Mercedes GL 63 AMG review, test drive

Longer stretches of ‘foot-down’ time need much more space, and luckily we find a few. Time to unleash AMG’s rumbling, snorting, fire-spitting physics experiment on wheels. I select Sport+ (yes, it has Sport+), pin the throttle and hold on as Bungalow No. 27 devours said long stretch in mere seconds, the blare and rumble of the exhausts adding to the drama. If you don’t pay attention, this massive SUV has the ability to take you to the wrong side of 200kph before you think it has got to 160kph. Here’s an SUV that thinks it’s a drag car.

How quick is it? The 0-100 comes up in just over five seconds, and by the time 18 seconds have elapsed, it’s knocking on the doors of 200. What’s also impressive is that stability around long corners is fantastic. The long wheelbase, wide stance and wide 300-section tyres give it masses of grip, and there’s almost no flip-flop or shifting around, even at really high speeds. The GL also has the ability to sit calmly on the road even with the speedo wound all the way around. And by calm, I mean calm – eerie calm. Seriously impressive.

So straight-line performance is fantastic for a car of this weight, and so is poise and grip. But how good can this car be in tighter stuff? We turn off the expressway and onto the sinuous Pali road. This recently surfaced road dips and bobs more than a bantamweight boxer and so, initially, I approach it with a fair amount of trepidation. Soon, however, I find myself attacking corners with more confidence. I start braking later and harder, and because the GL AMG has those active anti-roll bars, I find ‘leaning on it’ is not really a problem either. Of course, there’s no getting away from all that mass, especially when it comes to successive corners where you drive it with one part of your brain calculating the effect of all that mass moving around above and behind you, the brakes take a hammering too if you drive it hard for a considerable period of time,  performance does begin to tail off slightly. So while this is no Porsche Cayenne GTS, it surprisingly still is a fun car to drive hard.

Of the three modes, Comfort, Sport and Sport+, it’s obviously Comfort that is the most useable.

The big 21-inch wheels don’t help, but the ride is so acceptable, you don’t really notice. There are a few thuds over the bigger stuff, but otherwise, the ride of this long-wheelbase monster is impressive.

The GL 63 AMG is unique. It has seven full-sized seats, delivers real luxury, genuine performance, loads of fun and thoroughbred driving manners, all wrapped up in one imposing package. Yes, it costs Rs 1.6 crore (ex-showroom, Mumbai) and the running costs of the petrol V8 will be huge, but if you want to have your cake and eat it too, this is the SUV for you. It’s easy, really; there literally is no competition.