SPEAKER: Land Rovers invited us to incredibly beautiful Norway
to drive the new Land Rover Range Rover Velar.
Yes, that's the full name.
And this vehicle is going to slot
in between the Evoque and the Range Rover Sport in the Range
Rover lineup.
And before we drive it, we're going
to talk a little bit about some of the exterior
elements of the design, and why they work,
and what they're intended to do.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Now, it's lets go up to the front end and talk about some
of the styling elements up here.
This is a limited edition first edition variant of the Velar,
so it has these big 22 inch wheels.
And some of the detailing upfront
like the bronze work that's up here
are nice little details that reinforce
the luxurious, premium styling elements
that Range Rover is known for.
A couple of the elements that most interesting are--
with what Range Rover's done to shrink
elements of the design, these headlights, for example.
They have these character lines--
these LED lights-- that kind of evoke the Range Rover Evoque--
forgive the pun.
But they've also shrunk these lights quite a bit.
And the effect-- what that does to the rest of the vehicle,
is it gives us this elegance, I want to say.
And It's a very attractive thing when taken as a vehicle
altogether.
Another design element that stands out
once you start noticing it is this stripe
down here at the bottom that runs along the entire length
of the vehicle.
It's a nice design touch.
And then as we get towards the back,
we have to point out these flush door handles.
This is a Range Rover first-- we've
seen a lot of other automakers do something like this.
This has aerodynamic benefits, but it also
has a styling element that helps make
the entire side of the vehicle look entirely flush.
And as we get to the back, we look at the tail lights.
And these two were also the smallest
in the Range Rover lineup.
And that reinforces this idea of minimalism.
Overall, it's a very, very attractive vehicle.
And next up we're going to see how it drives.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
We're driving a first edition version of the Velar.
And it's limited in very few numbers.
It's a high content variant.
Priced close to $90,000, but the interior
seems to represent that price very nicely.
It's most similar to the Jaguar F-Pace,
coming with the same engine that vehicle's available with.
It also shares a suspension design and the platform
underneath.
But as you can tell, it looks extraordinarily different.
And the way it drives feels quite a bit different as well.
The version we're driving right now
has air suspension that makes the ride smooth soft and m
where the F-Pace, for example, doesn't have air suspension.
It has adaptive dampers, but the difference
in terms of ride quality is pretty pronounced.
We have the driving mode set to auto.
And that's letting us move down this path at a fairly
leisurely pace and pretty comfortable in terms of ride
as well.
This Velar has the supercharged V6,
which generates adequate power.
More than you'll need.
It's a little bit quieter, a little more muted
than the F-Pace.
And that reinforces the refinement
that this car delivers and seeks to deliver as well.
You will also be able to get the Velar with gasoline
drinking two liter turbo four and a diesel turbo
two liter four as well.
All of them use an eight speed automatic transmission.
This will be able to tow around 5,500 pounds with the V6.
And it has legit off-road capability,
as we found out by doing a little bit of light off-roading
earlier today.
There's a lot of computer controls with regard to that.
It's a single speed transfer case.
That active electronically controlled rear differential.
That's optional.
And you basically use the touchpad right here
to set a preferred driving method,
whether that's mud, rut, or snow, sand, or so on.
And the systems take control of lock
up between the center differential and the rear
automatically.
In fact, there's a low speed cruise control
that you can activate, set it at any speed--
we're in a car set to kilometers per hour-- set it to any speed
below 20 kilometers per hour, and you
can take your foot off the gas pedal
and it does all that work for you when climbing through ruts
and whatnot.
It's a pretty sophisticated system.
Although, we'll be curious to see,
once we can test it in off-road areas
that we're used to, how it acts.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Design is one of the big differentiators between this
and other SUVs, especially the F-Pace.
It looks striking.
It looks different.
It has the traditional Range Rover design cues.
And inside, Land Rover's paid careful attention
to ensuring there is a very tech focused interior lay out.
A lot of capacitive switches, including those
on the steering wheel as well.
It looks very clean, especially when the vehicle is off.
And it gives a sensation of technology and sophistication
that suits the overall design of Land Rovers very well.
A couple of things I like about this interior layout
is the digital gauge cluster.
It's a nice, high resolution, quick reacting,
easy to reference display that's multi-configurable.
You can see your navigation screen in it.
You can move stuff around and personalize it to your taste.
And I like that it.
It has all the benefits of a digital display,
none of the downsides that you typically associate.
The bisected interface here is the novel as well.
It's interesting to use at first glance,
but we'll have to play with it a bit more
to see if it works just as well in our daily use.
The top level screen looks very similar to the InControl Touch
Pro system that Jaguar has in the F-Pace.
And we generally like the functionality of that system.
We're told that Android Auto and Apple CarPlay compatibility
is coming and we're looking forward to when that happens.
The screen here down at the bottom
is multi-configurable as well.
And the display itself is a really neat idea.
Again, it's something that's going
to take a little bit to get used to in terms of operation,
because it is a fresh approach to controlling climate
controls, your stereo, your seat heating and ventilation
settings, and vehicle settings as well.
One of things I like is that underneath it,
there's a bit open space for a small handbag or whatnot,
or whatever devices or stuff you want to hide back there.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
And as for comparison, it gets kind of difficult.
Because this vehicle splits, in terms of exterior size,
right between a compact luxury SUV and a mid-sized luxury SUV.
At its base price, it closer to the compact luxury
SUVs, like the Audi Q5, BMW X3, and Mercedes Benz GLC.
But with the V6 and options that come on that model,
it gets closer to the midsize vehicles.
Now at the lower end, that means it benefits
from being a little bit bigger.
It has a little bit more cargo capacity and interior space.
And on the larger side, it's a little bit smaller
than those vehicles, so the inverse applies.
But from this first impression, it's
pretty clear that Land Rover's made a very successful
looking vehicle.
There are a lot more videos where this one came from.
Subscribe now to see all of Edmunds' latest reviews.