Silent, and Now Subtle Too - Greenfleet Scotland 2017 Roundup

Rather embarrassingly, I haven’t managed to write up my roundup from GreenFleet Scotland 2017 at the Royal Highland Centre. The last couple of months have been hectic, with the house move taking up a lot of my time (and energy), meaning things like this have taken a back seat. No excuse, I know, and I’ll try to be more diligent in future.

Anyone looking for more of my witterings, both motoring and otherwise, follow me on Twitter, or check out these articles I’ve produced for the site Supercars.net.

I’m a big fan of what GreenFleet are doing. Their annual events break down the anxieties of electric and hybrid powertrain sceptics by allowing fleet managers and the general public to get up close and hands on with these vehicles, helping to encourage uptake in a fleet sector that put 1.38 million vehicles on UK roads in 2016.

Interview with Cameron Davies, 2016 DMACK Fiesta ST Rally champion and Contender in the 2017 British Rally Championship

Those of you who follow my social media profiles will have noticed that I recently attended GreenFleet Scotland, a fleet event focused on increasing the uptake of low emission, hybrid and electric powertrains in fleet services and generally increasing awareness and uptake of efforts to make our cars greener.

I’ve a longer post in the works summing up the day and differences to last year’s event, but for now I’ve included – for the first time on McMotors – a bit of audio from the day.

I got chatting to 2016 DMACK Fiesta ST Rally champion Cameron Davies, who’s contesting this year’s British Rally Championship in a Peugeot 208. Cameron was accompanying visitors on their test drives and generally making sure no one did anything really silly in the cars BMW and the other brands had kindly brought along for people to try out on Ingliston’s historic circuit.

In the clip, Cameron and I discuss his racing career so far, how running up mountains helps him prepare for rallying in his Peugeot, and what it's like to wheelspin on a track in 5th gear - as Jack drives a BMW 116d, which doesn't wheelspin in 5th gear, around a dry Ingliston circuit.



The videos Cameron mentions in the clip for the Peugeot 208 Black edition and the 44 years of BMW M cars can be found below.

Peugeot 208 Black Edition.

44 Years of BMW M Cars.

Many thanks to Cameron for talking to me on the day - you can follow his British Rally Championship season on his website and social media accounts below:

http://www.camerondavies.com/

Twitter: @cameron_davies

Sunday Drives - American Muscle, Devil's Beef

Spring has sprung! And in a much more wholesome way than we’re used to in Scotland.

This brings the obvious benefit of good weather, but with that sunshine comes a litany of motorbikes, cyclists, horses and sun-seekers with caravans-in-tow out of hibernation and on to the road network.

I don’t have a problem sharing the road with other road users, but many of us who prefer to travel on four wheels know the frustration of hitting the umpteenth mile of 40mph pootling behind a caravan that just won’t yield, while all the bikers zip past astride their insectoid machines.

This past Sunday, however, I was happy to trundle along at a sedate pace, in a fair-weather convoy of a rather different kind. On my jaunt back from visiting family in Dumfriesshire to Edinburgh on one of my favourite stretches of road, I came upon quite a special cavalcade.

Sun, Sand and, er... Steel Wheels? - Almost a Week in Spain with a Renault Clio 1.5 dCi

Back in October, I got my first taste of continental driving on a short holiday in Spain. Having contacted our rental company in the run up to the trip, we’d been told by email to expect a Nissan Micra or similar – that last part being the roll of the dice in the lucrative “Class C” market at Tony’s rent-a-car. We’re not talking Mercedes here.

On arrival at Malaga airport, we were met by two representatives of Tony’s (one of whom could have filled out the handover form in his sleep if he’d had to) and, speedy paperwork behind us, we were led outside with our bags to a bustling bank of rental pick-up-and-drop-off activity. Here we were introduced to our car for the week. A car, which, in the bleary, dank darkness looked almost Micra-shaped, but was not itself a Micra.

Hey, that cloud looks like a Clio... kind of... if you squint maybe?