#BrownCarGuy – News, Views & Reviews!
Some car events are about shiny bodywork and concours polish. Others are about dyno runs, burnouts and drifting lunacy. And then there’s the Enfield Pageant of Motoring – a gloriously eccentric celebration of British car culture at its most charming, cosmoplitan and utterly captivating.
Think the Nissan Micra is a sensible little supermini for your nan? Think again. Because this one… this one is utterly mad. I’m talking about the Nissan Micra 350SR – a rare, rear-wheel drive, mid-engined Micra, powered by a V6 and tuned up with 350Z bits to produce a whopping 300bhp. I remember when it was first unleashed 23 years ago as a mad marketing exercise by Nissan. Never thought that one day I would have a go in it – well, a passenger ride to be precise – at Millbrook Proving Ground during the 2025 SMMT Test Day. And yes, it was just as unhinged as it sounds.
I’ve just returned from Brussels where I got an exclusive early look at the all-new 2026 Lexus ES, and let me tell you – it’s a quite a game-changer for the famed Toyota luxury marque. This isn’t just a facelift or mild refresh. No, this is a complete reinvention of the ES saloon. Sleeker, smarter, and now electrified; both hybrid and fully electric for the first time ever.
The world’s best-selling SUV has just had a serious upgrade. I was at an exclusive Toyota preview event in Brussels to get my hands (and camera) on the brand-new 2026 Toyota RAV4 GR Sport, and let me tell you, this is a whole new beast. Yes, the sixth-generation RAV4 has officially made its global debut, and it’s not holding back. Toyota’s taken everything that made the RAV4 a suburban legend – and added more power, more tech, and a whole lot more attitude.
There are many questions in life for which we have thus far failed to find a satisfactory answer. For example: why does toast always land butter-side down? Or what precisely is the purpose of a rubber chicken? And most pertinently on this occasion, what happens when you take a classic Fiat 500 – a car only marginally larger than a ripe melon – and stuff it full of EV batteries and magnets instead of a noisy two-pot and Italian expletives?
This compact 2025 BMW M235i xDrive Gran Coupe has more horsepower than the 1992 E36 BMW M3. So does that make it a bona fide junior ‘M’ car? With the keys to the turbocharged four-door in my hands and the Hill Route at the Millbrook Proving Ground beckoning, there is only one way to find out!
Sometimes a car doesn’t need to scream to make a statement. It just needs to show up with a cheeky grin, a bit of charm, and enough clever thinking to stand out in a sea of lookalike electric boxes.
Sometimes the news hits you with something so utterly ridiculous, so mind-meltingly daft, you can’t ignore it. So here we are. Hold onto your steering wheels. Because apparently, 20mph wasn’t slow enough – now they want to cut urban speed limits to 10mph. Yes, TEN. And no, check the date below, this is not an April Fool’s Day post.
Once a year, something quite magical happens. An event so uniquely brilliant that if you’re a proper car nut and a seasoned motoring journo and content creator, like yours truly, you mark the date months in advance and count down the sleeps. I’m talking about the SMMT Media Test Day – the Glastonbury of car journalism, if you will – held at the legendary Millbrook Proving Ground.
Some speeches are polite, PR-friendly affairs filled with vague optimism and corporate buzzwords. Not this one. Mike Hawes, Chief Executive of the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), came out swinging at SMMT Test Day 2025 with what felt more like a rallying cry for survival than a standard industry update. “The industry faces an existential threat,” Hawes warned. And if that sounds dramatic — well, good. It should. Because the message he delivered was clear: the UK automotive sector is on a cliff edge, and we’re running out of road fast.
