Considering the performance it offers, the Elise is affordable to run. Fuel economy is around 33mpg on average and reasonable emissions mean it isn’t expensive to tax. Lotus. However Lotus servicing is pretty pricey and the Elise requires attention every 9,000 miles.

For a car with such impressive performance, the Elise has quite low emissions with the current S emitting 196g/km of CO2 – that’s less than a Volkswagen Golf GTI. Even the supercharged model only puts out 202g/km of CO2 and returns 33mpg. Incredible considering it will go from 0-62mph in 4.6 seconds.

Hand built from aluminium and plastic, there’s nothing to corrode and the light weight means the engines aren’t too highly stressed even under hard driving. There can be the odd hood-leak but surprisingly, Lotus has not been affected by the well-publicised problems with the K-Series engine in older models (usually concerning blown head gaskets), which have plagued Rover and Land Rover.