Background
Once, not so very long ago, swearing in public was deeply frowned upon. Society has changed a lot since the turn of the century. Now, the very worst words routinely pop up everywhere. Not just in film and TV, but even in the once sacrosanct medium of radio.
To escape the torrent of filth, listeners of a delicate constitution find themselves obliged to take refuge in established bastions of decency such as The Archers –and you suspect that it’s only a matter of time before even that script is sounding like a bad day at a Tourette’s conference.
In 2003, the F-word wasn’t quite as prevalent as it is now, which made the impact of Mitsubishi UK’s decision to call the first Evolution VIII the FQ-260 all the more shocking. Although nobody could quite believe it, the letters before the horsepower number were indeed intended to convey just how Blanking Quick it was.
260bhp will give you a thrill even now but it was a crazy number in 2003, especially in what was basically a family saloon. The secret of the VIII FQ-260’s gigglesome performance was not just in the turbocharged 2.0 litre four engine’s power – which in five-speed form is usually attributed with 270bhp rather than 260 – but also in the four-wheel drive system. This drivetrain combination has been firing rally drivers off the line at unholy rates of acceleration since the original Lancer Evolution of 1992. The rally Evo’s way of going about its business would later summed up by Finnish ace Tommi Makinen as ‘maximum attack’.
Evos had been trickling into the UK market for five years before our car was launched. The high water mark of these earlier Evos was arguably the epic and now hugely sought after Evo VI Tommi Makinen Edition which was rumoured to pack over 300bhp. The Evo VII of 2001 calmed things down a bit, being based on a new and slightly heavier platform. Although the addition of chassis electrickery kept the car front and centre in the performance saloon market, the subsequent Evo VIII of 2003 – the first of the FQ series – was a much more convincing car.
Anyone who has ever driven an Evo will testify to their extraordinary aura of bulletproof strength and reassurance. You get the impression that any liberties you take with the powertrain will be shrugged off with a casual ‘is that the best you’ve got?’ insouciance. The gearshift feels like it’s been carved out of solid billet, the engine is always eager to put serious power at your disposal, and the brilliant competition-honed AWD chassis has more than enough talent to transfer a big chunk of that power to the ground.
But an Evo VIII is much more than just a ripsnorting performance car. With five genuine seats, a remarkably usable boot space and extremely docile low-rpm manners, it truly is a car for all occasions and for all seasons. If anything can be described as a good compromise, the Evo VIII in particular can. It may not have been the fastest Evo ever, but nor did it have the most bone-shattering ride. It’s still pretty firm, but the reward for that is great handling.
