As Jaguar transitions its sole focus towards fully-electric vehicles, the final, V8-powered F-Pace SVR reminds us of why we fell in love with the brand in the first place.
First things first, let’s get the obvious objections out of the way: if you’re concerned about fuel economy, affordable maintenance, and road noise, the Jaguar F-Pace SVR is absolutely not the right car for you. The F-Pace SVR is brash, deafeningly loud, crudely offensive, and borderline anti-social, but for some people–the right people–its imperfect attributes are precisely what make Jaguar’s super-SUV so uniquely captivating.
An uncommon occurrence for a brand-new car of our current era, the Jaguar F-Pace SVR has a distinct character like no other. You either harbor a deep, unrelenting adoration for supercharged, V8-powered Jaguars, or you utterly despise their sheer crudeness–there is no in-between. That unapologetic nature of Jaguar’s most exciting offerings is what loyalists of the brands have always cherished. In a sort of “if you know, you know” fashion, Jaguar has long appealed only to those buyers who truly appreciated the brand’s relative insanity–its emotional appeal. The F-Pace SVR (along with the recently-discontinued F-Type), resembles the last remnants of a Jaguar that now, to the detriment of long-time fans and many loyal buyers, no longer exists.
The soul of a Jaguar SVR is irreplaceable and inimitable
Now that Jaguar has announced its intention of discontinuing its entire lineup in favor of pricey, fully electric passenger cars, I grip the textured-leather steering wheel of the F-Pace SVR even tighter than I used to. I know that as I pack on the miles, slamming through its gears and listening to the raucous growl of its active exhaust system, there’s nothing left out there that could ever replace its soul when the lease ends and it has to go.
That’s something that a lot of people fail to understand about cars these days–we used to laud vehicles that felt innately human, for better or for worse, because that humanity allowed us to form bonds and relationships with our cars that not only imprinted memories of driving them into our minds, but also memories of life itself that occurred during our ownership of those cars. Like the nostalgic scent of an old school hallway’s carpeting or the distinct taste of grandma’s baking that you haven’t experienced in decades, the sound and feel of a V8-powered Jaguar transports your mind to a better place–an ancient time–that can no longer be accessed in the physical world.