Would you like a BMW to drive for the week? It’s not often you get that kind of email delivered on an otherwise dreary office day. Let me tell you, my reply was typed out and sent quicker than it’s taken you to read this paragraph! (The answer was yes, just in case you thought it might be anything but that.) You see I’ve never had a brand like that as my everyday car, it’s always seemed unattainable, but if I learnt one thing in the week I had the BMW for is that it perhaps should be something I should get… at some point!
I picked up the X1 on a Monday morning and was immediately impressed by its size. From the outside it’s a small looking car (I like to call it the baby beemer!). But once you get inside, it’s spacious, there’s room for my 6”2 body in the driver’s seat without it feeling cramped. I then spent an hour driving 12 kilometres back to the aforementioned dreary office, and took a wrong turn which dumped me in more traffic than I was already in. Not a great start to our relationship!
So to test it, I thought a Sunday run to the Blue Mountains, a couple of hours west of Sydney, to test it out in a region with a little more to offer. This is just a couple of hours in the car but it mixes up city driving, three lane highways and some winding country roads. It handled everything really well and the things that stood out the most were how smooth everything was on the freeway, how easily it took the corners and attacked the changes of elevation on the way up the mountains and as a side note, how deliciously warm it was when we got back into it after 4 hours of racing around outside in weather that was far colder than we were anticipating. Interestingly the big change with this car is a switch from rear wheel drive to front wheel drive, something that only started to change 2 years ago.
Luxury is never far from your fingertips with a 6.5-inch display with satnav, reversing camera, automatic parking, auto tailgate and 18-inch alloys all as standard across the X1 range. Saying that though, I’m a sucker for heated seats and these are sadly lacking.
There’s huge amounts of storage in the BMW X1, including a big hidden space in the boot. Each and every area is spacious without looking too big when you look at the interior.
Under the bonnet it really feels like you can give it a good kick and it responds. BMW claims it can go from 0-100km in 6.5 seconds, being the responsible driver I am, I cannot confirm this fact!
Being green when you love driving cars anywhere and everywhere can be a bit tricky, but BMW’s ECO PRO mode is great, by adjusting to your particular driving style, the system runs more economically through intelligently adapting gear changes and acceleration as well as the climate control. It displays your ‘bonus kilometres’ which are how many more kms of fuel you can travel thanks to the changes – If you’re interested this Sunday drive saw me create over 20 kilometres worth of fuel!
The only noticeable downfall from my point of view was how stiff the suspension is, and being a small SUV it’s a little surprising. But if you find a pot hole or ridge in the road, you’ll know about it, and it’s perhaps where it needs a little improvement.
If you’ve read my reviews before, you’ll know there’s always some random observations. The first one here is the view from the driver’s seat. It really feels like you are sitting outdoors. The windscreen is big and the pillars are small which makes for a great combination and excellent all round vision.
Secondly, the lights in the interior are awesome. Not only do they look really cool when you unlock the car on a dark night. But they also work very well when it comes to finding door handles, window controls and if you’re needing to tie a shoelace in the back, fear not, the downlights will make it almost impossible to tie your laces together!
My three and a half year old son, who’s been mentioned in my car reviews before always has a say and this was no different. Firstly, this was his ABSOLUTE favourite car so far this year… because it was blue, and blue is his favourite colour. He also loves his tables and gadgets in the back seats and as you can see, the arm rest/drink holder in the centre of the back seats was a big hit with him, as you can see!
