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COOLING OFF?

The Honda S2000 has spent nine years in the cool camp but after a couple of facelifts and taming that wayward rear end has time caught up with it and will bigger rivals steal its sunshine?

No way, the Honda S2000 still has cult appeal and there is little in the way of direct competitors who can beat the rush it gives you when driven all out! Just remember back to those days when you were in the Porsche showroom every day, slipping 50 competition forms with your name on it in to the box and still you didn’t win one? And then you read an article on this new Japanese roadster which was just as quick and you didn`t have to contemplate anything illegal to get it. Yep it was quite a novelty to own a car that looked so inviting, revved past 8000rpm and was capable of terrifying you on track. It also was sturdy enough to last and easy to handle at slower speeds.

But nobody ever bought an S2000 to drive everywhere like Miss Daisy, they bought it because it was wild – sometimes too wild! Even the most experienced drivers had a job trying to get its back-end in line with the front. However it was so tactile, reliable and explosive that you always wanted to go back for more. Then when the suspension was upgraded you got a heads up when the rear section was about to break loose. Well there’s been yet more adjustments made to the chassis for 2008 and what better place to try them out than at Brand Hatches’ Race circuit.

The noise is the first thing that ripples through you; just 2.0-litres but it’s ripe aggression. There’s a real sheerness about being inside the cabin too, it’s like having little more between your skin and the road than a condom. Sliding controllably around corners as only a rear wheel drive sports car would, it switches direction and snatches back the road with complete ease. With enough patience each axel shadows each other with the type of intensity that Tom Cruise homed in on Katie with. The pedals warrant a certain amount of feathering, their delicacy allowing you to punch in exactly the right depth. The gears too flow easily through each sequence but are sturdy enough to take your heavy-handedness. There’s also a new optional stability system (VSA) which takes raging emotions out the picture when trying to straighten the wheels.

For 2008 the Roadster not only gets the Type S suspension as standard but also unique headrests and alloys as well as a new colour scheme. I bet you didn’t notice the visuals though; neither did we. And with sales lagging well behind last year, perhaps Honda could have wowed us with some new DNA rather like Audi did with their new TT. What you have got though is a GT version with an upmarket detachable hardtop. It will cost you an extra £550 but you will get to make eye contact with any female fans. The downside is you’ll have to iron your shirt and stop picking your nose at the lights.
There’s an obvious compromise in space when using it as an everyday run around and because it needs to attack a race circuit with as tense approach as possible, the ride over poor road surfaces could haplessly worsen a migraine. Forget buying your Wildbean Café pick-me-up’s too as your left hand will be too busy changing up and down gears. For £28K you’d also expect more feely plastics and the dash could do with a little modernisation too.

Would you really buy one new when second-hand models look nearly identical and are still going strong? Well put like that probably not but judging on how it’s evolved dynamically the 2008 model is a proud example of Japanese fettling. If rumours are to be believed, there’s plenty more adaptations in the pipeline and Honda are far from calling off the party!