Range Rover Evoque named Scottish Car of the Year

Land Rover’s new  Evoque model has been named as Scottish Car of the Year at the 2011 Scottish Car of the Year awards. The compact crossover newcomer won the SUV/crossover category, beating the BMW X3 into second place in the category, before going on to win the top accolade.

To win the top prize Land Rover’s smallest model had to beat the other 11 category winners too. Categories included Small, Family, Estate, Executive, MPV, SUV/Crossover, Drop Top, Diesel, Sporting, Electric and Eco. Competition was strong right across the board and very tight in the Small category where the excellent Kia Picanto came out on top ahead of the second placed Audi A1.
The new Ford Focus won the Family car sector with the Peugeot 508 having to settle for second place. The Estate sector was won by the all-new Hyundai i40 with Peugeot again taking second place with their 508 SW.

There was another close contest in the Executive sector where the Audi A7 came out on top just ahead of the Volvo V60. The MPV category had a very clear winner with the excellent Seat Alhambra winning comfortably with the Ford C-MAX in second place.  In the Drop Top section the VW Golf emerged as the winner despite some very expensive opposition from BMW and Audi. The BMW 6-Series was second.

The diesel section is always hotly contested and this year’s winner is Jaguar’s XF 2.2d with Volvo’s V60 DRIVe in second spot. The Sporting category was won by Jaguar’s XKR-S with the BMW 1 Series M Coupe in second place. Peugeot’s iON took the first ever Electric category award beating the Nissan Leaf into second place. The Eco category was very tough this year with the frugal Seat Ibiza Ecomotive taking the title ahead of the Fiat 500 Twinair.

John Murdoch, President of the Association of Scottish Motoring Writers commented: "Some superb new cars entered the market during the past 12 months and our members had a tough time selecting the category winners. Manufacturers are responding to market challenges and continue to provide improvements in safety, emissions and economy at an astonishing rate.

"One car stood out from all the others with its stylish good looks, sound packaging, fine driving dynamics and desirability and the Range Rover Evoque is a worthy winner of the Scottish Car of the Year title. With 18,000 advanced orders already in the bag it will provide job security for hundreds of people and generate huge exports for the British economy."

Colin Green, Land Rover UK Managing Director said: "We are absolutely delighted that the Range Rover Evoque is the 2011 Scottish Car of the Year – undoubtedly one of the most important accolades in the industry. On behalf of everyone at Land Rover, I would like to thank the Association for the award and for recognising that the Evoque is the most exciting car to be driven on Scottish roads this year."

Author: Faye Sunderland, October 17th, 2011
Filed under: Land Rover | No Comments »