PATRICK BEDARD
Something to drive if your attention span exceeds 0 to 60.
BY PATRICK BEDARD
January 2002

You know how some cars give you that overdog swagger? Like, "I can put taillights to any sumbitch on the road."

Honda's technoslick Insight gas-electric hybrid does that for me.

"Into the retro lane, Porsches. Pretend you don't notice your obsolescence, Bimmers. You don't have the IQ, the science, the exponents to run with this silver bullet crouched in your mirror."

I confess that I even parked the tiny coupe in front of my office window, just so I could look out at it while I worked. Lessee, have I done that since the crazy-mad affair with my 1963 Sting Ray convertible? That Vette had bikini lines; I loved the way its lower fenders pulled back, showing lots of bulging tire. So erotic. I'm getting embarrassed.

It's not adultery if you go at the object of your lust with Turtle Wax. I think I'm safe on that.

The Insight arouses me in a different way. I see naked theory—the low, shaved nose, the front-wheel opening with its streamlined trailing edge, the faired B-pillar, the little kicker under the sill to direct air around the rear tire, and of course the fender skirts. This car looks like the theory of low-drag aerodynamics. So pure, so elegant, so perfectly functional.

Let the bewinged Porsches and the beskirted Bimmers flaunt their froufrou. This hybrid Honda is an automobile pared down and engineered out to the cutting edge, a high-performance capsule for two occupants.

High performance. I've chased it for years. As a car-cuckoo schoolboy back in the Age of Whitewall Tires, I read Uncle Tom McCahill. Zero to 60 was his big thing, rocket Oldsmobiles that snapped your neck like a string bean in a salad factory. That was fun.

When I could finally afford a V-8 of my own, the Beach Boys were singing, "Tach it up, tach it up, buddy, gonna shut you down," and I devoted nights and weekends, not to mention an imprudent chunk of my paycheck, to ever lower ETs. That was really fun.

Later I was hooked on 200-mph laps in methanol burners, and devising just the right combination of neck collars and tether straps to hold my helmet upright against 3.00 g. There's no explaining such adventures, except to say that life always has a next thing.

Now, as I reach for the Insight's door handle, my gaze falls on a next thing beyond Uncle Tom's imagining. A black-on-silver sticker on the rear-quarter glass, down in the corner, in the same spot we bragged in the tach-it-up days with our decals for Isky Racing Cams. The sticker says, "SULEV," the acronym for Super Ultra Low-Emission Vehicle. How low? Imagine this: Collect from the tailpipe all the hydrocarbon emissions over 100,000 miles of driving, and you have the equivalent of one pint of spilled gasoline, according to the California Air Resources Board.

Automotive engineers have dreamed of perfect combustion for more than a century. This little three-cylinder is within a sniff.

Mostly, C/D is a magazine of glandular thrills. We promise breath-catching spasms of acceleration. When you're finally numb to those, the Insight starts you on joys more cerebral.

Later the same day . . . Since the last paragraph, I just ripped off a 51-mpg average on a run to the post office. When I really get the feel of this Honda, I'll break 60, I'm sure.

This 2002 Insight has the newly optional CVT in place of the five-speed transmission. Think of a CVT as a Phi Beta Kappa automatic with an mpg major. Mostly, they cut the driver out of the ratio-choosing game, but Honda, being Honda, sends what amounts to a secret invitation—only we hard-core types will notice the two buttons a thumb's reach from the right hand's position on the wheel.

The one marked "S" aids acceleration a bit by telling the CVT to let the engine rev up out of the best-economy range when you put your right foot to the floor. If you're coasting, it also notches up the regeneration—think more generator braking (instead of engine braking) and therefore more energy recaptured and deposited back in the battery.

When you're done with "S," a push of "D" takes you back to normal.

They say fishing with light tackle heightens the sport of it. Same applies to cars: Passing with 67 horsepower is an art. The road into town is two lanes, and the distances between yellows get shorter every year; I know them down to the millimeter. A lunker green Chevy Suburban was getting bigger in the windshield, going 10 under the limit at least, Mom being extra safe. If I fell in line behind her, the pea-shooter three-cylinder wouldn't have the oomph to accelerate by in the next opening. Gotta hang back, do the slingshot—foot off the gas, push "S." In the edge of my vision, I see the battery-charge gauge jump upward.

Timing is everything, because there's no reserve of acceleration. I practiced this move over and over at the Speedway. You think those cars surge ahead to pass? No, they ooze; they're nearly maxed out when they top 200. To pass, you set the gap to the car ahead and then build a reserve of speed to close it, all timed to carry you past just as you squeeze into the next turn. Perfection feels so good. Imperfection feels . . . well, drop back and set the gap again.

I push "D," saying no to the extra acceleration. Let's see if I can still cut it. I need about 12 mph on her as I pull out. More speed than that just wastes gas. CVTs are cerebral in their way; when you toe into the power, the engine spools up near the redline as if the clutch were slipping. Once you know the deal, "Oh, yeah, more time at the power peak." Why aren't all cars like this?

I steer left just as Mom's bumper sticker comes into focus: "Every child is an honored student at . . ." Platitude Day School. Uh, had to make that last part up. No time for the fine print.

Halfway around, I see lots of room before the yellow starts up again, which means I used a bit too much power. I give myself a C plus on the pass and glance at the Honda's instantaneous fuel-economy meter. It flickers just under 50 mpg as her green hulk appears in my mirror. That Chevy wouldn't do 50 mpg off the side of a mountain.

Well, maybe it would if she remembered to switch off the engine on the way down.

Uncle Tom, as I recall, claimed to have invented the 0-to-60 magazine test just after World War II. It's still an okay performance measure, I guess, for those with short attention spans. The Insight is more interesting for those of us who like to keep it up all day.