Range Rover Sport P510e: the ultimate

The water wading, field chewing, luxury waft mobile

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Car Reviewed: Range Rover Sport P510e

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Hearing the news of an imminent white blanket wasn’t all that terrifying, quite the contrary. The new Range Rover Sport was dropped on my driveway and I began scoping out a road that would allow me to test its fancy anti-snow abilities. Turning 31, the posh off-roader was quite the gift. It’s just a shame that I couldn’t keep it.

Plans for testing the P510e’s snow crawling abilities were soon sabotaged. The report for storm Isha’s masses of snow soon turned to heavy rain. Still, the P510e made for an excellent puddle destroyer.

The car was plastered in dirt when it arrived because the jet washes had frozen, but it looked great caked. My test car cost a whopping £111,245 which was due to a few tasty extras such as the £895 Giola Green paintwork and £1,100 23” alloys among some other stuff. If you fancy a new P510, you’d better be prepared to part with £108,545.

Being a plug-in hybrid, I was focussed on just how efficient it would be. I soon remembered that this is a 100k car and that if you can afford such luxury, you’ll probably not be too fussed about how much time you’ll spend at the pumps filling up. For those interested, however, it managed 141.4mpg over a 21.7-mile run to a park. The overall average over a 38.3-mile run was 104.2mpg – impressive.

You’ll need to remember and plug it in and if you don’t have a home charger, you’ll need to think outside the box a little. My outside plug powers an inflatable garage, which houses my VX220 during the winter and this meant running a large extension through my letter box to charge the car. This got tiresome and eventually, the idea of charging it was soon binned. Of course, this left me with the 3.0-litre petrol powerplant, which returned 25-28mpg. It took 14hrs, 42min to charge the 38.2kWh battery via a house socket from empty and when full, it showed 51 miles of EV range.

Booting the throttle released all 503bhp and 516lb-ft, firing the 2,810kg P510e down the road at quite an alarming rate; the 0-62mph time of 5.4sec was more than believable.

In the cabin, everything felt incredibly upmarket, as you’d expect. The ‘Light Cloud and Ebony’ interior made wafting around in ultra comfort that little more special. The front and rear heated seats came in handy in -1°, and those who sat in the front passenger seat enjoyed a massage. Road noise is very minimal and on colder days, the loudest thing in the cabin was the sunroof blind which squeaked when retracted.

The Range Rover wasn’t put through an off-road course, but it did endure some green lane action after taking a wrong turn. Engaging the mud/rut setting saw the P510e climb effortlessly over loose stones, through deep potholes and slippery muck. Luckily, the rear-view camera had a washer which made reversing a lot easier.

Storm Isha was far from the worst that we’ve had, but chaos was in the air. People in small cars hesitating to go through puddles, brake lights flashing on and off as the rain hammered and road closures plagued radio stations. Classic FM through the P510e’s Meridian sound system and the high seating position combined with little outside noise, made it feel like everyone else was sinking while we sailed on through aboard the RMS Opulence.

There’s little to dislike about the P510, but one thing did bug me: not having a designated cubby for the charge cable bag. This could be troublesome for those with a dog, as Fido would need to dodge a heavy coiled up cable whenever there’s a sharp corner; charging up prior and leaving the cable at home would be a sensible solution.