A pulchritudinous sun casts it gentle dawn rays across the badlands of Kettering and grasps but for one fleeting moment the soft curves of metal, enveloping them like a warm, gentle envelope and scampers like a cheeky spider over a chrome effect badge, picking out each letter as if it were a sniper picking off a target from a celestial bell tower. Singularly those letters mean nothing; together they spell out potency and promise: A G I L A.
I grip the Vauxhall badged fob in my feverish palm and deploy the button marked with the distinctive shape of an open padlock. Instantly the driver’s door unlocks with erectile urgency and soon I’m behind the wheel. The motor fires quickly, promptly, immediately and we’re under way. First impressions? Gearchange crisp as a bag of Walker’s cheese & onion crisps, clutch action soft as stepping on the face of a kitten. It feels good. The fluids take a few moments to warm like a watched pot gathering moss and then it’s time to see what she can really do. Run it to the red line, bang through the gearchanges, timed to perfection. In a straight line, a Fiat Panda wouldn’t know which direction it had gone.
Time to test her on the twisties. Turns in well, feels keyed to the road, feedback is like a focus group, firm but fair, the coiled springs soaking up the worst the road can throw at them like a well turned sponge in a bath of gravel. Go in hard, lift off the throttle and the tail steps out, but it’s as controllable as a well trained spaniel on a short lead in a fenced in garden with Barbara Woodhouse watching on. As soon as it gets sideways I gather it up with a well timed dab of oppo and I’m away.
What price driving pleasure to put a smile on your face as if you’ve slept with a coat hangar full of Ecstacy in your mouth? In this case, from £7595. The Vauxhall Agila is a bitch, and I spanked it.
Troy Queef is Executive Associate Editor-at-Large at Dab Of Oppo magazine
