Car and Driver - Brock Yates - The era of pea-pod cars may be over

[Klaus]

Car and Driver

The era of pea-pod cars may be over.
By Brock Yates
July 2004


For those of you having the fortitude (or poor judgment) to continue reading this blather more than once, you may recall that several months ago I admitted to the purchase of a Hummer H2, perhaps the most politically incorrect motor vehicle to ply American highways since Al Capone’s armored Cadillac. Of course, I expected my friends in the granola crowd to sneer openly, claiming I was defiling the environment while lining the pockets of the very same mullahs who are trying to blow us into small bits. My feeble defense is based on the need of a vehicle that will plow through upstate New York winters and haul my Eliminator hot rods and two dogs that are roughly the size of Shetland ponies. This cuts me no slack with the Kerryites and the Nader raiders, all of whom consider any passenger car larger than a Toyota Echo akin to a Euclid earthmover.

But having driven the great whale around for the past couple of months, I am staggered at the general response, leaving me to puzzle over exactly how Americans are involved in the so-called automotive culture of the nation.

The question was first posed on a stretch of interstate as my wife, Pamela, and I were trundling along in the right lane at a steady 75 mph (a velocity, by the way, at which the H2 is amazingly silent, stable, and comfortable—provided one ignores the gallon of regular being swallowed every 12 miles).

On my left I spotted a ragged Chevrolet station wagon that drew alongside. A girl in her 20s in the passenger seat was frantically scribbling on a hunk of cardboard with her lipstick. She held up a sign that read, “You’re hot!” I had to presume she was referring to the H2 and not to me, as I’m old enough to be her great-uncle.

Several days later, while heading east on Interstate 90, another car cruised beside me as the driver leaned to his right and tossed me a thumbs up. This did not surprise me, as I had seen the same signals from other drivers.

But the source of my amazement centered on the car he was driving—a Honda Insight! This is, with the Toyota Prius, the most politically correct automobile on the planet. Making sure his gesture did not involve a middle finger, which it did not, I was left to ruminate why, in the name of OPEC, anyone wheeling a tiny gas-sipping, primo-P.C. hybrid like an Insight would give me the thumbs up. A frustrated Kenworth driver? A drugged-up whacko who thought he’d spotted a rapper’s Slade?

To this day I remain baffled by the gesture, except to note that the H2 has been the source of more reaction than any other vehicle I’ve driven since the insane Lamborghini LM002 (“The Rambo Lambo,” C/D, October 1987) terrorized the roads. Most of it has been favorable, save for an encounter with a middle-aged suburbanite leaving a Rochester supermarket with his small son. As the little boy walked behind the H2, he asked, “Daddy, what’s that?”

Heading for a Subaru wagon nearby, the father sneered, “It’s big, it’s ugly, and it’s a gas guzzler.”

That is the only overt assault on the H2 that I have witnessed, and it was in direct opposition to the almost totally positive reaction to the vehicle. The impact the big ugly gas guzzler has on the general public has been a shocker. Over the decades I have frittered away endless hours motoring around in multitudes of cars and trucks, most of which have faded into my memory bank, and only a handful of vehicles have elicited a similar response.

The first was a Mercedes-Benz 600, the stunning leviathan sedan that the Stuttgart firm launched in 1964, powered by a lusty 6.3-liter DOHC V-8. Our test car, a short-wheelbase version, was, for all its weight and size, capable of running with the fastest sports cars of the day while leaving gape-jawed spectators in its wake. I recall a drunken tear down Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue with Carroll Shelby and other misfits after a smoky burnout from the portico of the posh Plaza Hotel following a black-tie dinner, proving once again that the barbarians are never far from seizing civilization.

So, too, for the first 930 Porsche that fell into my hands in 1975. That little maverick, complete with its vivid whale-tail spoiler, was a cranky beast, its turbo capable of suddenly, without warning, jacking up power to a point where the omnipresent oversteer could turn the little coupe into a whirling dervish. But it was a machine I truly loved driving.

Of course, my favorite long-hauler of all time was the Ferrari Daytona that Dan Gurney and I drove to victory in the 1971 Cannonball, crossing the nation in less than a day and a half. That fabulous old warrior, now in the hands of Seattle collector and vintage racer Bruce McCaw, captivated like no other. Its vast range of torque produced amazing performance. I recall a race with a guy in a Pontiac GTO somewhere in Oklahoma. He was able to stay with me until about 100 mph, when the Ferrari seemed to gain a whole new life, surging to 150 mph while the victim in the GTO thought he’d been tied to a tree. That wonderful machine would top out at just a wink under 175 mph while being as docile as a Buick Electra.

In retrospect, the unique factor among all those machines, in addition to their vivid performance, was their styling. Each had a profile that was outrageous and outside the box. Like the H2 this offered an extra dimension to their appeal.

In this age of androgyny, wherein a Suzuki can be confused with a Toyota or a Saturn or a Honda, outré styling is playing an increasingly important role in sales. I think of the Mazda RX-8, the Mini Cooper, the Chevrolet SSR, the Audi TT, the Chrysler PT Cruiser convertible, the Honda Insight, and the Dodge Magnum wagon, among others, as breakout machines, not due necessarily to their performance or mechanical exotica, but rather because of their eye-arresting contours. So, too, for the H2, which, love it or despise it, refuses to be ignored. It transmits a message to all automakers that the era of pea-pod cars may be over.

We live in a world that is becoming increasingly bland, with clothing, food, music, and television developing an overlay of worldwide conformity. A street in Paris or Hong Kong is beginning to look like one in Malibu or Greenwich, Connecticut. If automakers are to survive in this world of excessive overcapacity (estimated by some experts to be as much as 30 percent), daredevil styling and design may be the only salvation. Including big ugly gas guzzlers.

http://www.caranddriver.com/article.asp?section_id=27&article_id=8217&page_num ber=1

[Klaus]

Car and Driver

The era of pea-pod cars may be over.
By Brock Yates
July 2004


For those of you having the fortitude (or poor judgment) to continue reading this blather more than once, you may recall that several months ago I admitted to the purchase of a Hummer H2, perhaps the most politically incorrect motor vehicle to ply American highways since Al Capone’s armored Cadillac. Of course, I expected my friends in the granola crowd to sneer openly, claiming I was defiling the environment while lining the pockets of the very same mullahs who are trying to blow us into small bits. My feeble defense is based on the need of a vehicle that will plow through upstate New York winters and haul my Eliminator hot rods and two dogs that are roughly the size of Shetland ponies. This cuts me no slack with the Kerryites and the Nader raiders, all of whom consider any passenger car larger than a Toyota Echo akin to a Euclid earthmover.

But having driven the great whale around for the past couple of months, I am staggered at the general response, leaving me to puzzle over exactly how Americans are involved in the so-called automotive culture of the nation.

The question was first posed on a stretch of interstate as my wife, Pamela, and I were trundling along in the right lane at a steady 75 mph (a velocity, by the way, at which the H2 is amazingly silent, stable, and comfortable—provided one ignores the gallon of regular being swallowed every 12 miles).

On my left I spotted a ragged Chevrolet station wagon that drew alongside. A girl in her 20s in the passenger seat was frantically scribbling on a hunk of cardboard with her lipstick. She held up a sign that read, “You’re hot!” I had to presume she was referring to the H2 and not to me, as I’m old enough to be her great-uncle.

Several days later, while heading east on Interstate 90, another car cruised beside me as the driver leaned to his right and tossed me a thumbs up. This did not surprise me, as I had seen the same signals from other drivers.

But the source of my amazement centered on the car he was driving—a Honda Insight! This is, with the Toyota Prius, the most politically correct automobile on the planet. Making sure his gesture did not involve a middle finger, which it did not, I was left to ruminate why, in the name of OPEC, anyone wheeling a tiny gas-sipping, primo-P.C. hybrid like an Insight would give me the thumbs up. A frustrated Kenworth driver? A drugged-up whacko who thought he’d spotted a rapper’s Slade?

To this day I remain baffled by the gesture, except to note that the H2 has been the source of more reaction than any other vehicle I’ve driven since the insane Lamborghini LM002 (“The Rambo Lambo,” C/D, October 1987) terrorized the roads. Most of it has been favorable, save for an encounter with a middle-aged suburbanite leaving a Rochester supermarket with his small son. As the little boy walked behind the H2, he asked, “Daddy, what’s that?”

Heading for a Subaru wagon nearby, the father sneered, “It’s big, it’s ugly, and it’s a gas guzzler.”

That is the only overt assault on the H2 that I have witnessed, and it was in direct opposition to the almost totally positive reaction to the vehicle. The impact the big ugly gas guzzler has on the general public has been a shocker. Over the decades I have frittered away endless hours motoring around in multitudes of cars and trucks, most of which have faded into my memory bank, and only a handful of vehicles have elicited a similar response.

The first was a Mercedes-Benz 600, the stunning leviathan sedan that the Stuttgart firm launched in 1964, powered by a lusty 6.3-liter DOHC V-8. Our test car, a short-wheelbase version, was, for all its weight and size, capable of running with the fastest sports cars of the day while leaving gape-jawed spectators in its wake. I recall a drunken tear down Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue with Carroll Shelby and other misfits after a smoky burnout from the portico of the posh Plaza Hotel following a black-tie dinner, proving once again that the barbarians are never far from seizing civilization.

So, too, for the first 930 Porsche that fell into my hands in 1975. That little maverick, complete with its vivid whale-tail spoiler, was a cranky beast, its turbo capable of suddenly, without warning, jacking up power to a point where the omnipresent oversteer could turn the little coupe into a whirling dervish. But it was a machine I truly loved driving.

Of course, my favorite long-hauler of all time was the Ferrari Daytona that Dan Gurney and I drove to victory in the 1971 Cannonball, crossing the nation in less than a day and a half. That fabulous old warrior, now in the hands of Seattle collector and vintage racer Bruce McCaw, captivated like no other. Its vast range of torque produced amazing performance. I recall a race with a guy in a Pontiac GTO somewhere in Oklahoma. He was able to stay with me until about 100 mph, when the Ferrari seemed to gain a whole new life, surging to 150 mph while the victim in the GTO thought he’d been tied to a tree. That wonderful machine would top out at just a wink under 175 mph while being as docile as a Buick Electra.

In retrospect, the unique factor among all those machines, in addition to their vivid performance, was their styling. Each had a profile that was outrageous and outside the box. Like the H2 this offered an extra dimension to their appeal.

In this age of androgyny, wherein a Suzuki can be confused with a Toyota or a Saturn or a Honda, outré styling is playing an increasingly important role in sales. I think of the Mazda RX-8, the Mini Cooper, the Chevrolet SSR, the Audi TT, the Chrysler PT Cruiser convertible, the Honda Insight, and the Dodge Magnum wagon, among others, as breakout machines, not due necessarily to their performance or mechanical exotica, but rather because of their eye-arresting contours. So, too, for the H2, which, love it or despise it, refuses to be ignored. It transmits a message to all automakers that the era of pea-pod cars may be over.

We live in a world that is becoming increasingly bland, with clothing, food, music, and television developing an overlay of worldwide conformity. A street in Paris or Hong Kong is beginning to look like one in Malibu or Greenwich, Connecticut. If automakers are to survive in this world of excessive overcapacity (estimated by some experts to be as much as 30 percent), daredevil styling and design may be the only salvation. Including big ugly gas guzzlers.

http://www.caranddriver.com/article.asp?section_id=27&article_id=8217&page_num ber=1

[Klaus]

Car and Driver

The era of pea-pod cars may be over.
By Brock Yates
July 2004


For those of you having the fortitude (or poor judgment) to continue reading this blather more than once, you may recall that several months ago I admitted to the purchase of a Hummer H2, perhaps the most politically incorrect motor vehicle to ply American highways since Al Capone’s armored Cadillac. Of course, I expected my friends in the granola crowd to sneer openly, claiming I was defiling the environment while lining the pockets of the very same mullahs who are trying to blow us into small bits. My feeble defense is based on the need of a vehicle that will plow through upstate New York winters and haul my Eliminator hot rods and two dogs that are roughly the size of Shetland ponies. This cuts me no slack with the Kerryites and the Nader raiders, all of whom consider any passenger car larger than a Toyota Echo akin to a Euclid earthmover.

But having driven the great whale around for the past couple of months, I am staggered at the general response, leaving me to puzzle over exactly how Americans are involved in the so-called automotive culture of the nation.

The question was first posed on a stretch of interstate as my wife, Pamela, and I were trundling along in the right lane at a steady 75 mph (a velocity, by the way, at which the H2 is amazingly silent, stable, and comfortable—provided one ignores the gallon of regular being swallowed every 12 miles).

On my left I spotted a ragged Chevrolet station wagon that drew alongside. A girl in her 20s in the passenger seat was frantically scribbling on a hunk of cardboard with her lipstick. She held up a sign that read, “You’re hot!” I had to presume she was referring to the H2 and not to me, as I’m old enough to be her great-uncle.

Several days later, while heading east on Interstate 90, another car cruised beside me as the driver leaned to his right and tossed me a thumbs up. This did not surprise me, as I had seen the same signals from other drivers.

But the source of my amazement centered on the car he was driving—a Honda Insight! This is, with the Toyota Prius, the most politically correct automobile on the planet. Making sure his gesture did not involve a middle finger, which it did not, I was left to ruminate why, in the name of OPEC, anyone wheeling a tiny gas-sipping, primo-P.C. hybrid like an Insight would give me the thumbs up. A frustrated Kenworth driver? A drugged-up whacko who thought he’d spotted a rapper’s Slade?

To this day I remain baffled by the gesture, except to note that the H2 has been the source of more reaction than any other vehicle I’ve driven since the insane Lamborghini LM002 (“The Rambo Lambo,” C/D, October 1987) terrorized the roads. Most of it has been favorable, save for an encounter with a middle-aged suburbanite leaving a Rochester supermarket with his small son. As the little boy walked behind the H2, he asked, “Daddy, what’s that?”

Heading for a Subaru wagon nearby, the father sneered, “It’s big, it’s ugly, and it’s a gas guzzler.”

That is the only overt assault on the H2 that I have witnessed, and it was in direct opposition to the almost totally positive reaction to the vehicle. The impact the big ugly gas guzzler has on the general public has been a shocker. Over the decades I have frittered away endless hours motoring around in multitudes of cars and trucks, most of which have faded into my memory bank, and only a handful of vehicles have elicited a similar response.

The first was a Mercedes-Benz 600, the stunning leviathan sedan that the Stuttgart firm launched in 1964, powered by a lusty 6.3-liter DOHC V-8. Our test car, a short-wheelbase version, was, for all its weight and size, capable of running with the fastest sports cars of the day while leaving gape-jawed spectators in its wake. I recall a drunken tear down Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue with Carroll Shelby and other misfits after a smoky burnout from the portico of the posh Plaza Hotel following a black-tie dinner, proving once again that the barbarians are never far from seizing civilization.

So, too, for the first 930 Porsche that fell into my hands in 1975. That little maverick, complete with its vivid whale-tail spoiler, was a cranky beast, its turbo capable of suddenly, without warning, jacking up power to a point where the omnipresent oversteer could turn the little coupe into a whirling dervish. But it was a machine I truly loved driving.

Of course, my favorite long-hauler of all time was the Ferrari Daytona that Dan Gurney and I drove to victory in the 1971 Cannonball, crossing the nation in less than a day and a half. That fabulous old warrior, now in the hands of Seattle collector and vintage racer Bruce McCaw, captivated like no other. Its vast range of torque produced amazing performance. I recall a race with a guy in a Pontiac GTO somewhere in Oklahoma. He was able to stay with me until about 100 mph, when the Ferrari seemed to gain a whole new life, surging to 150 mph while the victim in the GTO thought he’d been tied to a tree. That wonderful machine would top out at just a wink under 175 mph while being as docile as a Buick Electra.

In retrospect, the unique factor among all those machines, in addition to their vivid performance, was their styling. Each had a profile that was outrageous and outside the box. Like the H2 this offered an extra dimension to their appeal.

In this age of androgyny, wherein a Suzuki can be confused with a Toyota or a Saturn or a Honda, outré styling is playing an increasingly important role in sales. I think of the Mazda RX-8, the Mini Cooper, the Chevrolet SSR, the Audi TT, the Chrysler PT Cruiser convertible, the Honda Insight, and the Dodge Magnum wagon, among others, as breakout machines, not due necessarily to their performance or mechanical exotica, but rather because of their eye-arresting contours. So, too, for the H2, which, love it or despise it, refuses to be ignored. It transmits a message to all automakers that the era of pea-pod cars may be over.

We live in a world that is becoming increasingly bland, with clothing, food, music, and television developing an overlay of worldwide conformity. A street in Paris or Hong Kong is beginning to look like one in Malibu or Greenwich, Connecticut. If automakers are to survive in this world of excessive overcapacity (estimated by some experts to be as much as 30 percent), daredevil styling and design may be the only salvation. Including big ugly gas guzzlers.

http://www.caranddriver.com/article.asp?section_id=27&article_id=8217&page_num ber=1

[KenP]

Nice article Klaus. Thanks.