Maruti Suzuki Vitara Brezza – evo fleet

Relative to the cars we usually drive to bring together the feature stories we do every month, the evo India fleet is a fairly humble set of cars. And we often fail to appreciate the convenience these cars give us with all the exotics you see in the earlier pages of this magazine. Just two months ago, we pulled off an epic photoshoot with eleven convertibles, something you haven’t seen in an Indian automotive magazine ever. I drove to the shoot location in the Brezza, drove back home in it, and believe me, I was happy doing that after a great day at work. I would have loved to drive the 911 back home too, but after a long day, waking up before the sun rises and getting back after it sets, you want something simple and easy. It gives a sense of calm after all the adrenaline.

Talking of calm, a couple of weeks later, I drove a big 4×4 to Rajasthan for the adventure of a lifetime (wonder if I repeat this often at evo India), went dune bashing, drove 2800km over 4 days, camped in the wild and crossed rivers. But it was also exhausting driving the big beast. Getting into the Brezza felt like a free upgrade to business class, where the steering wheel turned with very little effort, the pedals worked without lifting and placing my feet like in a Sunny Deol dance move and the relative lack of weight felt like driving a go-kart after a bus. I know I’m supposed to be a little objective, but when you drive these many cars, everything is relative to each other till we begin to write a review.

The Brezza has seen a lot of good times in the eleven months it has been with us. I’ve driven it to Coorg for a vacation with friends, my colleague Rohit has driven it on the Golden Quadrilateral as a support car for the Benelli 302 prototype G-Quad story, it has made it to Mumbai countless times for events, personal trips for me or someone in the team and otherwise, when the Brezza isn’t seen crossing toll booths on highways, it’s hustling in the city. We have clocked over 25,000km in it, in all its time with us and it has struck that balance of city and highway driving like Maruti intended it to achieve. Besides the tight interiors (this, after all, is under 4 metres in length) I have no complaints about it as its term comes to an end. Most of all, it has been an awesome car to take my dog for joy rides in. He loves the back seat and enjoys long drives so every week I’ve taken the Brezza and Oscar, my golden retriever, for at least an hour-long drive. Maybe more than me, he will miss this SUV.

Date acquired: April 2016
Duration of test: 11 months
Total mileage: 25,256km
Mileage this month: 2050km
Overall kmpl: 15.4kmpl
Costs this month: Nil