Hindsight is a wonderful thing, isn’t? In the late ‘90s, shortly after the Mk 1 Freelander was released, I had a turbodiesel variant for a fortnight. And I thought it was quite brilliant, from its novel Hill Descent Control (HDC) to its chunky, Lego-like switchgear.
I put it to the test, too, doing things like travelling four up to Lesotho, taking on a sand-driving course and making several airport trips to collect overseas relatives and lots of luggage.
Then the horror stories, too legion to fully explore here, began trickling and then flooding in.
Suddenly the little Land Rover That Could didn’t seem quite so enticing. And now I cringe when I think of all the praise I heaped on it in publications like the now-defunct SA edition of Maxim.
Just one upshot was the inadvertent appearance of two-wheel-drive Freelanders, thanks to a level of mechanical unhappiness that falls outside the scope of this blog.
On the launch of the Freelander 2, one of the company’s people went so far as to say that the original was perhaps the worst vehicle that Land Rover has ever built – adding that the Freelander 2 is probably the best.
Either way, the earlier model sullied Solihull’s standing somewhat, which perhaps accounts for the fact that the SA market is unique in that the latest Discovery outsells the Freelander by a ratio of about two to one.
In the vital US market the new Freelander is badged LR2, making you wonder why a similar ploy wasn’t adopted in SA. But I suppose the bad taste the original car left will eventually be washed away as the new model – a good vehicle to start with – just gets better all the time.
For 2011, as you probably already know, it looks better than ever, in keeping with the increasing gentrification of the whole Land Rover line up, makes more power, is more economical and feels yet more solid. Prices meanwhile are only fractionally up.
Over a few hundred kilometres in an SD4 HSE that included ramming down some rutted dirt roads in the KZN Midlands there wasn’t even the beginning of the hint of a rattle. On sealed surfaces, the little Landy hissed along with all the serenity and most of the agility of a smaller sedan from the Teutonic triumvirate.
And that makes me think that the Freelander 2’s competitors are no longer just other upscale soft-roaders but luxury sedans too.
Given the happy choice between an SD4 HSE and a more potent but less versatile Mercedes C350 CDi, I’d be hard torn between the two, especially as they both sit in the same price bracket.
In a decade or so from now I don’t think I’ll be looking back at this blog with the wisdom of hindsight and cringing at having said that the Freelander 2 is no longer just a good vehicle but an outstanding one…
