Watch A Range Rover Sport P400e Attempt An Insane 999-Step Climb

Jaguar Land Rover likes a good PR stunt. Usually they’re bloody good ones, too, and it’s our very great pleasure to bring you yet another, involving 99 hairpins just metres from cliff edges, and a brain-freezing attempt to drive up the 999 steps on China’s famous Tianmen Mountain, towards the stunning rock arch called Heaven’s Gate.

Range Rover, as we told you late last year, is launching a plug-in hybrid version of the Sport called the P400e. It has a 2.0-litre, four-cylinder turbo with a fruity exhaust, bolstered by an 85kW electric motor and good for a handy 395bhp overall. It can also climb like Sylvester Stallone in Cliffhanger, when you put Jaguar Racing’s Ho-Pin Tung behind the wheel.

To mark the start of the Range Rover Sport P400e’s official roll-out, Land Rover decided to attempt to climb the fearsome hairpin-stuffed Tarmac snake that climbs the legendary mountain, before driving a technically showroom-standard P400e (it has optional off-road tyres) up one of the world’s longest and most picturesque flights of steps.

We don’t want to spoil the tension for you. We’d just like to tell you this video is well worth a few minutes of your time. Yes, there are safety precautions and yes, the talk of certain death is slightly overplayed as a result, but the sight of a fetching red Range Rover Sport, mountain-goating its way up stone steps that reach an angle of 45 degrees in places, is a mighty thing to behold. Enjoy!