There are roughly 150 new car models on the market today, many of them only narrowly distinguishable from each other. The sedans are flame-surfaced affairs with elongated rooflines, and even the sporty coupes rely on huge grilles to trumpet their brand lineage. Most emit the same muffled calls, so you can’t reliably classify them by sound, either. This guide is intended to help you identify the 10 cars that, through a rare combination of strengths, stand apart. They reward close observation. We hope the following pages will tune you in to the attributes that mark the differentiation. Individual areas of noteworthiness are called out, but the assembled cars share the following traits: They cost less than $80,000, they excel at delivering value for the money, they have a strong mastery of their segment, and they are graceful in motion. These 10 will entertain and delight any driver, but only if you know how and where to spot them.
These awards were originally announced in November 2014.
BMW M235i
I once had a tail attached to the bottom of my spinal column. Don’t judge me; you had one, too. I lost mine a little more than a month into my embryonic development. And, I presume, you did as well. Not all of us lose ours, though. While vanishingly rare, some babies are born with an honest-to-goodness cartilage-, nerve-, and muscle-filled tail. These people have what’s known as an atavism. It’s a physical trait from deep evolutionary time that occasionally pops back up and, in this case, means that the affected person will forever be referred to by the unsympathetic as “Tail Boy.” Because of the probability of significant Levi’s chaffing and never-ending ridicule, most tails are surgically removed almost immediately upon discovery.
The BMW M235i also has a tail, albeit a metaphorical one. The car itself is a throwback, its genetic code expressing something that has gone nearly dormant in the last generation of small BMWs. The company is aware of this. It has even advertised this two-door model as the spiritual successor to the 2002, the model that predated the original 3-series.
With all due respect, BMW is wrong about that. The 2002 is too far back in the rapidly evolving car world to share much of its character or size with any new car. Modern BMW compacts are larger and more thickly padded animals, both in physical dimensions and in the broad scale of their market appeal. The M235i instead reverts to the same general plan as the E46 M3 of the early 2000s. That’s back to a time, in other words, when our adoration for BMWs was at its most unabashed.
BMW M235i
Have a look at the two specimens. The M235i is within an inch and a half of the 2003 M3 in almost every exterior dimension. The M235i carries an inline six-cylinder engine pushing out 320 horsepower, compared with the M3’s 333. Of course, the new car uses a turbocharger to maximize horsepower, where the old engine used stratospheric revs to achieve its numbers. The M235i wears staggered tires on its 18-inch wheels, just like the old M3’s standard setup. When both are equipped with six-speed manual transmissions, the M235i trails the M3 to 60 mph by a tenth of a second (4.9 seconds to 4.8) but is two-tenths quicker through the quarter-mile (13.4 seconds to 13.6). Because automatic transmissions have improved so much over the last decade or so, the M235i with its eight-speed automatic sprints to 60 mph in 4.3 seconds and covers the quarter in 12.9. The M235i also stops shorter and corners harder than the old M car; tire technology has also advanced.
As its convoluted name implies, the M235i is neither a fully aggro M car nor just a day-to-day standard sports coupe. Its character is in between the two. And that’s . . . well, that’s perfect. The M235i is easy to drive slowly and rewarding to drive quickly. It is, in fact, just about everything we want a modern 3-series to be: quick, confident, and sexy, with decent fuel economy, a close-coupled cockpit, and an eagerness to romp that’s been suppressed in the current 3. And like BMWs of old, the tall greenhouse allows for excellent outward visibility. The car is a manifestation of nostalgic impulses.
The M235i proves that BMW still has the code to driving excellence. This makes us both relieved and slightly annoyed that it’s not used on a broader range of the company’s products. The M235i might be a throwback, but it’s also a decidedly positive step up the evolutionary ladder. Long live the tail. —Dan Pund
Cadillac CTS
Cadillac’s CTS fended off multiple Audis, Benzes, and BMWs to win its 10Best berth. While we are (still) big fans of the twin-turbocharged, 420-hp V-6 that powers the Vsport model, it’s the handling that sets the CTS apart from the competition. To determine how GM sharpened the CTS’s reflexes to cuff the Germans, we returned to the scene with Cadillac’s executive chief engineer, Dave Leone.
Turns out that Leone and his development team know these byways—located only 30 miles from GM’s proving grounds—as well as we do. “We’re here every month to check our progress tuning new models and to assess competitors,” Leone explains. “The bends, bumps, and abrupt elevation changes challenge any car’s integrity, so this loop is an excellent supplement to our Milford Road Course and Nürburgring work.”
The third-generation CTS builds on the ATS’s Alpha foundation with larger wheelbase and track dimensions. “To optimize mass efficiency and to achieve a [near] 50-50 weight distribution, we created over 40,000 analysis models. We specified aluminum for most of the front components, positioned the battery at the rear of the car, and counted every gram to gain a 200- to 300-pound weight advantage,” Leone adds. “We targeted both the E90 [2006–2013] BMW 3-series and the current 5-series. When the 5 got heavier, our task became easier.”
Cadillac CTS
Leone’s strategic weapon, the electronically controlled magnetorheological (MR) dampers that GM developed years ago, has seen use in several sporty European cars. As we sail over a crest, he notes: “Our goal is maintaining the car’s composure in the face of severe road inputs. The MR dampers help keep the body straight and level by sensing suspension travel and by responding rapidly with extra rebound control over rises like this one. The dampers collaborate with the springs and anti-roll bars to keep the body flat in sweepers and to quell waddle [GM’s funny word for head toss] over undulating pavement.”
Encountering a stretch of tortured asphalt, Leone switches the Driver Mode Control from sport to tour. “The softer tour setting enhances comfort over rough roads while still providing enough damping to meet our goal of limiting wheel motion to one up-down cycle per bump,” he explains.
The body control is astounding over roads like this, but if the steering were less faithful, there’s a good chance we wouldn’t enjoy driving the CTS as much as we do. Leone explains, “Thanks to compliance in the belt connecting the assist motor to the steering rack, there’s minimal interference with the feedback traveling from the road to the driver’s hands.”
To Leone, the whole goal of chassis development is to create that elusive special sauce: “After enjoying a delicious dinner, you might ask for the recipe. That will reveal the ingredients while telling you nothing about the chef’s subtle contributions. The car-world equivalent is what we call integration: applying the necessary small refinements to assure that the whole vastly exceeds the sum of the parts.” And it’s amazing how General Motors—long the corporate behemoth most associated with sloppy handling, inattention to detail, and a generalized malaise—has gotten so adept at turning the good into the great. —Don Sherman
Chevrolet Corvette Stingray
When the first Corvettes rolled out of the primordial postwar haze in 1953, they were far from fully evolved. By all accounts, the shoddy, fiberglass-bodied “sports car” was headed for extinction just as quickly as its meager six-cylinder engine and two-speed automatic transmission could carry it. But then Chevrolet installed its first small-block up front. Thusly and successfully mutated, the Corvette’s genetic code has remained stable for 60 years. With few exceptions, the venerable Vette has always been a powerful V-8 plastic-wrapped with only whatever additional engineering was necessary.
The LT1 V-8 in today’s Corvette Stingray displaces 6.2 liters and makes 460 horsepower and 465 lb-ft of torque when paired with the performance exhaust or Z51 packages. Other engines may make more power or have more exotic designs, but there is no engine that feels closer to a living, breathing entity than the Corvette’s pushrod V-8. It is close to sentient, shutting down half its cylinders to conserve fuel and granting the Corvette a 29-mpg EPA highway rating. But the LT1 is no goody-two-shoes; it reminds you constantly of its presence, just on the other side of the firewall behind the axle centerline. At idle, the Corvette vibrates to its pulses, urging you to uncoil the tension in the pedals and shifter.
Chevrolet Corvette Stingray
When you do, it becomes evident that chassis resources were not begrudgingly allocated in designing this seventh generation of Corvette. Grip is far beyond the limits of daily driving. The steering wheel, brakes, and seat bottom tell you more about current events than CNN. Power delivery is immediate, at any sane speed, in any of the first four gears. There is still raw aggression in the Corvette’s acceleration, but the chassis is no understudy to the powertrain.
While the rev-matching seven-speed manual transaxle is our obvious preference, an eight-speed automatic is new for 2015. It offers crisp, quick shifts via steering-wheel-mounted paddles and makes two-pedal Corvettes more than just tolerable. Also new: the Performance Data Recorder, an onboard video technology serious enough that its full capabilities are not entirely legal in some states. Criticisms of Corvettes past have been addressed: A modern cockpit and supportive and comfortable seats testify to the thoroughness of Chevrolet’s mission (accomplished) in remaking the car. The C7 is the best-ever Corvette.
Even in this, its second year on our list, C7s hypnotize, the convertible and coupe equally. Sitting in the lot among the other contenders, they stand out as if rendered on a Retina display while others are appearing on a CRT. You might think that our familiarity with its many facets and creases has bred boredom, and certainly other beguiling shapes, even a real Italian demi-supercar, vied for our attention this year. But the Stingray looks transplanted from childhood fantasy, an interstellar dragon. We hear it roar, smell the heat of the LT1 cooking its own polymer skin, and the Corvette turns such imaginings into reality. —Jeff Sabatini
Ford Mustang GT
Imagine an enormous pyramid of glass spheres, perfectly balanced. Pull just one of those interdependent orbs from the base of that pyramid and the entire thing comes crashing down. In any complex system, a single change can have devastating consequences.
Or it can send things in the opposite direction. During the development of the 2015 Mustang one move set off a chain reaction that irreversibly altered the Mustang for the better. Granted, it was a big change: swapping out the old solid rear axle for an independent one. Partially derived from the aluminum and steel components supporting the tail of Ford’s Fusion sedan, the Mustang’s new independent suspension brings unprecedented refinement—unprecedented for a Mustang, anyway.
Chief engineer Dave Pericak swears that a new front suspension wasn’t part of the initial plan for this sixth-generation Mustang, but after it had fitted the new independent rear, his team realized that the front suspension it had been working with was now outmatched. And once the team started down that rabbit hole, the result was a complete chassis tear-up. In went a new design with a completely different geometry and a new subframe, which just happens to be lighter and stiffer than the individual crossmembers on the old car. Pericak calls it a “significant time, money, and engineering investment,” but admits that the improvements would not have been as marked without it.
Ford Mustang GT
Atop the new suspension, Ford placed a new body that is also lighter and stiffer than the outgoing one. It is a beguiling design, too, inviting long stares and walkarounds, and devoid of the bloat that makes other retro designs look like old cars wearing fat suits. The result is a decisive abolition of the distinction between pony car and sports car. In spite of an increase of about 150 pounds in curb weight—the inevitable result of safety and electronic gear, as well as the independent suspension and bigger brakes—the Mustang doesn’t feel fat.
Thanks to the stiffened front end, the steering wheel twitches in your hands, communicating textures, undulations, and grip levels as you drive down the road. Turn the wheel and the car responds as quickly as if you’d poked it with a needle. Wheel and body control are just as tight. Dive into a series of challenging turns in the Mustang and you’re not driving a car, you’re wearing wheels. That connection is furthered by the GT’s smooth, responsive V-8. Five liters is small for the Mustang’s class, but the 5.0’s 435 horsepower and 400 lb-ft of torque aren’t inadequate by any measure. Snappy throttle calibration makes slight output adjustments easy, and the six-speed’s closely spaced ratios keep the driver engaged. Refinement has also come, finally, to the clutch and shift linkage, neither of which requires as much muscle to operate as in last year’s car. We do wish that Ford would have left the exhaust alone, although the polite factory-fitted stranglers will make those working in the aftermarket overjoyed.
Oddly but happily enough for us, amidst all this urbanity, Ford somehow decided that it would offer the first production car with line lock. Engage the system while stopped and the front brakes hold the Mustang stationary as burnouts not even your 16-year-old self could have imagined boil off the un-braked rear tires. We can’t figure out how that made it past the lawyers.
However they were distracted, the bean counters must have been with the legal team, because every detail in the cabin seems fussed over. With its stitched leather, matte-silver toggle switches, and faux turned-aluminum trim, this interior boasts meticulousness heretofore absent from mainstream American cars. There’s an element of toyishness in the sheen of some of the plastics and the Duplo-scale toggle switches, but that puerile charm gets to the heart of what we love about the Mustang. It reminds us that driving a great car can be play, something that even grownups enjoy. —Jared Gall
Honda Accord
There is a veil of sameness draped over the Accord that comes from racking up 300,000 to 400,000 annual sales, year after year. Who would imagine that such an exceptional car could be hiding in plain sight, mimicking a lowest-common-denominator family appliance? Many Accord owners are unable, or do not care, to spot what makes their car better than the rest. Most just get in and drive. But that hasn’t stopped Honda from treating its bestseller like a flagship. Indeed, they are one and the same.
Accords are not pimped out to shabby rental fleets, so the cars go home with real customers, those who ran a gantlet of salespeople and dealership-finance goons to get their cars. Buying or leasing the car, even if you have a good experience, will certainly be the worst part of Accord ownership. Once home, owners will find that their Accords are dependable, no-fuss devices. Whether sedan, coupe, or hybrid, an Accord ingratiates itself first by delivering on its family-car promise: Five humans fit comfortably, it’s easy on fuel, and the trunk is ready for Costco. There is more, however.
The seduction is a subtle, two-pronged lure. The first is that the Accord combines thousands of parts into one as if they weren’t bolted, welded, snapped, or glued together but molded to form a single, one-piece device. Parse each piece, though, and here’s what you get: the harmonious hum of hundreds of engine components, slicing throws of the six-speed manual or fast responses from the continuously variable transmission (yes, even it), satisfying weight in the steering, an absorbent yet playful suspension, and a driving position that seems to have been custom tailored with an emphasis on great outward visibility. Accords are better cars than they have to be, better than their owners might demand, a rarity in our consumer economy.
Honda Accord
The second trick is another kind of camouflage: These cars have the ability to transcend, to fade from attention on dull drives and then reappear when you’re fully engaged. Even to the initiated, the Accord is a chameleon. Whether you choose to partake of it or not, a percentage of amusement is built into each car. Most of the Accord’s competitors don’t even offer driving joy on their options list. But the Accord is always ready when you are. As with old friends who haven’t spoken in a long time, there is an ease to picking up where things left off.
It should come as no surprise that the Accord is a bestseller. And yet, someone who has never driven one might think that giving it a 10Best award is akin to Michelin (the restaurant-guide part of the operation) giving three stars to the local McDonald’s. But the Accord is proof that millions can be served, and still be served, the best. —Tony Quiroga
Mazda 3
The Mazda 3 is as humble a pigeon as you could imagine, part of the cityscape, nothing apparently fascinating or flamboyant about it. But did you know that the pigeon is one of just six species that can recognize its reflection in a mirror?
The 3 likewise harbors hidden talents, including its ability to illustrate the difference between style and design. Style is how something looks. Design speaks to how something works. Unlike most small cars, the 3’s interior is not simply in thrall to the former.
Underneath the cabin’s carefully trimmed sculpting lies a functional integrity that goes beyond how smoothly the vents move or how precisely the central-command knob clicks under your right hand. The 3’s interior is designed to manage distractions visual, cognitive, and manual—interruptions that have infiltrated the modern driver’s car, turning what should be at-the-wheel joy into a long, punctuated stream of annoyance.
To overcome visual distraction, Mazda placed its information array—a seven-inch screen on the center console and a flip-up “active driving display” over the instruments—in the driver’s existing sight picture, thereby minimizing the time required to refocus and readjust the eyes.
Mazda 3
The car metes out relevant information in a way that keeps cognitive distraction at bay, too. The central screen shows just seven pieces of information at a time, and they are spaced so that drivers don’t have to stare at the screen. Making or taking calls, for example, doesn’t cause a mental scramble.
This is enabled by the way the interior eliminates manual distraction. The driver sits with his elbow planted on the armrest, his hand controlling a dial that obviates the need for confusing touch screens or frustrating voice commands.
You usually only find this sort of haptic virtue in European luxury cars. But shouldn’t every manufacturer be thinking like this? With an unprecedented amount of information coming through to today’s driver, Mazda makes the orderly coordination of tasks a priority, not a luxury.
That said, if the 3 had only a well-thought-out interior, it wouldn’t have made it onto this list. The cabin’s true function is to allow the driver to focus on the chassis and powertrain, and what a combo they are. Take the steering; most modern electric-assist systems are failed attempts to replicate the sensations of hydraulic pumps, which are familiar but generally nonlinear and numb. But the 3’s electrically assisted wheel is set up to mimic the directness and response of manual steering. By changing suspension geometry—nearly doubling caster angle and trail—Mazda matches the rise in steering effort to rising g-loads in the tires.
The result is a car that makes full use of its engines. Our favorite powertrain is new for 2015, a naturally aspirated 2.5-liter inline-four making 184 horsepower and driving the front wheels through Mazda’s tidy six-speed manual. The four is as forthright and linear as the steering, which makes the whole car feel harmonious, matched, and smooth, and not like some intemperate hot hatch. But a hot hatch is what it is. Fun fact: Pigeons can hit 90 mph. —Eddie Alterman
Mazda 6
It’s pretty much impossible to talk about car design without sounding pretentious. This is probably the main reason professional car designers tend to wear turtleneck sweaters and space-age eyewear and jackets with too many buttons (or, occasionally, none at all); a uniform of mild ridiculousness to match this vocation of affected divination. So when Mazda tells us that the 6’s “Kodo” design language represents the muscular beauty of an animal pouncing, or that it takes its inspiration from the living athletic forms of nature, our first instinct—if we can manage not to snicker—is to smile and nod politely. Yes. Sure. It’s a fine-looking car—can we leave it at that?
But bullshit aside, Mazda has done it. The 6 is that rare beast, a car that looks like it drives and drives like it looks: taut, agile, and, yes, athletic. In a world where car design is often nothing more than bending metal around a set of platform-derived hard points and then thinking up some zingy metaphors, the 6 stands out as the real thing. All the more impressive is that Mazda has pulled off the form-and-function double with a mid-size sedan.
The reason the 6 looks lean and lithe is, obviously enough, because it is. This iteration is more than 200 pounds lighter than its predecessor, and that savings has been made without recourse to carbon fiber or pixie dust, which would have inflated its price tag well beyond its current position of almost outrageous affordability. Those shaved pounds are also a large part of why the 6 stays so composed when you ask it to make progress over a favorite back road at a pace that would feel abusive in one of its many less-agile rivals.
Mazda 6
The 6 isn’t a sports car, but it’s clearly been engineered by people with a deep understanding of how far you can take a family hauler in that direction without making it harsh or uncivilized. It’s an expertise reflected in the accuracy of the 6’s steering, the solidity of its brakes, and throttle response that’s sharp enough to make some of the turbocharged cars here feel as if their computers communicate internally via Morse code banged out on a telegraph. And that’s not to mention the reassuring presence of a slick-shifting six-speed manual transmission, or the fact that the pedals have been carefully spaced for heel-and-toe work. Mazda clearly knows that, however improbable it will seem to most, some owners are going to want to seamlessly blend their downshifts.
Those buff Kodo lines also give the 6 an upmarket feel well beyond its modest MSRP, as does the well-finished cabin. The standard 2.5-liter four-cylinder is tuned for torque and mileage more than excitement, but it’s impressively economical. The optional capacitor-fitted i-ELOOP energy-storage system paired with one of the industry’s best automatic transmissions returns hybrid-like EPA numbers, reaching 40 mpg on the highway.
The more time you spend in the 6, the more you find yourself wondering how much more car you actually need. Unless you have 12 kids, the answer is probably none. —Mike Duff
Porsche Boxster / Cayman
We put an $80,000 base-price cap on 10Best contenders because, when it comes to building cars, money can solve most problems. As price rises beyond that mark, the number of bad cars approaches zero and the difference between great and merely good becomes increasingly trivial. You could say a similar thing about mid-engined cars. Put the power behind the driver and it’s hard to get it wrong.
That explains why it can seem unfair to drive Porsche’s Boxter and Cayman back to back with 50-some other cars that are led by their horses. The mid-engined Porsche twins are so fundamentally different from the competition that considering them for a 10Best nod feels as if we’ve shattered our price ceiling—most of their architectural analogues cost three and four times as much. Admittedly, the Boxster and Cayman easily blow past $80,000 when moderately optioned, but the inherent goodness of these cars is fully realized even at the Boxster’s $52,395 base price.
The mid-engine advantage is, at its core, a matter of physics. Take something heavy from either end of a car—say, 500 pounds of powertrain—and move it to the middle, and voilà! You’ve just slashed the polar moment of inertia, increasing the car’s willingness to change direction. Think of a figure skater pirouetting with arms outstretched, then increasing the speed of the spin simply by pulling his arms in toward his chest. Centralizing the mass in a car has a similar effect: Its ability to initiate and to halt rotation quickens, its reflexes sharpen.
Porsche Boxster / Cayman
But mid-engine greatness is more than simple physics. When a company mounts an engine in the middle of a car, it implies that chassis dynamics are paramount. It’s no surprise then that quick corners in the Porsche are led by tight steering, met with deliberate body control, and matched by dogged grip. The steering in the Boxster and Cayman is exceptional, benefiting from the absence of weight on the nose of the car and the electrical assist’s ability to tailor effort to g’s.
Both flat-sixes swell enthrallingly to 7800 free-breathing rpm. With the intake positioned behind the driver’s left ear, there is no better case to be made for doing without turbocharging. You row through six sweet-shifting gates or click off gears with the prescient PDK dual-clutch automatic. One is the purest way to experience sports-car nirvana, the other is both its greatest threat and most worthy successor.
The Boxster and Cayman demonstrate immense mutability. They are daily drivers, luxury coupes, and sports cars. Scouring our notes on the pair, we find complaints only about the cup holders. The third generation of Porsche’s mid-engine platform has also widened the gap between base and S models. If you’re expecting straight-line performance from these corner hunters, the base cars can be uncomfortably slow. The extra power of the S and GTS trims, however, transforms these cars into well-rounded athletes.
Finally, here’s the real-world application of your college physics class: Have $65,000 to spend on something fun? Buy yourself a low polar moment of inertia. —Eric Tingwall
Tesla Model S 60
It starts with the battery. Tesla’s is the best in the business, with 50 percent higher energy density by weight than the next closest EV competitor’s (Nissan Leaf). Though really, the Model S doesn’t have competitors, at least not directly. Because the battery offers so much capacity, the Model S needn’t compromise its mission with a bulky gas-powered range extender. You’ve heard the rationale behind Tesla’s purity movement: Having a single propulsion element, the motor, allows for more battery cells, which extends electric range, obviating the need for a Plan B, the internal-combustion engine.
But the Tesla battery isn’t just a box of lithium-ion cells packed in the trunk or behind the seats. It contributes to the car’s structure in a way that serves as an asset to handling. The battery pack is close to the ground, essentially serving as the car’s floorpan. Whether you’re hustling down an on-ramp or meandering home from your tech incubator, the Model S feels through-bolted to the earth’s mantle, its center of gravity close to the pavement. And because the weight is so low, Tesla can run softer springs while still preserving good roll control, so the ride is relaxed. On the highway, you have to pay attention, because your inner-ear gyroscope will tell you you’re doing a mild 60 mph when in fact you’re going 93. Your frame of reference is probably not calibrated to the degree of serene imperturbability provided by the suspension.
The Model S architecture also allows Tesla to place the electric motor— in 60 trim, it makes 302 horsepower—just aft of the rear axle. This gives the car a rear-biased weight distribution, more like a mid-engined sports car than a typical luxury sedan with its engine up front. Plentiful traction at the drive wheels means the Model S can take advantage of its electric powertrain’s instant torque, beaming away from a stop like a big-block Chevelle on mute. You don’t waste time shifting because, of course, there’s only one gear.
Tesla replaced the Model S 60 in April with the Model S 70D; we have already tested the new car, and it will defend the Model S 60's award when 2016 10Best Cars testing commences.
Tesla Model S 60
So yes, the battery architecture enables a level of performance, of over-the-road mastery, that is thus far unmatched by any other electric, and the S even betters many conventionally fueled cars. It also opens up new possibilities for creative packaging and design. Consider the airiness of the interior, unsullied by a driveshaft or transmission tunnel, and where a vast, showstopping touch screen somehow doesn’t overwhelm the dash. It turns out that touch screens are really easy to use when they’re huge and right in front of you.
The compact drivetrain opens up room for both front and rear trunks, with optional rear-facing third-row seats turning the Model S into the only seven-passenger sedan on the market. The modular powertrain also allows Tesla to make easy hardware upgrades. Want four-wheel drive? Simply add a second electric motor at the front axle, as Tesla is doing for a new four-wheel-drive model. Because the Model S is part car and part electronic device, updates can be downloaded as soon as they’re available—no trip to the dealer. And that’s key, because there are no dealers in the conventional sense.
It’s rightly amazing that Tesla, only a few years removed from startup, can mass-manufacture a car this good, while also fighting state-by-state franchise battles, building out its network of Supercharger stations, planning its “gigafactory” battery-manufacturing operation, and mollifying the financial community. And, sure, the CEO occasionally has to divert some attention to one of his other companies that makes spaceships.
Maybe that’s why it has taken Tesla some time to get us a 60-kWh Model S, two years after we tested the top-of-the-line Model S P85, the one with the gargantuan battery pack and uprated motor and a base price that exceeds our 10Best threshold. The 60 truncates some power and range to qualify, while sacrificing nothing else. It is a revelatory machine, with possibilities that are still unfolding. —Ezra Dyer
Tesla replaced the Model S 60 in April with the Model S 70D; we have already tested the new car, and it will defend the Model S 60's award when 2016 10Best Cars testing commences.
Volkswagen Golf/Golf GTI
Switzerland may be neutral, but its government still insists that its soldiers carry a Swiss Army knife. Maybe it’s because a Swiss soldier, having such intense non-action on his hands, requires a corkscrew for decanting that ’95 Moulin-à-Vent. And maybe those puny scissors are perfect for trimming curds at competitive fondue festivals. And that nifty can opener is surely what Colonel Nestlé needs to pry open a tax-free account in Geneva. By the way, Geneva is home to the Large Hadron Collider, which—few people realize this—was built entirely by four Swiss soldiers with very sharp Swiss Army knives.
Which brings us rather indirectly to the Volkswagen Golf, the correlative tool for enthusiast transport. No matter your preferences in price, practicality, and performance, there’s a Golf that will take your money without giving up much in any other direction. The gasoline TSI models perhaps represent the paring knife. The practical diesel TDI models represent the screwdriver. And that spearlike awl, always blood-encrusted, is the sharp-edged GTI.
Also like a Swiss Army knife, the Golf—now in its seventh generation—is a historically mellifluous integration of mechanical functions into a hamster wheel of usefulness. It doesn’t look much different, which is just fine. It doesn’t feel much different, which is just fine, too. We say that because this is the ninth consecutive year that the whole Golf family, the lone GTI, or, as is the case here, both have accumulated 10Best plaudits. Not even a U.S. president gets to walk on blue carpeting for that long.
Volkswagen Golf/Golf GTI
The Golf’s steering remains light and alive. You’re aware of impacts rearranging the suspension, but the forces rarely penetrate the now-airier cabin. The dampers know when to apply discipline and when to relax. Cockpit surfaces and the jigsaw manner in which they interconnect cause all occupants to whisper “Audi.” Shift efforts are light, with a clutch as repetitively predictable as Groundhog Day. The body is vault-solid, the platform bombproof. The thing feels like a midget Mercedes S- class. Separate any of those gloriously evolved elements from the whole and you don’t have a Golf.
The turbocharged 1.8-liter gas engine produces only 170 horsepower, but its 200 lb-ft of torque arrives at an accessibly low 1600 rpm, delivering a gratifying mid-range surge. The redesigned 2.0-liter turbo-diesel thrums like a Strausberg cello, revealing its oil-burning secret to no one. And the GTI’s 220 horsepower (in Performance-package trim) makes it sufficiently nimble to catch a Higgs boson. All of this comes at a price that spans a $12,700 gulf—from the Launch Edition three-door manual at $18,815 to the GTI Autobahn five-door with DSG automatic for $31,515. The Golf is Mr. and Mrs. Every Budget personified.
There are larger cars for the money, just as there’s a 314-blade Swiss Army knife that weighs 11 pounds. But few cars engender as much driving satisfaction, and few annually hold a snappier family reunion, in which no relative gets loud or offensive, except maybe the perennially delinquent cousin in the plaid pants. Oh, no. What’s he pouring in the punch? Jeez. He seemed like such a nice young man. —John Phillips
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