The 2010 model year is a bad one for Honda. For the first time that I can remember, they do not have a sports car in the lineup. Early in the 90′s they had the NSX, Integra and even the Prelude holding up the bottom end. Sadly the NSX is no longer in product and the Integra/RSX is no longer available either. The S2000 debuted in 2000 but 2009 was the last model year in the series. Across both the Acura and Honda brands, there’s nary a sports car in the lineup. Earlier this year, Honda pulled out of F1 racing and the replacement sponsor scored a few wins in their absence.

It’s rivals, however, still have quite a few sporting models. Toyota even still has the Celica, and Nissan has the 370z, GT-R and arguably, the Altima Coupe. Even Hyundai has the new Genesis Coupe which is a spectacular car that even comes with Brembos.

Is this the trend for all companies going forward? Will the push for fuel efficiency and economical  cars kill the sports car? Will limited sales numbers and political incorrect nature of high-horsepower and poor fuel economy put the end to sports car demand?

I’m not sure how it happened, but collectively the auto industry has started offering the same type of car all at once: the cube. It started with the Scion Xb in the USA and the Honda Element here, now Kia and Nissan have jumped into the mix offering a tiny cube-like car to the market. I can’t imagine there is enough demand for all this supply, but we’ll see. the Kia and Nissan are being offered for sale here this year.

Kia Soul

Nissan Cube

Honda Element

Scion XB

A collection of affordable sports cars vs. the new 911 (non-S) has been brought together in Japan for Best Motoring. Watch the video below to see how closely some of these cars are matched on the track.

The video is at Racing Films. I’m not embedding it since it keeps ignoring my attempts to prevent it from autoplaying.

Tags: 911, BMW, Carrera, cayman, Honda, i35i, lap, Nissan, Porsche, race, s2000, track, Video

My sister has begun shopping around for a new car. One of the priorities is to get power seats with a memory option so that its easier for her and her husband to share the car. Unfortunately after doing some research into the Japanese brands, none of them offer power seats with memory. Only two offer power seats and one with memory.

acura csx (same car as honda civic) $28,290-29,990
no power seats

honda civic $16,990-23,480 (not including Si model)
no power seats

mazda 3 $16,895-25,745
no power seats

mitsubishi lancer $16,598-22,998
no power seats

nissan sentra $16,798-24,298
no power seats

subaru impreza $20,695-23,195
no power seats

toyota corolla $14,565-23,210
power seats on the LE model

toyota matrix $15,705-26,775
no power seats

volkswagon jetta
power seats with memory on 2.0T model