THERE'S nothing like a long haul to check a car out - and when it's as good as the BMW 120d, the trip is a joy.

I took it on a 400 mile round trip to North Wales and it handled the whole with consummate ease.

It was very quick when necessary, quiet and refined the whole time and I did the journey faster than I have ever managed it before without really trying.

The five door ‘1' left plenty of space for us and all our stuff and we were hugely comfortable the whole way - returning on different roads with poorer surfaces.

The handling and road holding were sublime, the steering perfectly weighted and all the controls brilliant, bar one.

That one is the i-Drive for controlling the sat nav, stereo etc. In these days of excellent touch screens, this is an anachronism.

It is difficult to use whereas a touch screen is immediately intuitive. Come on BMW, it's not often I ask you to move with the times.

The front seats are brilliant, with excellent adjustment for all sizes, but with a six footer driving there is no rear legroom at all. And the boot is also fairly small - albeit with split folding rear seat.

Equipment in M-Sport spec is excellent, emissions are very low and fuel consumption of a real 45mpg is superb, even if it's a long way off the official figure.