I had assumed “Genesis” was one of those offshoot brands, like Saturn, that General Motors dreams up in its forward strategy outreach deep-dive seminars. Why Genesis? Because Pink Floyd had their name fully legalled and Yes sounded weird. I was wrong, though. Genesis is actually a South Korean invention, created by Hyundai to do what Lexus did for Toyota. And now, after some modifications, it’s on sale in the UK and Australia.
I tried the four-wheel-drive GV80 2.5T and it was immediately obvious what Hyundai has done. They’ve built a machine that looks very Bentlish, with lots of chrome on the outside and lots of soft leather on the inside, and they’re hoping that this aesthetic and tactile double-whammy, along with the new name, will be enough to drag executives out of their Audis and Volvos and BMWs and Mercedes.
Don’t mock. Sure, Nissan failed miserably to pull off a similar trick with its Infiniti brand but at a cost of just eleventy trillion dollars, Toyota did make it work with Lexus. And Hyundai is on a roll at the moment. Some of their ordinary cars are extremely good and the hot N versions are absolutely brilliant. The new GV80, though, isn’t. It’s a terrible car.
Even in “comfort” mode, this car rides like a light aircraft in a tropical thunderstorm, heaving and crashing and lurching on even smooth bits of tarmac. It’s not the most uncomfortable car I’ve ever driven because I’ve driven a Nissan GT-R Nismo, but it’s close. Certainly, I’d keep a few sick bags in the glovebox, because if you have passengers on board, you’re going to need them.
And to make matters worse it’s fitted with all the usual electronic claptrap designed to make sure you stay both on the road and legal. The idea – and this isn’t new – is that it reads the white lines along the road ahead and if it thinks you’re straying into the wrong lane it’ll take control of the steering. In other cars it’s a mild intervention and consequently it’s only mildly annoying. But in the GV80 it’s like Tyson Fury is on the other side of the steering column. And it drove me up the wall.
On a narrowish country road it is nigh on impossible not to go near the grass verge or the white line, so Tyson is wrenching the wheel this way and that, and you’re being bounced around by the mad suspension and then, every time you break the speed limit by so much as 2km/h, a vivid red warning light flashes in a head-up display on the windscreen. So, I was doing 82km/h on a road I know well, and it felt like I was taking part in a display with the Red Arrows. Exhausting doesn’t even begin to cover it.
After a little while I had to do something, I’ve never done before: pull over, find my specs, and spend some time working out how all the electric health and safety could be turned off. There was nothing to be done about the turbulent suspension, but eventually I shut down the speed warnings and the dashboard-mounted Tyson Fury. Which meant I completed the journey to my destination in a car that was simply horrible, rather than completely unbearable.
Half an hour later, though, I set off on the journey home and couldn’t believe it. The car had turned all the safety features back on. Have you ever heard a cow after its calf has been taken away? It’s the sound of misery and despair, and it’s the exact noise I made when the steering wheel started fighting me again.
I suppose at this point I should tell you about the rear-facing cameras that feed an image to the dash of what’s alongside the car when you turn on the indicators. I think on balance I’d rather have a Volvo and use my mirrors. I trust mirrors. Apart from the one in my bathroom, which lies every morning.
The problem is Hyundai is trying to do something it’s not really equipped to do. A company like this trying to make an Audi-type luxury car is like McDonald’s trying to make a gourmet dinner or me deciding to write about classical music or Ferrari trying to sell hats. Actually, scratch that. Ferrari does sell hats.
- GENESIS GV80 2.5T
- ENGINE: 2.5-litre four-cylinder turbo petrol (224kW / 422Nm). Average fuel 10.4 litres per 100km
- TRANSMISSION: Eight-speed automatic, all-wheel drive
- PRICE: From $95,600 (2.5T AWD)
- RATING: ★
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