Thriller ice

The ever-wise Peter Tomalin was very strict about stories like this: ‘Lots of fun for the journo, but the resulting article is rarely of much use or interest to the reader.’

Evo’s sage editor would say it every winter when the invites rolled in from manufacturers to go and experience an inappropriate car on a frozen lake. Consumer journalism up there with reviews of chocolate turbos. And yet the siren cry of the snow is painfully strong. And, yes, of course he was right, but boy was it worth it if you could come up with a ruse good enough to justify the column inches.

Sometimes a trip to Sweden for skids could be dressed up as an early prototype test for a forthcoming new car. Cue caveats and camouflage. Or you might be able to do an exposé on the life of a test driver and how they spend their winter months honing the minutiae of ESP under the magnifying lens of a low mu surface. All for a journalist to simply say that the end product is much more fun when you switch everything off.