99 8Cs will be coming to the US.
Sadly I won't be able to buy one. (cries)
I'm dropping out to create a company that starts with motorcycles, then cars, and forty years later signs a legendary Brazilian driver who has a public and expensive feud with his French teammate.
Stand back, folks. In fact, go ahead and make yourselves a sandwich. A Subaru owner is about to start talking about AWD.
Sure, nobody 'needs' a four-wheel drive performance car, except maybe Petter Solberg. In normal driving conditions good ole' rear-wheel drive works a charm, and front-wheel drive, well, it tries its best with mixed results.
I actually had a soul-searching moment when I found out a few speed shops could do a permanent RWD conversion on my STi. For a price, I could turn my any road, any where, any time, make-it-look-easy sportscar into something rather more challenging and rewarding to fire out of a tight hairpin — you know, perfectly modulated throttle with the rear tires stepping those tantalizing few inches out of line from apex to exit — rather than a eye-widening, monsterous lunge to which the driver contributes little.
So, is AWD really all sound and fury, signifying nothing? Or is it really worth the extra weight and almost-unavoidable understeer bias?
Ultimately, since I am deep in hillbilly country and there are still many, many unpaved roads on which the STi is absolutely as fun as two panthers in a gunny sack — largely because of AWD, I decided to stick with it. FTW.
It's not as involving, and it's maybe not as fun at the end of the day, but I believe AWD has its place on certain cars. Purists turn white at its mention, but Lamborghini summed up the beauty of AWD in a pair of three foot long letters stuck to the side of one of their fastest Diablos: VT, vicious traction. That manic first-gear punt out of a tight corner (or a supermarket parking lot) just can't be matched by anything driving only a pair of its four wheels.
That being said, I'd hate to see a day where all the manufacturers thought AWD is a prerequisite for performance. 'Cause it's emphatically not.
I'm erudite ;-)
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