I drove the Jaguar XE Project 8, a wild $188,000 British muscle sedan - here's what it was like

But if I had, I could have savored the sweet symphony of a 5.0-liter supercharged V8 engine that edges right up to 600 horsepower, with 519 pound-feet of torque, all piped through quick-shifting eight-speed automatic (with manual mode and paddles) to the Project 8's surefooted all-wheel-drive system.

And I could have sampled all those things at their limit, or at least at the limit of my high-performance-driving capabilities.

Of course, although we have tested cars on racetracks, we don't do it off the cuff. So I had to make do with tooling around the New Jersey suburbs in the Project 8. That was it's own kind of fun. I did get in a few runs to New Jersey lake country, where I enjoyed the staggering power and bonkers acceleration of the machine: 0-60 mph in just over three seconds, with a top speed out there on the horizon of 200 mph.

I'm not entirely sure what's going on with me, but around the time I tested the new BMW M5, another magnificent super-sport sedan, I started to sour a bit on massive horsepower. Don't get me wrong — the Jaguar XE SV Project is something close to pure joy when you cut it loose, especially in the full-on track mode that maximizes the lusty exhaust note.

On one drive, I had to constantly check myself as I rocketed to the legal speed limit and felt the Jag champing at the bit for more, more, more.

My 13-year-old son was unimpressed with my restraint and declared that the Project 8 would activate his infrequently visited outlaw side.

"If I had this car," he opined, "I would go to some road in California away from everything and just speed."

An understandable dream — and one that, in its everyday impracticality, highlights the problem of cars such as the Project 8.

You really can't ever drive them as they were meant to be driven, which is to say fast and hard and without remorse.

More and more these days, although I admire what engineers can wring out of 100-year-old internal-combustion technology and four tires made of rubber — with no lack of carbon fiber thrown in — I want my sports cars to be, you know, sporty.

I mean, in that sense, something like a 332hp Nissan 370Z, with a straight V6, is plenty of automobile. And really, the sub-200hp Mazda Miata is plenty of ride. When you're under 350hp, you can get into all of it on public roads and not worry about blue lights or a premature exit from our realm.

Obviously, if you drop close to $200,000 on the Jag Project 8, good on ya!

But I'd personally save many thousands and buy a car that I can drive fully. Although to be honest, I had a perfectly grand time chugging along at 25 mph in the Project 8, listening to its British muscle-car accent and not needing to drop the hammer.

In the end, who needs speed, I guess?