Johannesburg - Judging for the 2018 SA Car of the Year competition has begun in Johannesburg.
The two-day test, involving track and road sections, will mark the final round of the competition before the 26-member jury lock in their votes for this year's winner. The top cars follow a vote cast by Jury, from an original list of 35 eligible vehicles.
The South African Guild of Motoring Journalists (SAGMJ) announced the finalists for the 2018 WesBank South African Car of the Year (COTY) competition earlier in 2017.
The SAGMJ says: "While all finalist vehicles represent examples of outstanding automotive engineering, there can be only one winner, and after careful deliberation by the COTY Jury, the vehicle range that best represents automotive excellence when compared to its segment peers, will be crowned the 2018 South African Car of the Year."
Two finalists lead the grid of 10 models by quite some margin in our Readers' 2018 SA Car of the Year poll, with the Audi Q5 heading the pack. The Alfa Romeo Giulia trails by 298 votes in second place.
Testing takes place at Kyalami International Circuit for the second year now. The first day of testing included two modules. The first was track driving in an anti-clockwise direction on half of the circuit, straight in to a 150m acceleration test, then an emergency brake test before moving on to a slalom exercise.
Module two included skidpan testing with an emergency lane change before doing two clockwise circuits and another slalom exercise.
The last exercise was two laps on the handling track.
Here are the finalists below:
Alfa Romeo Giulia
Audi Q5
BMW 5 Series
Kia Picanto
Land Rover Discovery
Peugeot 3008
Porsche Panamera
Suzuki Ignis
Toyota C-HR
Volvo S90