Living with the Range Rover Sport SVR
Review by Jacob Lerklint.
I haven’t always been a fan of big SUV’s but by having spent some time around them in recent years I’ve started to come around and actually like them. It makes it easier when they have a five liter supercharged V8 engine put in them like this latest 2021 Range Rover Sport SVR. The special vehicles operations SVR Range Rover has been with us since 2014 and has entertained us with its silly performance and burbly V8 noises. This facelift version introduced in 2018 has some smaller visual changes from the previous one. With a new Range Rover Sport coming later next year will this be last proper silly SVR?
The five liter Supercharged V8 engine has seen many horsepower outputs and configurations the last ten-fifteen years. In the SVR it puts out a healthy 575 horsepower and 700nm of torque. Big numbers but the torque is slightly conservative for a massive 2500kg SUV. Mated to the engine there is an eight speed ZF gearbox and a four wheel drive system that has endless configurations and settings for street and off-road use. After having spent some time with none sporty range rovers with endless comfort and superb off-road capabilities it was interesting to experience a Range Rover that can do both those things but can actually handle a corner and have sports car performance on the straights.
My first issue with the Range Rover sport SVR is getting into it; with the roof being rather low and the seats being quite high there’s an awkward angle to take a seat in it. Once you are in, it feels fine and you sit very comfortable in the bucket seats. Yes, bucket seats in a Range Rover, crazy! They save 30kg from the regular seats but retain heating and cooling functions. Apart from the seats the interior doesn’t stand out except some SVR badging.
Since 2018 you get the Touch pro duo infotainment system from the Velar with two 10 inch screens stacked on top of the other. Believe me when I tell you that it will make you go crazy, the input is super slow and sometimes it won’t response at all. It is probably the biggest flaw of this car. On the steering wheel you get haptic feedback buttons like many other brands, and like those brands it is very poorly integrated and confusing. But you will forget about all that when you start the SVR, the burble from the valved exhaust is a joy every time. It’s not as loud as the pre facelift SVR but it makes one hell of noise once you put it in dynamic mode.
At first the SVR feels massive but after a while you get used to it and it’ll shrink around you, even though you sit quite high you can still get the seat at a pretty low position. Just cruising around in comfort mode you don’t realise the monstrous of an engine that’s in front. It’s not until you get on some uneven roads that you feel the revised and hardened suspension of the SVR. Even though it has a very sophisticated air suspension you can still feel the road a tiny bit more than maybe you would want. It doesn’t help that you have 22 inch wheels with massive tires.
Put your foot to the floor on the accelerator and the 2500kg SVR launches like anything else, 0-100kmh is covered in 4.5 seconds and it won’t stop accelerating until you hit 283kmh. The sound and thrill you get from the five liter supercharged V8 engine is priceless. The gearbox shifts perfectly and will let you hit the rev limiter without it shifting for you in manual mode. The corner ability in the SVR is outstanding, you can’t cheat physics but for a two and a half tone SUV the SVR invites you to take liberties like any other SUV I have experienced so far. I can confidently say that I took some of my local bends faster than I have been doing even in some serious sports cars. You can bring four of your friends or family and load 780 liters of luggage in the trunk and still, the SVR won’t miss a beat. The backseat is roomy and there is plenty of legroom for an average sized adult.
This doesn’t come cheap though, for a reasonable specced SVR you are looking at an outrageously 1 800 000 SEK and you can easily get that number to 2 000 000 SEK. This will probably be the last Range Rover to have this charismatic engine as the new one coming in a year or two will have a four liter twin turbo V8 engine from BMW. The SVR isn’t perfect by any means but an SUV with this engine and its high level of fun factor will be a win in my book.