Range Rover Celebrating 40th Anniversary Ahead Of New Model Launches

The iconic Range Rover is celebrating its 40th birthday in June, three generations after the 1970 launch of the first-generation model now known as the 'Range Rover Classic'.

The Classic was followed by the second-generation P38A in 1994 - even sold alongside the Classic for a brief time - before the current generation (and its updates) arrived in 2001.

"It is really four vehicles in one," Managing Director Phil Popham said of the Range Rover today.

"It's a seven-days-a-week luxury motor car, a leisure vehicle that will range far and wide on the highways and off-road trails of the world, a high performance car for long distance travel, and a working cross-country vehicle."

Click to read TMR's review of the 2010 Range Rover Sport.

The smaller Discovery-based Range Rover Sport - the first completely new model since the Land Rover Freelander arrived in 1996 - joined the line-up in 2005. Two years later, it was Land Rover's best-selling vehicle.

The next model to wear a Range Rover badge will be the LRX, confirmed for its worldwide debut later this year. 

While a final update is expected for the current-generation Range Rover sometime next year, an all-new fourth-generation Range Rover will reportedly arrive in 2012, weighing significantly less and offering massive fuel consumption improvements over the current model.