What is it?

Skoda’s chunky new family-friendly (and evo-friendly) off-roader, the Yeti. Prices start at £13,725 and our 1.8 TSI Elegance weighs in at £20,810.

Technical highlights?

This one has 4wd (not all of them do), but the highlight is actually the engine. The 1.8-litre turbo petrol is smoothly punchy and as with all direct injection engines, supplies good low down torque. It’s economical, hums contentedly when revved and generates more speed than you expect.

What’s it like to drive?

We guarantee it’s way better than you expect – in fact we’d go so far as to claim the Yeti is genuinely enjoyable to drive. You hurl it at corners expecting the relaxed long travel suspension to sag, droop and wallow, but instead the Yeti barrels in nose high, body level, wheels working evenly. It carries speed through corners, has a neutral handling balance, a remarkably stiff frame and deeply impressive damping – this is a family car that feels expensively engineered by people who really know what they’re doing. It even flies well.

So you barrel along roads with a smile on your face, gaining real satisfaction from chasing down GTIs or nailing the perfect line through that tricky late-apex roundabout on the way to your daughter’s gym class. There’s a well-judged chunkiness to the Yeti; it comes across as self-assured yet companionable, confident in its role and comfortable in its skin.

How does it compare?

It’s hard to know what its rivals are. It picks up the baton the Nissan Qashqai started running with and accurately treads the dividing line between SUV and MPV. 

Anything else I need to know?

It’s also quite practical – which, let’s face it, is the Yeti’s primary purpose. The rear seats fold, tumble and remove, the boot’s decent enough, the cabin’s well built and it cruises easily. A Mondeo estate is probably bigger and the Yeti can’t seat seven, but somehow that doesn’t matter. The Yeti is a joyful car.