No matter how many times you experience the low-down pulling power of a high-torque turbodiesel, there is still something spooky about being able to summon so much acceleration with so few revs on board.
This is the defining factor in the 730d’s extraordinary performance repertoire; you put your foot down at anything above 1500rpm and within an instant you are already accelerating hard towards the horizon, the turbodiesel engine all but inaudible above the gentle rush of the wind and the increasingly loud rumble from the tyres.
How fast the 730d feels depends largely on how long you keep the fly-by-wire throttle pinned, and how wide you open it in the first place. Ultimately you can propel the car from 0-60mph in 6.9sec and from 0-100mph in 17.7sec – about the same as a Golf GTI at maximum attack, in other words.
What also adds to the effect is the excellent relationship the diesel engine shares with the six-speed automatic gearbox. Left in Drive and with the dampers, throttle mapping and gearchange modes in Regular, the transmission seems to find the perfect gear for every occasion, even if it does hang on to a gear too low occasionally in Sport.
There is little wrong with the way the 730d stops, either, thanks to its fine all-round ventilated disc braking system (348mm at the front, 345mm rear). The main problem is that the Seven doesn’t quite know what it wants to be on the road – ultra-luxurious cruiser or surprisingly sporty big saloon – and in the event it ends up being neither.
On most surfaces the ride comfort is almost very good, even if it is oddly unresolved over lumpier town roads.
But the real issues emerge when you drive it a little faster across undulating single-carriageway roads, and that’s when the Seven feels curiously misguided in its demeanour. In short, it feels too big, too heavy and not especially well controlled at the front in such circumstances.
