Clearly it was all me.
William Kelly
EV advocate. Petrolhead. Connect. I don't mind disagreement. It forces thinking. I happen to know a lot about aquaculture & am also a consultant in CSI project management. Part time scribbler in matters motoring & A/V.
It must have started when I wrote recently about the Raptor occuyping a unique space in SA Bakkie World right at the top of the food chain in terms of performance, sheer outright ride and suspension performance.
(As a heads up, for the rest of the world a Bakkie is a PickUp. Or 'Ute in Australianese.)
There is of course the Gladiator - the big bad ass Jeep that in an off road shootout might lose to the Raptor on washboard dirt roads and outright performance, but would probably tow a Raptor up a vertical cliff, pumping tunes completely naked and carrying bronze bodied sporty beach wear clad guys and gals as it does so.
The point being there is no comparison between the two and what that means on a practical level is that you would need to own both. I am sorry for the frightful inconvenience.
But happily it appears that Toyota reads my columns and equally apparently they cannot resist a challenge. Ergo they have done a quick tour of their garden shed and come up with some ideas from the shelves that they have crafted into the potentially disruptive Hilux GR-S III.
领英推荐
And so we are off to the races in the great game of SA Bakkie Top Trumps I suspect.
In truth I don't know yet because it hasn't actually been launched, but let's be honest. The rivalry between Ford and Toyota in the bakkie space is perhaps only very slightly overshadowed by that of the one between the All Blacks and the Bokke. Decades old, no quarter given or asked for, ruthless and absolutely the best possible thing for bakkie owners in SA, if not the rest of the world.
Forged from the local furnaces of competition these two brands can take their products anywhere globally and know that they have been proven in the great Saffer Testing Arena, the greatest on the planet. Just ask the All Blacks.
I'll know more in the coming weeks as to what the Toyota crew have under wraps - GR-S is not quite full strength GR undiluted but this is Toyota and so the anticipation for this latest unsheahing of a new weapon into the arsenal is eagerly anticipated by yours truly licking his chops, and I cannot wait to see what they have done. Watch this space. I know Ford will be.