Land Rover launched the new Defender V8 a couple of weeks ago, and it is already said to be working on a hardcore variant of the off-roader. This new version is tipped to come from Jaguar Land Rover’s Special Vehicle Operations unit and while stopping short of confirming the model, SVO boss Michael van der Sande told Car Sales that the new Defender V8 doesn’t carry any SV badging because it doesn’t have the right “amount of technical changes you would expect of an SV product.”
JLR purchased Bowler last year in what van
der Sande described as a “very intentional” move as the automaker was “slightly
underrepresented in performance off-roading.” Thanks to Bowler’s expertise with
making the Defender even more capable off the beaten path, JLR is now in the
perfect position to capitalize on the growing demand for performance
off-roaders.
The British company has yet to confirm
what direction it will take with the off-roader, but it could take inspiration
from the Discovery SVX concept that was unveiled in 2017. That vehicle was
outfitted with long-travel dampers, enlarged off-road tires, increased ride
height and wheel articulation, and a supercharged 5.0-liter V8 pumping out 493
hp and 625 Nm of torque.
Jaguar Land Rover intended to bring the
Defender SVX into production, but van der Sande has since revealed that he and
SVO chief engineer Jamal Hameedi scrapped the project as they had too much on
their plate at the time and needed to scale back SVO’s activities.
