Not all off-road courses on press drives are created equal. Depending on the intent of the program — a lifestyle program versus an automotive media program — and how capable the vehicle actually is, sometimes you’ll get a taste of rough terrain, and others you’ll be plated a 14-course tasting menu of mud, ruts, and boulders. Lined up at the famed Biltmore Estate in Asheville North Carolina, it seemed we were teeing up for the latter.
Chatting with our hosts/drive instructors, many of which coming from a variety of military vehicle training backgrounds, we were given a brief lay of the land. Being one of three Land Rover Experience centres in North America, and of several more around the globe, the driving course on the expansive property was built with the intent of blowing its competitors out of the water in that quintessential American “go big or go home” sort of way. The Defender 130 Outbound is no slouch in the all-terrain department, and in a sense also abides by that mighty American slogan.
As we noted in our initial coverage of the 130 Outbound, the longer-bodied unit ditches its third row seats, granting adventurers more cargo capacity to pack up for bigger and more boundary-pushing adventures. That didn’t give us any sort of advantage for the terrain ahead, mind you. Driving the longer 130 simply meant we had to be even more to be mindful of as we navigated our way around the extensive trail circuits. Credit where credit is due — despite the several steep climbs, loose terrain, and various bits of three-wheeled acrobatics — having instructors on hand to sight us through the program made life far easier than expected for a relatively unexperienced pack of off-roaders.
As expected, the vehicles seldom found themselves struggling; a light slip of the wheel here and sidestep there was as close as we ever came to not being able to push forward. This is especially impressive considering the diversity of surfaces found in the Biltmore’s backwoods circuit. We expected plenty of dirt and mud, however the program also offered up some unique climbs over loose rock, gravel, solid bedrock, and even a few sandy stretches just to make life interesting. Shy of a snowstorm or open sand dune, we tackled just about every bit of track one would expect when doing proper overlanding.
Much as the Defender is tough-as-nails from a hardware standpoint, its Terrain Response system was a real shining star in this experience. Those with years of hardcore off-road experience can manage their way through the rough stuff with throttle and locking differentials alone, but the reality of the matter is that most Defender buyers won’t necessarily be so seasoned, and the way the brand has adapted each mode makes a significant difference from one surface to the next.
We make no bones about the fact that we’re all Defender fans on team SHARP, and the more variants that come to market, the broader the refined brute’s reach becomes. We’ve already provided you our favourite build spec this past fall, but personally, the added cargo room and deleted third row moves the Defender 130 Outbound a little further up on my personal list — not just because of the fun I had crawling it along on three wheels…
The post SHARP Drives: The Defender 130 Outbound Goes Proper Off-Roading appeared first on Sharp Magazine.
