Start the engine, and immediately you know it’s a very different kind of burbling – revealing the special nature of the AMG V8 engine. Blip the throttle, and immediately the exhaust barks in response. Unfortunately, we were about to get into Jodhpur so there was no way I could speed up, but I did manage to hold my foot flat down briefly through first and second gears to the red line, and hurtle towards the crossing in front of me with a delicious exhaust note tailing behind. I’m happy to inform the CLS63 AMG stops very well indeed, thanks to the 6-piston calipers on 360mm discs in front and 4-piston calipers on 330mm discs at the rear – not surprisingly, the crossing came up quicker than expected, and I had to brake hard.

The rest of the drive to Khejarla was quiet. Darkness had fallen, as I negotiated traffic in Jodhpur with aplomb, the CLS63 AMG easily beating other cars in the scramble to fill gaps opening in the traffic. On the highway to Khejarla, I stayed at a steady 120kph all through. Although the headlights lit up the road ahead very well, there was no point in taking a risk and going faster. The Airmatic suspension with its self-leveling and anti-squat features eased out whatever few bends the highway had to offer, while the tyres, 255/35 R19 at front, and 285/30 R19 at the rear, mounted on special five-spoke AMG 19 inch rims did their bit.

As the roads to the Fort Khejarla hotel were too narrow and broken for the AMGs, outside Khejarla village, I had to hand the car back to Mercedes to be parked overnight – thus, ended my first taste of an AMG model. The CLS63 AMG is available as a CBU import at a cool Rs 1.40 Crore.



The pain of missing the SL drive had not gone away entirely, but I was feeling a bit better and resolved to do what I had never done before. On previous drives, I have deliberately NOT driven cars like the Maybach and S Class. I feel that doing so is to get a chauffeur’s experience, and not the owner’s experience. However, on the Fascination Drive, I was compelled to drive the S Class, simply because it was the AMG-modified version of the car, and, also, I had tasted a bit of AMG power – and, like Oliver Twist, I wanted more.

The S65 AMG costs Rupees 2.67 Crore, and is powered by a 6.0-litre V12 bi-turbo engine that develops a prodigious 612bhp at 4,800rpm and 1,000Nm of torque. That, with the help of an AMG sports exhaust system, gives it a 0-to-100km/h time of 4.4 seconds, and 0-200km/h in 13.3seconds, which is supercar standard performance. The power and torque is transmitted to the wheels via a 5-speed AMG SPEEDSHIFT automatic transmission. Standard features include Bi-Xenon (Active) headlamps, AIRMATIC suspension, distinctive AMG body styling with a special S65 front apron, and even a Harman Kardon Logic 7 surround-sound music system (who in his or her right mind would prefer music to the sound of that amazing biturbo V12?).

I approached the S65 AMG with mixed feelings – it is, after all, a luxury barge (length 5,206mm, width 1,872mm and height 1,473mm). Side on, the S65 AMG looks like any other S Class except that it appears to be a little lower and the wheel rims are very different. The front end styling, though, would be at home on a race track. The badging – V12 bi-turbo – gives an indication of what lurks under the bonnet. Would it be able to compensate for my missing the SL63 AMG? It was the last leg of the Fascination Drive, and I would be driving it to the finish at Manesar, before Gurgaon.



By the time it was my turn to drive, it was already twilight. This meant that I would only have a few minutes of driving in good light to find out what the S65 AMG could do. There is also the fact that as you get closer to Delhi, inbound truck traffic increases so the chances of getting a clear road ahead diminish. However, I had not factored in the power and torque of the bi-turbo unit, and the traffic turned out to be a blessing in disguise. As I started playing that familiar game of zipping in and out of the truck convoys, the huge car seemed to have shrunk in size, a la ‘Honey, I Shrunk the Kids.’ Darting in and out of gaps between trucks, which I would be scared to put a little Matiz through, became huge yawning chasms for the S65 AMG. Just tap on the accelerator to send you surging forward with a corresponding growl from the twin-exhausts, and though twice I thought I had bitten off a bit more than I could chew, the superb handling and steering response sorted things out in my favour. The power delivery never failed, the kick in the back was a rush, and I was actually enjoying driving an S Class!

Somebody up there must like me, and took pity on me, for just as I was despairing of finding an open stretch, all of a sudden, the road opened up in front of me – no traffic, nothing whatsoever. Mashing the pedal to the floor, the SPEEDSHIFT box responded instantly, as the growl behind me grew louder exponentially, and the speedometer needle went swinging around the face to touch 200km/h – effortlessly. The S65 AMG seemed to have more in reserve for, even at that speed, the car was rock solid as it arrowed its way forward. Unfortunately, knowing that it would take just one human, animal, or tractor ahead to dart across without warning to upset everything, I eased off, satisfied with the knowledge that I had got a taste of what an AMG-modified Merc can do.

As the Fascination Drive came to an end, and I had handed the S65 AMG back to Mercedes (albeit a little reluctantly), my thoughts returned to wondering what the SL would have been like. Now that I’ve had a taste of Herr Aufrecht’s and Melcher’s handiwork, I want more.