While the crew over at Winding Road Magazine usually specializes in doing POV test drives for the more interesting of new cars, occasionally feature a nice older ride, to reminds us of just how toned down cars are becoming nowadays.
Compare virtually any modern car with its older self, and you will begin to see that the inevitable progress of the industry has rendered its dashboard soft, along with its responses to your inputs. The same applies to sounds – I don’t really understand why all cars are getting so quiet (well, I see the point for family rides, but not for sports cars), but it seems to be an industry obsession.
Thankfully, there’s nothing stopping you from boycotting the new car market altogether, and enjoying the wonders of eBay and specialist sites. You could land yourself a nice (and loud) Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IX MR, and throw the bare minimum of mods (straight exhaust makes it even louder). The result is a machine like the one featured in this shorter and quicker-driven POV video drive.
There’s something exciting about driving or being driven quickly in Evos, even more so in in beefed-up MR trim. Insulation from engine noise is poor, and while the straight-four engine doesn’t sound bad, but it isn’t as nice as let’s say, a Subaru Impreza. Also, if I were to look back at the history of the Evo and some older versions, the factory body kit was not chosen with great attention paid to the aesthetic side – they were needlessly ugly and square.
Still, cars are driven from the inside, which is what you’ll see if you scroll down and click play.
By Andrei Nedelea
VIDEO