First Drive Review
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Disco’;s back, baby!
In Iceland, a kid can be Neptúnus or Torbjörg or Geirþrúður, but you’ll never meet a Moon Unit or a Zuma Nesta Rock born in the island nation. New parents here must choose from a list of 3500 government-approved names or plead their case to the Icelandic Naming Committee, a 3-person panel tasked with preserving the country’s heritage and protecting its children from a lifetime of mockery.
As overbearing as that sounds, it’s too bad the committee doesn’t consult with automakers. The panel could have stopped Land Rover from abandoning years of history when, in 2005, it dropped the Discovery moniker and began adopting alphanumeric names for some of its models in the North American market. The Discovery became the LR3 (and eventually the LR4) and the compact Freelander was renamed LR2. But Land Rover is now righting its wrong on its own terms, as its newest crossover would almost certainly earn the approval of the Icelandic Naming Committee. The LR2 replacement—even as that model will be sold for at least one more year—is now called the Discovery Sport and is every bit worthy of the name. The entry-level Land Rover, now competent and handsome, no longer makes a mockery of the brand.
Toned, Tanned, and Ready to Sell
The Land Rover LR2 was an awkward and unloved thing. Fewer than 3700 American buyers took one home in 2014, accounting for just 6 percent of Land Rover sales. Starting at $ 37,995, the new Discovery Sport undercuts the all-wheel-drive BMW X3 and the Audi Q5 each by more than $ 2000, but we’re guessing the Land Rover will win sales based on looks alone. There isn’t a bad angle or errant crease on the Discovery Sport. Its sheetmetal is pulled taut over an athletic frame, creating a design so free of clutter that there isn’t even a reference to the rear bumper lurking under the skin.
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The Discovery Sport stretches 3.7 inches longer than the LR2 and offers a third row of seats. It’s also about 9 inches longer than its kissing cousin, the Range Rover Evoque. And the fact that the Disco Sport doesn’t have a roofline as overtly aggressive as the Evoque’s means that headroom and outward visibility are significantly better.
The cabin is finished in typical Land Rover kit with excellent materials and a mediocre infotainment system. That’s significant, because the Discovery Sport is the first vehicle to use Jaguar Land Rover’s brand-new and desperately needed replacement for the fussy and stubborn system we’ve complained about for years. The new InControl system uses an 8.0-inch touch screen that looks sharp, with more color and crisper graphics than the current offering. However, all it takes is a few taps to the screen to realize that the underlying software is still slow to react and occasionally unresponsive altogether.
Press, Pause, Surge, Jerk
Ahead of the B-pillar, the Discovery Sport shares many of its mechanical bits with the Evoque, including a 2.0-liter turbocharged 4-cylinder and a 9-speed automatic transmission. The 240-hp engine, designed and built by Ford, is slow to build boost off the line and isn’t as responsive as Audi and BMW’s turbo 4-cylinders. Yet once the turbocharger has spooled up, the Discovery Sport lunges ahead with up to 251 lb-ft of torque. We estimate the Sport, handicapped in part by a roughly 4400-pound curb weight, won’t quite match the sub-6-second zero-to-60-mph performances of its competition. Figure on the benchmark sprint taking 7.3 ticks or so.
The engine’s slight hesitations are exacerbated by a transmission that downshifts with uncomfortable, pregnant pauses between the accelerator input and the gear change. We’ve had the same complaint in other vehicles that use the same ZF-supplied transmission, including the Jeep Cherokee. Compared with the 6-speed unit it replaces, the 9-speed gearbox feels like a step backward. Full-throttle shifts from eighth gear to 4th at highway velocities feel as if they can be measured in full seconds. And while shift quality is smoother than in the Cherokee, the upshift from first to second is still accompanied by the same unpleasant jerk.
Between the engine’s lag and the transmission’s hesitations, it can be a challenge to drive the Discovery Sport smoothly. During part-throttle acceleration—to climb a hill, make a pass, or simply accelerate for a rising speed limit—the Sport takes its time responding before suddenly delivering too much oomph. The result is an unseemly surge that will make your passengers think you’re treating the gas pedal like an on-off switch. Jaguar Land Rover’s all-new Ingenium turbocharged 2.0-liter engine, set to go into production in late 2016, can’t get here soon enough.
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The Ride Is Right
While the powertrain is the Discovery Sport’s biggest shortcoming, the chassis it’s bolted to is this crossover’s greatest asset. It starts with a rock-solid unibody structure that’s heavy on steel, although the hood, roof, and tailgate are aluminum stampings. As we scrambled over packed ice and rutted trails in Iceland, the Discovery Sport’s body never chattered or quivered. On paved roads, the cabin is seriously quiet, especially impressive considering that our test car rolled on studded winter tires.
Ride quality both on- and off-road is excellent, with none of the contrived “sporty” harshness that afflicts the Evoque. The suspension tuning is a masterful balance of compliant damping and firm body control. A new multilink rear suspension that is shorter and more compact than the Evoque’s strut arrangement creates the extra width between the wheels that allows for the optional third row of seats. Land Rover calls the Discovery Sport a 5+2-seater, which you should interpret as space for 5 adults plus a pair of 2-year-olds. As an occasional-use seat, though, the best part about the third row is its expert packaging. With the last row folded, the Sport’s load floor is just as low as in the 5-passenger version. (The 6-seater does, however, lack the 5-seat model’s underfloor storage.)
A Family Affair
Under Tata ownership, Land Rover has mastered the redesigns of the Range Rover models. The Discovery Sport suggests that the Land Rover side of the family is about to undergo a similarly successful revitalization. The LR4 soon will be called Discovery once again and a new Defender is due in a couple years. (And, yes, for the first time in nearly 20 years, that ultimate off-road tool will be sold in the U.S.) When it comes to staying true to your heritage, maybe Iceland is onto something.
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2015 Land Rover Discovery Sport Very first Drive: Disco’s Back, Infant!
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