph in just 3.2 seconds.
But the new Cyberster is in a different league. And it’s fun. It may only be a two-seater, but it’s big and full of surprises.
First, there are the two scissor doors that lift up at the push of a button. And then there’s the spectacular performance.
It can certainly shift gears. The flagship GT model, a dual-motor, 503-horsepower, all-wheel-drive car that I drove on motorways and back roads, sits on 20-inch alloy wheels and accelerates from 0 to 100 km/h in just 3.2 seconds, giving it supercar-level power and 0.2 seconds quicker than a Ferrari Roma Spider.
Top speed is 200km/h and its 77kW battery gives it a good range of up to 445km. Prices for my flagship GT start from £59,995.
There are four driving modes: Comfort, Custom, Sport, and Track (which removes the driver assistance features and is really track-only).
There’s even a red “Super Sport” acceleration button on the steering wheel. Changing the braking resistance makes one-pedal driving a relaxing option.
The less powerful 340bhp Trophy version costs from £54,995, accelerates from 0-62mph in five seconds and has a longer range of 316 miles.
The fully electric soft top opens in 15 seconds at speeds up to 30 mph.
It was a joy in the sun and coped well with the hood up in a huge flash flood on the highway that felt like going through a car wash.
There’s a decent-sized, practical, if low, 249-litre boot.
Electric cars can be a challenge for long journeys, so I took my Cyberster grand tourer on a 450-mile round-trip test from Surrey to south Liverpool and it proved a positive experience.
I left with a fully charged battery from my home wall charger and made one public charging stop heading north and two on the way back south, each taking 40 minutes to reach 80 percent charge, accompanied by a coffee break.
The cockpit-like driver’s area has three wraparound screens (a 10.25-inch screen flanked by two 7-inch screens), but the steering wheel obscures part of the sat-nav display.
The MG Pilot safety and driver assistance package includes lane change and lane keeping, adaptive cruise control and blind spot detection.
The mobile museum hits the road
To mark 70 years of partnership between the British Red Cross (redcross.org.uk) and the Land Rover Defender, the two organisations have created what they believe to be the UK’s smallest museum.
Exhibition: Ray with the mobile humanitarian museum housed in a British Red Cross Land Rover Defender
Inside a new, specially commissioned British Red Cross Defender, the mobile museum will use artefacts and audio to tell the story of seven decades of humanitarian work around the world.
The free museum will make its debut at London’s South Bank Observation Point, Upper Ground, SE1 9PP, on 19 and 20 September.
No booking is necessary. The British Red Cross said: “This is a celebration of a partnership that has helped a staggering 2 million people using more than 500 Defenders in over 50 countries.”
