A few reviews I have read say it is a crime to compare the new MINI with the Classic Mini, then most of them carry on doing just that throughout the entire report. Well being a classic Mini fan at heart, and knowing a few classic Mini colleagues who would love the chance to give the new MINI a good look over away from the glare of an eager salesman I just had to take a trip up to Manchester and the Peak District to put these two generations of Mini together on the roads for some fun.

Despite appalling weather which caused many ‘dramatic views’ to be lost in the fog completely in the Peak District, all involved had a good time (I think). The Classic Mini in the following scenes belongs John Baxendale, and goes by the name of TBag. A huge thank you to John Baxendale and family, Rob, Mel and Katy Kershaw, and Abi and Jessica Pobjoy for all your help with this.

Apart from having a great time chasing John around the Peak District in his MiniSport 90 bhp Mini 40 Ltd Edition, we also made a few observations. With the two cars together you could certainly see they were both Mini’s, but the differences do of course out weigh the overall familiarities. The new MINI was more than a match for the Mini’s handling, and to our surprise the 115 bhp MINI Cooper was faster off the mark, and overall than the tuned 90bhp Mini 40, which weighs a lot less than the new MINI. This is the last of our seven reports from the Week with MINI, but we also have video footage to follow which John is currently compressing, largely shot from the boot of Rob and family’s escort!