/ 30 September 2005

Topless and still tasteful

"After taking a little while to figure out how the retractable steel roof works, I got into the new Opel Tigra TwinTop 1,8-litre Sport and was constantly surprised by how it handled itself. The exterior styling is very appealing, though the rear lights are unusually large and really do stand out in a crowd," writes Sukasha Singh.

The advert for the new Opel Tigra TwinTop was pulled off television after people complained about the ad being offensive and sexual.

From what I remember of the ad, I didn’t find it terribly offensive. Yes, it featured a few shots of women taking their tops off at concerts, but it also featured a child struggling to take his/her sweater off in a laundry room and a group of teenagers stripping down to their underwear before jumping into a swimming pool.

I’ve seen far worse adverts on TV, a case in point being the Good Hope Radio commercial featuring a sordid array of scantily clad women in sexual scenarios.

When people complained about the Good Hope advert, another was made featuring, among other things, unkempt greasy mechanics and the message was blatantly clear: women were only acceptable as anorexic sexpots whereas men of all shapes and sizes were perfectly acceptable.

It’s easy to get furious about such a tastelessly chauvinistic advert, but after watching it a few times, I realised that all it did was ensure that I would never listen to Good Hope Radio and in a way I’m thankful to them for whittling down the options.

Reaction to the Tigra ad shows that the motoring industry needs a drastic shake-up as women express their unhappiness about the overt exploitation of the female form.

Car manufacturers and car–specific publications, which continue to objectify women, clearly haven’t realised the extent to which female consumerism has grown in the past 10 years.

Simply put: more women are buying cars and women will not support brands that exploit women.

Another case in point is a recent local car magazine that features a cover picture taken through the legs of a woman in hotpants with two cars in the distance. Despite the crass image, I looked at the headlines and was even interested in the stories, but, on principal, I didn’t buy the magazine, because I (and many women) are interested in cars, not ill-conceived pictures of half-naked women.

That said, the Tigra advert, in my opinion, does not fall into the above category as there seemed to be a great deal of thought that went into ensuring that it didn’t follow this exploitative route and it succeeded in producing a fun advert about losing your inhibitions.

For me, the advert conveyed the fun factor of a drop-top car and I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of the time I spent with this sporty little performer, which won the Coupé/Cabriolet of the Year at last year’s Geneva Auto Show.

After taking a little while to figure out how the retractable steel roof works, I got into the new Opel Tigra TwinTop 1,8-litre Sport and was constantly surprised by how it handled itself.

The exterior styling is very appealing, though the rear lights are unusually large and really do stand out in a crowd.

The Tigra is smaller than other coupé cabriolets, some of which feature two additional, yet rather cramped, seats at the rear. The Tigra is 3,9m long, 1,9m wide, 1,4m high and boasts a drag coefficient of 0,34.

To talk about the practicality of such a car is pointless because it is aimed at singletons who don’t have to worry about where to put the baby seat and won’t be doing grocery shopping to the tune of R1 500 every month.

The Tigra does, however, offer an impressive amount of storage space for a vehicle in its class. With the roof up, the Tigra’s boot can accommodate 440 litres and with the roof down, there is still 250 litres of space. There is also a 70-litre storage area behind the seats.

The 1,8-litre Sport (which costs R233 880) utilises its 92kW of power in a very pleasingly athletic manner. The 1,4-litre Enjoy (at R199 500) produces 66kW of power.

The 1,8-litre is a racy little goer that’s a great deal of fun to drive and the five-speed manual gearbox makes for a very brisk performance.

In addition to the standard features, the 1,8-litre comes equipped with 16-inch alloy 205s, heated leather seats and aluminium pedals.

Both cars, which have a high specification level, feature Ecotec engines with Twinport fuel-saving tech-nology, electric windows, heated rear mirrors, four airbags, anti-lock brakes, electronic stability programme, fog lights, air-conditioning and height adjustable sports seats.

The interior features a simple layout that incorporates an MP3 CD player into the central console. It’s worth noting that the radio/CD player fits in a way that would discourage car radio thieves — there’s no clear indication of where it lies in the console, it just forms part of a whole that incorporates other dials and knobs.

The 1,8-litre Sport is claimed to reach 100kph in 9,4 seconds and is said to reach a top speed of 204kph.

Most importantly, the electro-hydraulic roof takes a mere 18 seconds to fold away and once that’s done, the possibilities for fun are endless.