2020 Lotus Evora GT Drive Review: Driving Purity
Lotus Evora GT sees more power, more downforce and added lightness for 2020.
Owning a Lotus puts one in an exclusive club. This is especially true in the United States, where Lotus vehicles are an extraordinarily uncommon sight. Even in car-crazed Southern California, where sports cars like the Mazda Miata were born, and where every landlord, dentist and doctor drives a Porsche 911, or Chevrolet Corvette, spotting a Lotus in the wild causes something of a spectacle.
Of course, this all begins to make sense once you factor in some numbers. If you want to buy that Miata, there are “about 600” Mazda dealerships from which to do so. Want that 911, or new Cayman GT4? No problem, as I am sure that one of Porsche’s 189 dealerships would be glad to take your order. And, the Corvette, which is “America’s Sports Car,” should be the easiest of the bunch to attain. After all, there are “approximately” 3,000 Chevrolet dealerships across the country. Meanwhile, there are just 36 Lotus dealerships in the United States. Yes, thirty-six.
This perhaps at least partially explains why the brand managed to move just 228 examples of the 2019 Evora sports car last year. Now, as an industry expert, I can confidently say that 228 is best described as “not much,” even for a low volume boutique car manufacturer, like Lotus.
However, Lotus is hoping to turn that around and the $96,600 2020 Evora GT is a big part of that strategy. The end goal is to sell enough Evoras to recuperate the enormous development costs of their forthcoming, 2000 horsepower Evija hypercar. And thanks to a large infusion of cash from the brand’s corporate overlords at Geely, Lotus has been able to bestow Evora with the sort of tuning tweaks one would expect from the legendary motorsports-focused brand.
For 2020, power rises from 400 horsepower to 416. Downforce is increased, to a claimed 140 pounds at it’s 188 MPH top speed. And, crucially for a Lotus product, lightness has been added. If every pricey options box is ticked, the entire front clip is made of carbon fiber. The roof panel can be made from the ultra-lightweight, ultra-rigid material, as well as the rear hatch assembly. A new titanium exhaust system is also available, for even more lightness, and a sharper exhaust note. All-in, Lotus claims this Evora GT offers a theoretical $12,000 price advantage over the outgoing 2019 Evora 400, which cost $94,400, thanks to the clever engineering and additional carbon fiber goodness.
On the road, the Evora feels nimble and agile, more so, even, than its claimed 3,178 pound curb weight would suggest. The test car has the 6-speed manual transmission, and it is a delight. Sure, a 6-speed automatic is also available, but opting for it would be doing yourself a disservice. This at-all-speeds agility is thanks to the Toyota-sourced 3.5-liter V6 engine, which is force-fed boosty goodness from an Edelbrock supercharger. The Evora will happily hurtle you down the road at any RPM above idle and below its 7,000 RPM limit.
It sounds good, too. Despite Lotus being known as a minimalist sports car brand, Evora GT features four different driving modes, Drive, Sport, Race and Off, that adjust the power delivery, throttle mapping, stability control and the bi-modal exhaust system. Much like the mandatory manual box, leaving the exhaust button switched “on” is a requisite of the Evora GT experience. The titanium pipes offer a choice, raspy and determined soundtrack to the Evora. It’s the sort of sound that urges the driver to push just that little bit harder between corners.
Of course, it’s in the corners that the Lotus shines brightly. Unlike its Porsche Cayman GT4 contemporary, the Evora features double wishbone suspension, front and rear. Those aluminum suspension arms, which are bolted up to aluminum subframes, gain negative camber under compression. This keeps the tire’s contact patch firmly planted into the pavement. It’s all very confidence-inspiring in a way that most would not believe possible from a 416 horsepower, mid-engine anything.
Though, that confidence also comes from the rest of the Evora GT’s sporting hardware. It rolls on 19-inch wheels up front and 20’s out back, which are shod in Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 rubber, sized 245/35 and 295/30, respectively. Behind those big rollers are a set of shiny yellow AP Racing calipers, which clamp down on massive two-piece rotors. With “big brake kits” on both ends of the Evora GT, and enough tire grip to match, this car will never be short on braking performance.
The mechanicals of the Evora GT work together beautifully and instill much driver confidence, however, the interior has some catching up to do. I am not expecting a Bentley-esque cabin from this hand-built British sports car, but the Evora has some weak spots.
The materials, overall, are excellent, with an alluring blend of leather, alcantara and exterior color-matched trim stitching. Likewise, the steering wheel, made from titanium, and also clad in alcantara, is perfectly positioned and sized for driving and drivers of all sizes. However, the pedals are all offset notably to the right in the very narrow footwell. For perspective, the Evora’s clutch is where you would expect the brake pedal to be. This creates the occasional disconnect from the driving experience as you remind yourself to double check your footing before you depress the wrong pedal and cause havoc. That’s a miss. Fortunately, the shifter is an excellent item to operate, and the action of the pedals themselves is wonderful, each brimming with communication and a subtle buzziness from lightweight carbon fiber body. Lastly, the head unit is a generic Alpine unit, that looks about 10 years behind everything else on sale today. Set your radio station, and then try to forget that it’s there.
All of this has me thinking about the aforementioned Porsche Cayman GT4. It is, of course, Porsche’s high performance mid-engine sports car, and clearly Lotus’ benchmark and sales target. The Lotus undercuts the base of the GT4 by about $3,000, and similarly undercuts it’s 0-60 time by two-tenths (3.8 for the Lotus, 4.0 for the Porsche). The Evora rather cheekily produces two (2) more horsepower than the GT4 and has it tied in the top speed run to 188 MPH. Interestingly, I specced a GT4 on Porsche’s website with as many comparable niceties as this Evora test car had and the prices continued to be within a few grand of one another. Talk about a close match-up.
I can forgive many of the Evora’s quirks, because, on the whole, it all seemed excellently put together, and is clearly built by people who care deeply about it. However, this test case, after all of the options are added in, costs $129,595, which is a lot, actually, make that a ton of money. Though, as mentioned, it’s on the money with it’s Cayman GT4 rival. The Evora GT is lighter, and harder-edged. I appreciate that Lotus has managed to both continually refine the Evora, and not lose the rawness that the brand heritage was built upon, because there are few experiences on Earth as delightful and exciting as wringing out the Evora GT on a winding road.
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