Dispatches from the front (seat). It's war out there.

I need to cross Sydney in a $311,000 electric performance car that will do 0-100km/h in 3.4 seconds, but this is not like one of those exciting car-chase movies. 

It's the opposite.

For three hours, I battle traffic. My nerves are shot. I’m tense and frazzled. This is not what I signed up for. 

The poor people at Mercedes could not have foreseen any of this when they booked a familiarisation trip from Auckland to Sydney for me to take their new marque Mercedes-AMG EQS 53 4matic+ for a drive. 

But after a couple of pleasant hours in the morning and a nice lunch, a comedic list of hindrances smashes us. Well, me.

  • It’s the last day of the school term, and we leave lunch just on 3pm.
  • There is a train strike, pushing people into their cars.
  • A once-in-a-generation storm causes widespread traffic jams and floods everywhere we go in the following days.
  • The disruption imposes a tense deadline: I have to get the vehicle back in time for Mercedes staff to catch their own flight.

It was not so much a test drive as an endurance test in not scraping, scratching or denting a car worth half as much as some houses.

All of this is compounded by what is called in my family “the Sydney push-in”. At any stage, a third-rate driver in a fifth-rate car (or even a nice car) will push directly into your lane centimetres in front of your vehicle, and then half way through the manoeuvre will turn on their indicators and act as if a gap existed all along. 

Meanwhile, the Merc is beeping an alarm that we’re about to crash.

And all the while, the rain buckets down and the traffic grows.

Every few minutes, the Mercedes-Benz route guidance pings with a new “fastest route” that is 10 minutes slower, but avoids the latest crash ahead. 

But it all worked out in the end, and I highly recommend the liquor store in Petersham. 

Anyway, the car.

I’d like to drive it properly one day. It’s a driver’s car and is blisteringly quick. Scarily so. That made it all the more frustrating that, other than a blat up the motorway in the morning, I am relegated to heavy-traffic thrombosis.

This 53 is the first electric model Mercedes' AMG performance-vehicle division has produced – in the company's new carbon-neutral plant in Sindelfingen, Germany – and they have gotten it right first time. It is an enthusiast’s performance car and is more than enough to expunge any memories of throaty V8s. 

I figure all buyers will add the AMG Dynamic Plus package for just $7690 extra; this boosts maximum torque to 1020Nm and power to 560kW, giving a 0-100km/h speed of 3.4 seconds (which is a stunning feeling). Top speed increases to 250km/h. 

These are all minor boosts on the standard model (0.4 seconds quicker to 100km/h) but I think the type of driver who’ll buy this vehicle will appreciate that.

The screen is an exercise in pure one-upmanship. It literally covers the whole dashboard, from door to door. And that is coupled with a heads-up display and augmented-reality overlay of map directions.

Sound is artificial (it’s electric, of course) and available in “authentic” and “performance”, which sounds a little bit like an angry whirr. 

Four-wheel steering gives the 53 an incredibly tight turning circle. The rear wheels will turn up to 9 degrees to enhance agility. 

It's run from a 107.8kWh lithium-ion battery that can charge in just 30 minutes if you can find a charger big enough. It has a range of 500 kilometres plus. 

Back when I reviewed the petrol-powered Mercedes-AMG 63 S, I desperately wanted the car to be electric, and its sibling 53 means it was worth the wait.

Big-screen entertainment – the MBUX hyperscreen.

The Sydney trip had three other NZ motoring writers on it. While I was in the passenger seat, another writer was driving and had to go around a corner at a T junction. He floored the vehicle and we jumped forward so quickly that I thought a crash was unavoidable. The car knew better. My neck hurt for hours.

Another time, he went around a corner so fast we skidded a little and he proudly declared the car was not invincible after all. Neither were my underpants.

Later, on a quiet, deserted stretch of road, another writer and I tried the Sport+ launch control. To do this, the driver presses both the brake and accelerator to set the mode. The whole car seems to shake and makes noises like an x-wing fighter about to take on the Death Star. The seatbelts tighten and pulsate. 

Releasing the brake unleashes the fury of 1024Nm of torque and three seconds later, the brakes go back on and we have schoolboy grins on our faces. “Again, again!" I squeal.

Mercedes-AMG EQS 53 4matic+

Price $311,000 (Dynamic Plus package is $7690 extra)

Carbon emissions: 0

Website: https://www.mercedes-amg.com/en/vehicles/eqs/sedan.html