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Ducking and driving? Not any longer
The launch of BMW’s armoured 7-Series High Security model brought back a couple of memories.
The first one was of being shot at.
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Now I’m not trying to get some‘props’ (as I believe the young people say) for living in my south London‘hood. No, I just happen to have spent an afternoon operating the targets at a rifle range, back in my days as a teenaged air cadet.
Believe me, the sound of bullets whistling past and ricocheting about your head is not one you forget in a hurry.
The other memory was driving Mercedes-Benz’s armoured S-Class limo, the S-Guard, a few years ago in Stuttgart.
It was a pretty impressive car. Despite being nearly four tonnes in weight, the S-Guard drove just like the S-Class. It was quick and manoeuvrable, and coped easily with a coned handling course that had been set up for us to drive around. Until it was time to brake.
I found at the first corner that, although it felt just like an S-Class, the extra weight meant that you had to slam on the anchors earlier than normal. Cue the death of a few cones.
While I was there, I also got to see the car being built and, more excitingly, see the in-house sniper in a long basement room under the factory shooting random samples of the reinforced steel and glass used in its construction. Seeing high-calibre bullets shattering on contact with the metal was great fun, even if it was a little loud in there.
So if BMW’s standards are anything like its German rival’s– which they no doubt are– and I were in the market for a tank/limo hybrid, I’d be more than happy to relive that afternoon at the rifle range while sitting inside a 7-Series High Security .
I don’t think my air cadet uniform will fit me any more, though.
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