Power play

Dislike grey imports? Rs 1.71 crore can get you an officially imported SL 63 AMG. Game?

AMG is short for Armageddon. Actually it is not, but it is very close. Back in 1967, Werner Aufrecht and Eberhard Melcher decided to get together and supply go-fast bits for Mercedes-Benz cars and donated the A and M of AMG. ‘G’ came from Grossaspach, the birthplace of Aufrecht. We have no idea whether Melcher was disappointed at the fact that his birthplace finds no mention in the name of the company they started. But what we do know is that AMG, when roughly translated in many languages, reads “kick-ass” and the cars bearing the said letters can expose bad drivers pretty easily.

 

The fact that I am writing this story means that I am not, ahem, a bad driver since I managed to drive three of AMG’s finest between Jaisalmer and New Delhi and survived to tell the tale. Sure, there were a few seconds of panic, late and entirely missed braking points and a sense of euphoria that comes only when you know that you are still alive… but I can explain all that.

It is not every day that you wake up in a tent and start driving a piece of kit that politely dishes out 612 hp (not a mistake that, 6-1-2... you read right!) even before your breakfast has reached the small intestine. The S65 AMG looks more like a Victorian mansion than your average sportscar. And if you get your kicks reading torque figures, 100-plus kgm has a ring to it, right? Luckily for me, I was part of a convoy that was being led by someone who knew that following him was a poor motoring journo struggling with a two-and-half tonne motorcar with enough propulsion power to haul 20-odd goods bogies.

It may have seating for four, four doors and everything that an S-Class is supposed to give you, but that twelve-cylinder powerplant, you soon realise, just jumped over the walls of a lunatic asylum for internal combustion engines. I was doing 100 kph runs between corners in 4.4 seconds as unsuspecting desert dwellers looked skywards thinking they heard a thunderstorm. Overkill? Yes. I don't really get the point — you normally get chauffeured around in S-Class Mercs, but in this AMG version, you either drive it or experience what pineapple slices go through in a blender when someone is having tremendous fun behind the wheel. Mothers are supposed to be benign and this one is anything but.

Ditto the CLS 63 AMG — the four-door coupe with AMG oomph. In case you are interested, Anil Ambani was one of the first customers of the CLS in India. Every other car maker and their designers laughed at the CLS and labelled it the “banana Merc” before being asked by their respective board of directors to go back to the drawing board and build their own interpretation. Now everyone from BMW to Audi and even Porsche and Lamborghini have a four-door coupe being built or being considered.

The CLS has limited headroom at the back but the AMG version is as much about headroom as Mahatma Gandhi was about SAMs. It is about stupendous power (514 bhp and 64 kgm) and recession inducing acceleration (0-100 kph in 4.5 seconds again). You can’t but marvel at its ability to soak up the roads and still behave like a sportscar when the need arises (read when the driver starts playing chicken). I drove it on the rather peaceful Jaipur-New Delhi highway where truckers try their bit to block your road by driving three abreast or try to ram your belly by changing three lanes at one go. I repeatedly read “Horn OK Please” written in reflective tape at dangerously close quarters before retiring to a more sedate pace. But again, nothing can be taken away from the special group of engineers from Stuttgart — the CLS has the room, has the go and has the stopping power to match. It needs good owners who drive rather than are driven. And then there is the minor matter of shelling out Rs 1.4 crore (how it sounds oh-so-cheap next to the S65’s Rs 2.67 crore!).

The third AMG car that was part of the ‘Fascination Mercedes’ drive was the real article — the SL 63 AMG. In short, a “pukka” sportscar with that mental V8 capable of 525 bhp and 64 kgm of torque. A proper car with serious history to live up to rather than the expectations of the bloke who spent Rs 1.71 crore on it! It is a strict two-seater and since my requests for a pretty lady wearing a polka-dot scarf never got much attention, I decided to get along with the appointed driver/caretaker who emitted a rather dismissive chuckle through paan-stained teeth every time I floored the SL.

My luck! I got on with the job — dropped the top (twenty-odd seconds of fun as it draws a crowd with uniform dropped-jaws) and hammered the throttle for whatever it was worth. The SL can behave like a German-made magic carpet or a slightly obese go-kart — depending on the way you want things. Since cruising with the wind in my hair (hair?) or a polite conversation with the lady in the scarf was not possible, I decided to go completely bald and deaf at one go.

This car can be bought for the sound track from the exhaust as much as its ability to briskly cross continents. The brand new seven-speed gearbox is the closest Mercedes could get to a dual-clutch format its rivals are seeking, without adding weight. This automatic box can be set in different modes ranging from comfort (standard) to fully manual. Once you get the hang of things, keeping the gearbox setting in the sport mode ensures that you are apex hunting without losing revs. Alright, I said that for effect — you slot it in any mode and there is enough power and performance to scare you silly, period. Seriously, it is not just enough to buy this car — you need to go through a driver training programme to get the best out of her. Or stick to scarves and cruising. In case you are wondering, the car is restricted — like other AMGs and powerful Mercedes-Benz models — to 250 kph and it can crack 100 kph in 4.6 seconds despite the weight of that trick electric roof.

So if you are in the league, it is the SL 63 AMG that you need to buy to grace your garage. Chances are that you will have an S-Class and other cars for other “transport” duties. This SL is about involvement and commitment... Bah, it is all about selfish, greedy pursuits as intended by a couple of characters who set up shop at Grossaspach! Buy one and don’t let Greenpeace know.