2014 Chevrolet Cruze- Road Test Review

The great performance is also the reason why this car is actually quite a successful racing car as well. The Chevy Cruze has 4 World Touring Car Championships (WTCC) on the trot for the past 4 years in the hands of Yvan Muller and Robert Huff while being a British Touring Car legend in its own right winning the championship in 2010 with Jason Plato behind the wheel. The Cruze was also the 2011 Scandinavian Touring Car Championship winner. The Cruze achieved another milestone in August 2014 when the company sold 3 million units world-wide with the Indian market also contributing to this achievement.

So what this car is, is a fast little magical creature to drive but the question remains how it fares in the real world? Well for starters, it handles brilliantly. You almost get the same amount of body roll in a car of the same segment that costs 3 times more. The steering though is a bit light, it feels like a feather in your hands when you’re going straight but when you turn at high speeds, it pulls back and becomes heavier and come to think of it, it’s actually quite genius. Then when you want to put it into sport mode, you can’t. There is no switch that says sport and I’m glad there isn’t only because if the car is this good on its own, why ruin it with a ‘Sport’  button? Your sport mode is your throttle pedal, be gentle with it, and you have comfort, floor it and you awaken all the 163 horses this unicorn ate for lunch. It’s not a child’s play this car; it’s a Gentleman’s racer. The more aggressive you are, the more aggressive it gets.

The finish inside the cabin is stupendously good. The leather upholstery is stitched beautifully and feels like a perfectly hairless woman’s legs after she uses all her million dollar moisturisers. The centre console, the dash, the instrument panel are all brilliant, but it doesn’t come with Sat-Nav even though it has a digital screen, and when I tried to use the USB port to charge my phone and play music, none of the buttons on the console did anything. The only way to control it is from the phone. Or you could also pair it via Bluetooth and then use the buttons. There are several  clever little cubby holes for storage laid out around the cabin, and a sunglass holder placed cleverly above the driver’s door.

To drive this car, is totally different from any other out there. Like I said before there is something in this car that most others in the market lack. The Cruze has character, a sense of its own and a place of its own, distinguished from anything else out there. But it’s not really practical in the real world; it’s nowhere close to what its competition has to offer in terms of being practical. There are cheaper options that have better fuel economy as well, so the questions looms why would anyone buy one? Would I buy one? Yes! Why? Because firstly it rubbishes my pre-historic notion that all American cars are badly built, and secondly a car is a direct reflection of its owner’s personality, it shows if the owner is interesting or not. So if you are the kind of person who likes to stand out from everyone else in the crowd with something different, to feel a little distinguished from the herd of donkeys in ponchos the Chevy Cruze is the Unicorn to have and it’s not just an image booster, the amount of fun you get for your money, makes this car priceless.