Why does the British motoring press hype the Ford handling?

patronniall

Throughout the years I've noticed many mainstream British motoring press like Autoexpress, Autocar, and Whatcar always overrating the handling capabilities of Ford cars (Fiesta, Focus Mondeo) often citing it as the most poised, fun and best handling. I've driven Ford cars and while they don't handle badly, I found them overall quite boring and handling average at best. Whats with the motoring press?!

dannyrst

patronniall wrote: »

Throughout the years I've noticed many mainstream British motoring press like Autoexpress, Autocar, and Whatcar always overrating the handling capabilities of Ford cars (Fiesta, Focus Mondeo) often citing it as the most poised, fun and best handling. I've driven Ford cars and while they don't handle badly, I found them overall quite boring and handling average at best. Whats with the motoring press?!

They can't accept the French have the best handling hatchbacks on the market (or at least used to, I haven't driven the newest RenaultSport Clio or Megane).

patronniall

Car Magazine is another one...

facade

Like most things that you see, hear, read- they are all lies.

If someone gave me £500 to say that BMWs were the best cars in the world I wouldn't hesitate to forget all the evidence and my own personal experiences.

patronniall

dannyrst wrote: »

They can't accept the French have the best handling hatchbacks on the market (or at least used to, I haven't driven the newest RenaultSport Clio or Megane).

For its class, the French do make some very comfortable and good handling machines - Peugeot more so.

scaredofdebt

Do you have quote that says the Mondeo's handling is "fun"?

patronniall

facade wrote: »

Like most things that you see, hear, read- they are all lies.

If someone gave me £500 to say that BMWs were the best cars in the world I wouldn't hesitate to forget all the evidence and my own personal experiences.

For the general public, the "best" car in the word is always a subjective matter. One may call the most comfortable car the best car while another may say something else. Another thing I've noticed with mainstream motoring press is that they almost always give cars like Toyota and Honda average or below average reviews (usually 3 stars). They call the Toyota "bland". -and boring when I've found Toyotas generally much better in most aspects than the equivalent Ford! What they usually fail to notice is that historically Japanese cars have had much better resale values than their beloved Fords and I'm sure there are good reasons for that.

facade

facade wrote: »

If someone gave me £500 to say that BMWs were the best cars in the world I wouldn't hesitate to forget all the evidence and my own personal experiences.

Actually, since I cast all morality aside when I hit 50, I'd say it for as little as £5 (cash in hand )

Form a queue car manufacturers!

marlot

I remember Vauxhall refusing the let Clarkson test any of their cars after he criticised one of them.

I'm sure all the positive reviews of certain makes has nothing to do with flying the journalists to exotic places to test them!

I remember what car raving about the Freelander2 when it first came out, even when their one had been off the road for an extended period!

thescouselander

I'm pretty sure motoring journalists don't actually drive the cars they write about. I once read a review about my current car where the journalist got mixed up and started going on about features in the pre-facelift version that had actually been changed on the car they were reviewing.

I've also seen reviews for other cars that I have driven through work (they're always giving me hire cars if I need to go anywhere) and the review never seems to match the experience.

That said I do think Fords handle very well compared to similar cars from other manufacturers.

Shaka_Zulu

marlot wrote: »

I'm sure all the positive reviews of certain makes has nothing to do with flying the journalists to exotic places to test them!

Or the amount of advertising the manufacturers buy.

Having said all that you can use this to your advantage and buy great cars at much better prices due to the motoring press only giving them 2 or 3 stars.

Best place to look for reviews is the What Car reader reviews. (Might need to weed out the moaning nutter reviews)