It must be me, but, I find greatest poke at ~2 to 3000rpm, anything above that and the power seems to fall away. E.g, in 3rd gear, up to ~3000 is fine, above that and it's fairly non-impressive. Any thoughts ?

Nothing wrong with out right power, my old mans ZF 2.2 deisel can not pull away from me.

If your talking about torque, what do you expect from 999cc ?.

I get a reasonable shove from 2 - 3.5K.

Man your not in an st, the power is incredible for 999cc

O blimey yes, it really is amazing. When you compare it to my 948cc A35 van (35bhp) around 1965 it's unbelievable :)

No, up to 3k'ish it's terrific and I rarely go above that. No need to rev the goolies off it :D

A35.......good comparison.

If you do want to keep up, you DO need to thrash the goolies off it.

not gonna lie to you guys, my ecoboost zetec 100 is the fastest car i've ever owned so far.

it handled a trip to the skate park with 2 mates and 3 bikes strapped across the back with a halfords bike rack, and it handled a trip to london with a boot loaded with chopped tomatos in cans

i don't know if i could imagine a more willing engine

A35.......good comparison.

If you do want to keep up, you DO need to thrash the goolies off it.

Keep up with who though? ;)

At 3K or less it can burn-off 90% of the "insert expletive here" :D