Jaguar’s E-Pace playing catch-up to the front-runners in crowded SUV market

On the one hand, the Jaguar E-Pace can be a (relatively) mundane second-car; on the other, it can be a tyre-burning tyro. Inside, meanwhile, the E-Pace is a very nice place to be and there are some typically ‘Jag’ touches dotted around the cabin which will make you feel very happy about your decision to buy one, writes Declan Colley

Sat, 31 Mar, 2018 - 01:00

SUVs, as we all know only too well by now, are taking over the world. Budget brands, big-selling brands, premium brands — they are all getting on the bandwagon. Why, even the guys at the stratospheric end of the market — Lamborghini, Bentley, Porsche — are in on the act and Ferrari, which has never, even since Enzo’s death, liked being pushed down any non-traditional route, is understood to have one ready to go into production. Things change very quickly these days.

For some manufacturers, it is a ‘needs must’ scenario because if they don’t get into the SUV market they’re dead in the water, but for some others, it is very much a simple response to customer demand.

And, like the traditional car market, where there are small ones, medium ones, and big ones, the SUV market is following suit and we now have small ones, medium ones, and big ones too. You can even get humongous ones if you so desire.

But it is the compact segment SUV that interests us most this week as we try out the baby Jaguar SUV, the E-Pace. The marque has already scored quite a significant success with its larger SUV, the F-Pace, but it is the smaller car that is stoking up consumer interest like nothing else.

This is very understandable, especially when you think that in 2016 some 40% of global SUV sales have concentrated on the compact end of the business and the general consensus is that this end of the market is the one which is going to expand most quickly. Indeed you can readily expect that these kiddies are where the biggest amount of business is set to be done.

At one end of the market, you’ll have the Suzukis and SEATs of this world, at the medium end you’ll have hoards of VWs, Fords (in due course), Renaults, Nissans, and Toyotas, and at the premium end of the business you’ll have, Audis, Mercs, Beemers, Lexuses (Lexi?), and such like, including the Jag.

Despite the fact that Jaguar is actually competing with itself in this sphere — the Range Rover Evoque is one of the E-Pace’s main rivals — the car is still slated to appeal to a very broad church of potential buyers, largely thanks to the fact it is a Jag and not an Evoque. That there is a choice of engines and drivetrains on offer is only a mirage — the same stuff is on offer on the other side.

On the one hand, the E-Pace can be a (relatively) mundane second-car; on the other, it can be a tyre-burning tyro. The one thing it will not be, it must be said, is cheap. The ‘entry’ offer of €36,000 seems a bit too good to be true when you look at the overall pricing scale of the E-Pace. Sure the baseline model comes only as a front-wheel drive and with the ‘basic’ 150bhp two-litre turbodiesel Ingenium engine.

Buying one could result in a scenario where the salesman throws the keys out the window to you, rather than being associated with such a lower order and could well result in your owning a car which will be scoffed at when you rock up to the Iso-gym, or whatever faddy name they have these days.

Thing is, the next model up is nearly 42 grand and the next one after that is 70-and-a-bit. And, the tester we were provided with comes with a jaw-breakingly shocking price of seventy-seven thousand, five-hundred euro. €77,500! For a compact SUV? They’ve got to be kidding.

Sadly not. That means that a decently specified version of this car is going to cost somewhere in the region of the same sort of money that will get you into a luxobarge, or something very close to it, at any rate.

In truth, I don’t see many people biting this particular bullet — certainly not for that money. The sellers, I feel, will be the mid-ranges models in both two- and four-wheel drive, but not the tester.

That said, it is a very nice thing to wheel around in and so it should be for that sort of money. But, even with the 180bhp version of the two-litre, four-pot Ingenium turbodiesel, this thing felt a little underwhelming, power-wise.

It was OK to drive but, allied with a nine-speed auto ‘box, the E-Pace, when driven on anything other than a highway, seemed to be in constant search for the right cog and never really sure it was in it.

Acceleration is no more than OK at 9.4 seconds and certainly demonstrates little of the snappiness you’d expect from a Jag. The engine is also decidedly rattly at start-up, although the clamour does lessen once the temperatures heat up a bit.

On the road the handling is as pin-sharp as you’d expect from a premium brand, but the ride — largely thanks to the 20” alloys fitted to the tester — is on the jiggly side on anything other than a billiard table surface. And, as we all know, there’s very few of those here on our Emerald Isle, so life with the E-Pace is not always going to be as smooth as you might like.

The AWD system shuffles the power between the front and rear axles imperceptibly and a clever vectoring system sends all the rear axle torque to whichever wheel is deemed to need it most at any given time.

On the inside the E-Pace is a very nice place to be and there are some typically ‘Jag’ touches dotted around the cabin which will make you feel very happy about your decision to buy one.

Equipping levels too are exhaustively thorough and it is very hard to pick any holes in any aspect of this part of the car’s make-up.

It has an excellent infotainment system, which incorporates some very intuitive and driver-friendly touches. Far too often some of these things are actually a major — and dangerous — distraction, but that is most certainly not the case with this exceptionally well-thought-out design.

On the practicality front, the car lacks little and while it might appear to be targeted at young, single owners, couples with kids will not find themselves battling a car for storage space or seating flexibility.

This is a very nice car and while it might not be as good as some of the best in class, it is a capable first stab at the genre from the company.

One suspects, however, that the sellers will be those mid-range E-Pace models which do not carry the hefty price tag enjoyed by this week’s tester, nice and all as it is.