MARTIAN INVASION

Following the Lamborghini Sterrato and Porsche 911 Dakar, the trend for go anywhere supercars continues... but this takes things to a whole new level

- TOM FORD

We've literally run out of road.

There we were, happily surfing a wave of torque provided by a RUF tuned Porsche flat six, the tea kettle boil of boost causing the car to squirm very slightly on upshifts on the hot tarmac, each tiny snatch of silence between gears like the pause before someone reveals a secret. The air is filled with the howl of an Akrapovič titanium exhaust and sparkling grains of sand are siphoned from the road surface by the car's passing. Glorious. But very suddenly there's a lot of braking and the chunky tyres are groaning under the effort of managing traction the other way. It's not a gentle wash of windblown sand that's veiled the road, but a blunt downing of tools and a half metre drop into dune from the highway. It's like the desert bit it off, a termination likely to end in a face full of airbag. For most sports cars, this would be the end.

For the Marc Philipp Gemballa Marsien, it's only the beginning. Mainly because at the touch of a button, the Marsien climbs its own suspension to rise from 120mm to 250mm of ground clearance. Nothing to an SUV, a generous amount for a car that looks like a modernised take on a 959 crossed with a GT series car. Which it kind of is.