[MUSIC] Sometimes, such as it’s almost mythical status, you would assume that the 205 GTI, was the last good sporty car that Persia produced. The only point of debate being which was better 1.6 or 1.9. But of course, sporty Persians didn’t end with a 205 there was a 106 in three or six restart.>> But more recently there’s been the 208 GTI, pozo sport and the 308 GTI, both of which have been very, very good to drive So her Joe has never truly lost his Mojo. It clearly still really understands how to make a driver’s car. But even given that, and the fact that pleasure was going back to the mall in the new hypercar class, would you spend 56,000 pounds on a sporty pleasure? Yes, you’re right. 56,000 pounds. Because that’s what this costs. This in case you’re wondering, is a Peugeot 508 SW PRC. If you’re unfamiliar with Peugeot lingo, SW means it’s the station wagon or state version. And PSE stands for Peugeot Sport Engineer. The headline figures are 355 brake horsepower and 386 pounds for the talk, which can deliver the car from nought to 62 miles an hour and 5.2 seconds and onto an electronically limited 155 miles. Miles an hour. However, those figures don’t tell the whole story you see under the bonnet is a 1.6 litre turbocharged four cylinder petrol engine capable of putting out 197 brake horsepower through an eight speed automatic gearbox. However, this is augmented with a pair of electric motors, a 109 brake horsepower on the front axle and a 111 brake horsepower one on the rear axle. So this is a sporty hybrid, as well as having all wheel drive. The PSE also gets three mode dampers Michelin Pilot Sport for us tires, the 24 millimeter wider track at the front, 12 millimeter wider track of the rear and big 380 millimeter brake discs at the front. So it’s got some intriguing hardware. I want to take a minute to talk about the looks, because I think this looks fantastic. Not just in this, Particular PSE variant which we’ll get to the individual bits in a moment, but just overall, it’s a really good looking estate, Jill Vidal, who I’ve mentioned before, is responsible for this and the equally good looking little 208 and sadly for pozo, he’s now moved to Reno, but the striking face, not too big a grill I quite like the ribbed bits down there, down here. Frameless doors, and then this sort of bit here. Look at that. BMW, I think really, overall, just a really sleek, good looking car. This is Selenium grey paint, which is specific to this PS II model and it’s actually metallic looks flat most of the time but in the sunlight, it does. Start to pop a bit. Now the PSE bits you can tell because it’s got these three green claw marks down the front of the line, claw marks etc. But unfortunately it then just sort of offsets this whole batch here incidentally model name on the nose of the car, not really sure about that kinda works I suppose for 508 but if this was a Porsche, Panamera Turbo S e hybrid sport Turismo, that not so much but there we are. We’ve also got more kryptonite highlights here. And then these little carriage anomic Phillips here we’ve got one here and another one Down here, which really caught some stones in. And then the final one down here, and they’ve got stickers, which are already starting to peel off, which is a bit annoying and they just, I don’t know, they’re a bit fussy and want is overall a very clean design. I don’t think you need them 20 inch wheels on this, that perfectly nice overall. They are really striking. Very good looking car. The other colours available by the way, are Perla Nero black and pearl white. So not the most adventurous palette to choose inside well it’s something of a mixed bag ready. The first thing you notice is the little steering wheel which is something poesia has done for a while. I don’t mind that actually you live with it for a while and you do get fairly used to it. However, that does still seem to be a flow with it because they just don’t seem to find a way of you being able to really see all of the dash. You always feel even at my height, like just okay. For the top of it, it’s also quite sort of bizarre if you find yourself parkings of no which way is up, which seems odd because you’d have thought that would be difficult with around wheel but somehow it’s more difficult with this. There we are. There are lots of nice little design touches in here though. I love these keys here that look like a piano. You want to play a tune on underneath they are actually really Be useful as well though for just navigating around the various bits of the infotainment that you need and want and invent the car setup which we’ll come to in a bit. The materials they’re mostly Alright, we’ve got sort of different layers as you go up. I like this carbon fiber effect on short BMW He used to do that quite a lot, but it is. It’s really quite nice. The phone call or is it called stereo is okay. It’s not the best but it’s pretty good. And I do like the fact that there is a button just here for turning the lane keep assist straight off, because it comes on every time we get into the car like an awful lot of modern cars, but at least you can turn it straight off. In terms of modes, well, we’ve got electric value, obviously and we’ve got 26 miles of range which is what’s enough to get you most places locally I think I’d recommend that most trips to work and back could be covered just using electric only. And you can do a decent speed and electric only as well. You do really need to be able to plug it in at home or at work though Because although you can charge it on the go from the engine using the various settings down here, it does take some time and obviously some skill. Then we’ve got hybrid, which is obviously the sort of the main mode you use most of the time it’s what is it default I suppose. [UNKNOWN] Comfort is exactly the same as hybrid, but it just backs off the dampers, so it makes it a little more relaxing. Talking of comfort I should just say that those frameless windows actually, they don’t create as much wind noise as I thought they might. It’s really pretty quiet on the motorway in here. It’s obviously particularly quiet if you’re driving on electric power only. And you could be because it will do up to 80 miles an hour without the internal combustion engine kicking in. There is only an 11 and a half kilowatt hour battery on board, but that thankfully doesn’t encroach on the boot space 530 liters with rear seats up and 1780 liters within folded flat. Obviously the hybrid element makes most sense if you can do a lot of short journeys on electric only, but for that, you’ll need to plan your day charging strategy. Plug it into a regular socket, and it will take seven hours to brim. Both of you hook up to a dedicated seven kilowatt or box like this, then it could be back on the road in an hour and 45 minutes I should have mentioned that there is also a four-wheel drive mode for ultimate tenacity when things get slippery. But the question on all your lips is really what’s it like when you put it into sport? [SOUND] And the answer is, well, it’s quite quick. I wouldn’t say it feels necessarily 300 55 brake horsepower quick, or 384 pounds for the torque for that matter, I suppose the torque it does, because you get that instant response that, you expect with, electric motors. However, there is, a certain element of it, this car that, the, match between the electric. Trigger motors and the internal combustion engine isn’t quite there. When you come out of a sharp corner like this, you get the instant punch. But then there just seems to be almost a little gap. It’s a bit like they’ve sort of built the bridge 75% of the way across the river and then you just need to jump the last bit because the engine doesn’t quite, it’s not quite often running when the The push from the motors runs out. It is of course, a big heavy cars as well It weighs nearly 1900 kilos. So actually, it needs every bit of its 355 brake horsepower to push all that along. I’ve like this little 1.64 cylinder turbocharged engine In other applications, it’s amazing how much power they can get out of it. I’m not sure though, that it really fits the sort of the character of a bigger car like this. You certainly get the thing that you really need to flash the little engine. And then these panels aren’t the most tactile things. The GS If the drive training’s a little bit underwhelming the chassis. I actually really like, there’s a really nice fluidity to the whole chassis and it’s actually pretty involved. It turns in sharply and you can trail break into the corner and get the whole thing just to up on his tip toes. In a surprising way for a big estate car. Obviously, there’s only so much you can do as soon as a heavy car and it will rise in front and grip, but it’s pretty transparent in the way that it actually handles. Tighter corners aren’t necessarily his thing that he definitely can’t fill. The longer wheelbase that you can feel the rear motor kicking in on the way out to the tighter corners which is nice. You can I feel that it’s definitely all wheel drive, and then through the longer corners, it’s just a nice balance to it. So the 56,000 pound question, would I buy one? No. I like the fluidity of the chassis, but the powertrain doesn’t really do it for me and the sporty steaks. Instead, I think I’d look further down the range because I fundamentally like the 508. It’s different, it’s got some style, it’s not a vag product, and for between 13 and 18,000 pounds less, depending how you spec it, you can get a 222 brake horsepower 508 sw hybrid without the rear motor, but with an increased range of up to 39 miles on electric only That seems to me to make more sense, then spend the spare cash on something genuinely sporting. So really 508. Yes. Really good looking car in a sporty version. I think you’d have to be a very committed 205 fan perhaps would have grown up. Too more, one. [BLANK_AUDIO]