Each year around this time, the auto mags release their Top 10 lists -- the cars they liked best and, more important, the ones they think you would like best. It's a useful exercise, not least because it provokes a bit of thought, some gnashing of teeth and a few wagers here and there.
My list is limited to the cars I drove during 2009 (you can find the complete reviews of most of them at the sfgate.com Top Down auto blog), but after I drew up my Top 10 I saw that there were several overlaps with the Top 10 choices made by the editors of Car and Driver, a publication that is no slouch in the field of autoliterati.
All of this Top 10 stuff is, of course, highly subjective -- indeed, as I tell my friends who are thinking of getting new wheels, buying a car is a highly emotional process -- and so, without belaboring the point, these are the cars that raced my motor, so to speak, over the past 12 months. Whether they race yours, I'll leave to you
.Aston Martin DB9 Volante. For sheer outrageousness and automotive narcissism, it's difficult to beat this venerable marque. You'll get a lot of comments about "Bond. James Bond," that kind of thing, but you'll also get pure wind in the hair and the muted growling of a 6-liter, 470-horsepower V12 that will send the bureaucrats at the EPA's fuel economy lab scurrying for cover. At $209,000 and change, it's not for the faint of farthing, but it is a nice car.
Audi A3 Quattro At nearly $42,000, including some $11,000 worth of extras, you might wonder why it's in the Top Ten. Drive it. This is a real pocket rocket, with its 200-horse turbocharged four-banger -- 3.2-liter V6 is also available -- running through a six-speed clutchless automatic. It's small on the outside, roomy on the inside and goes around corners almost flawlessly. The almost part comes in when, in a fit of joy, you fling the car about with too much energy. Hard not to do this in the A3.
Cadillac CTS-V. Ok, ok, it's been a lousy year for General Motors, what with the BANKRUPTCY and all. And the BAILOUT, and the musical chairs with CEOs. But let's get beyond that. Let's get into the four-door Corvette. That is precisely what you get with the CTS-V. It's a great, charging saloon -- take that!, Jaguar -- with a 6.2-liter, 556-horsepower V8 and it will hold five people, in comfort. It's very fast and, at less than $68,000, as tested, a bargain.
Ford Fusion AWD. Ford is riding high these days. It's the only one of the Big Three to avoid the humiliation of bankruptcy court, and it has caught the attention of the Reliability Mavens, who rank cars on how often -- or seldom -- they break down. With the Fusion, Ford is going head-to-head with Toyota's Camry and Honda's Accord. To beat them, Ford has an all-wheel-drive version of the Fusion that should even give hearty Subaru a run for its money. For less than $29,000, this car is well worth a look.
Honda Fit. Trust Honda to come up with the Swiss Army Knife of cars. For under $19,000, you can get the topline Fit Sport -- base price for a Fit is less than $15,000 -- , with navigation, electronic stability control and an unerring sense of fun when you're coursing through a bunch of mountain switchbacks. At the same time, the Fit will carry five people and their luggage. The Fit is designed to go after that sub-compact market of ultra-small cars, and it does so with a nice sense of elan; and it's not even a Lotus.
Hyundai Genesis Coupe. Following on the heels of the big Genesis luxo sedan, the coupe is something that gives you true sports car for not much money. For about $22,000, you can get the base model, with its two-liter, turbocharged four-cylinder motor, but the real buy, for less than $30,000, is the 3.8-liter V6, with 306 horses. This is a real go-fast sports car and my only hesitation is that the looks are a bit out there. Hyundai goes all swoopy with its sports cars -- viz. the Tiburon -- and needs to tame things a bit. Nonetheless, they do give value for money.
Infiniti G37x Coupe. It's the best of both worlds -- you get the svelte sports car lines and the upscale Infiniti comfort. The trick with the "X" series is that you also get all-wheel-drive. And as someone who just spent two weeks plowing an old Pathfinder through New England snowstorms, I can tell you that AWD or 4WD is worth every penny. In the case of the G37x, the price of entry is around $47,000, "nicely equipped," as they say.
Jaguar XFR. Take a look at the above note about Cadillac's CTS-V, then test drive this Jag. It would be easy to say they're the same car, but, in fact, they are similar. You get honking big engines -- in the Jaguar's case, a 5-liter, 510-horsepower V8 -- to haul you quickly, and the rest of the car swaddles you in leathery comfort. The Jag is about $80,000 and, frankly, I think it's a prettier car.
Lexus RX450h. It's the SUV for the Tiffany crowd, but it's also the SUV for the Green crowd. Whether spending nearly $50,000 for a hybrid is your idea of economy in this Green Age doesn't really matter, since the people who will buy this svelte sport utility are looking for comfort with a patina of political correctness. The RX450h is a descendant of the original 1999 RX300, mutated through a 2004 generation change, the RX330. It's quiet, roomy, comfortable and, yes, it gets better fuel mileage than its non-hybrid sister, the RX350.
Mercedes-Benz S550. When somebody asks me, "hey, which car should I buy?", I ask how much they want to spend. Once in a while, somebody will say, "oh, it doesn't matter," in which case I ALWAYS say, "that's pretty simple. Go buy an S550." When they find out it runs about $110,000, there's a gulp and then we start talking realistically. What you get with an S550 is the echt uber-cruiser, the big-deal over-the-road, long-legged chariot of infinite comfort. I once drove an S550 from Joseph, Oregon, to San Francisco -- some 826 miles, by the Mapquest math -- and at the end of the ride felt as fresh as I did at the start. Not many cars can do that.
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