The best car in the world?

8th September 2011

By Anthony Peacock

Jeremy Clarkson described it once as the ‘best car in the world’ so it has a tough act to live up to. On the other hand, Jeremy Clarkson presumably thinks highly of his own dress sense too, so that doesn’t necessarily mean anything.

Skoda is the brand of the moment – in rallying at least – and the Yeti, the Czech firm’s first attempt at an SUV, conveys all the messages that people like Juho Hanninen and Andreas Mikkelsen are busy putting across on stages throughout the world: rugged, go-anywhereness combined with sporting intent and the non-stop reliability of a German railway.

In terms of sportiness a 1.4 turbo such as the one propelling the Yeti we tested is hardly going to get the pulse racing (unless we’re talking about Renault’s very first turbocharged Formula One engine from 1980: unbelievably this put out around 1000 horsepower from just 1500cc). But the power from the 120-horsepower Yeti is just about enough for most people; and in any case that’s not what the car is all about.

Instead, it’s to do with transporting up to five people just about anywhere in comfort, within a package that is just a bit different. That’s something the Yeti does very well.

If you’ve not seen a Yeti on the road recently (and the point about any sort of Yeti is surely that it’s meant to be rare?) that’s because there’s a waiting list for one. As is the case with Jeremy Clarkson’s clothes, that means little enough by itself: there used to be a five-year waiting list to have a Lada in Soviet Russia after all.

This time, it’s no anti-climax though. Skoda has come up with something genuinely innovative: a thoroughly European version of all the funky 4x4s that have been coming over from Japan in recent years, such as the strangely-named Nissan Juke and the pornographically-named Honda Joy Machine.

Inside the slightly austere cabin there’s plenty of space, helped by a prominent but car-like driving position that gives a commanding perspective of the road ahead (although the prominent A-pillars mean that the view is not quite the same around the corners). Plenty of storage space means you travel around unencumbered by stray mobile phones, chargers, loose change and all the other impedimenta that regularly finds its way down the back of seats and similar impenetrable crevices. There’s a place for everything in the Yeti and it appeals to the Obsessive Compulsive in all of us to put everything neatly in its appropriate compartment. Or is it just me? In any case, hours of fun are guaranteed just playing with the central storage bin.

 As a design the Skoda Yeti just works, in a cohesively solid Tonka toy type way. It’s a genuinely useful, rather than a fussy car. Most people won’t bother finding out, but it’s surprisingly capable off-road too. The boot isn’t massive and the big diesel engines are better than the slightly asthmatic turbo petrols, but most of the time, the Yeti is practical, fun and slightly irreverent. That’s quite an achievement for a vehicle from the Czech Republic that is inspired by an abominable snowman.