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Subaru Outback wins 2010 SUV of the Year award
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The 2010 Subaru Outback is this year's SUV of the Year
winner. (Photo by Subaru)
An unapologetic station wagon is the year's best new sport-utility vehicle, Motor Trend magazine said today.
The Subaru Outback, a wagon version of the Subaru Legacy with slightly higher ground clearance, won the magazine's annual SUV of the Year award.
Wrote the magazine:
Once again, it seemed, Subaru was successfully reshaping the very definition of "sport/utility vehicle" -- melding the multi-mission prowess of true SUVs with the driving refinement, fuel-frugality, and easy access of wagons and sedans.
Car-based SUVs have won the SUV of the Year award in the past; Subaru's own Impreza-based Forester won last year. But those have at least had the proportions of a truck rather than a car, even if they were cars underneath.
The Outback, first introduced in 1996 as the "Legacy Outback," is one of Subaru's strongest sellers, easily displacing its Legacy parent. Subaru dropped the Legacy wagon in favor of the slightly higher Outback in 2008, leaving the redesigned 2010 Outback as Subaru's only station wagon.
But with its standard all-wheel-drive, 8.7 inches of ground clearance, and 71 cubic feet of cargo space, Motor Trend ruled that this station wagon did nothing most SUVs cannot. Any station wagon can typically claim the same over an SUV in on-road use but none matched Subaru's all-weather credentials.
As a through-and-through passenger car, the Outback also impressed the magazine with its passenger car driving dynamics and gas mileage -- 22 miles per gallon in the city and 29 on the highway with the standard four-cylinder engine, better than any conventional gas-powered SUV on the market.
"The Outback shines with bona-fide SUV prowess and versatility. Yet it does so without typical SUV penalties," Motor Trend wrote.
The 2010 Subaru Outback has the shape of a wagon
instead of a truck, but it looks more like an SUV than the
2009 model had. (Photo by Subaru)
The Outback midsize station wagon is priced on the high end of the compact SUV class, starting at $22,995.
Check back later this year in this space for a full DC Car Examiner review of the new Outback. While the related 2010 Legacy was not a standout compared to the average midsize family sedan, a vehicle vastly more space but similar driving dynamics and gas mileage would be another story.
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