Bumper to Bumper

by Doug DeMuro

  But I didn’t. And I spent the next three hours going from “fearful” to “thrilled.”

  At first, I had to get my bearings. The studded Nokian tires were excellent, and they were crucial to the experience: acceleration, though vastly different from driving on pavement, was impressively easy. Turning was a little more challenging because there was a lot of understeer—but the car managed to go just about everywhere I put it. And braking, surprisingly, wasn’t really all that bad.

  Before too long, I was drifting around, laughing, and screaming “WOOO!” at the top of my lungs, like a child on a roller coaster, as the car slid around video game-style. It was the most fun I’ve had behind the wheel in a long time—and a far cry from a few weeks ago, when my summer tires couldn’t even get me moving on less than an eighth of an inch of snow.

  Eventually, it was time to get off the ice, and back to dry land. And I spent the next day and a half meeting with readers and viewers—the BMW fans at PRIME Shades, the amazing Defender-stocked 4x4 Center, the incredible collection of vintage exotics at RPM in Vergennes, and the awesome University of Vermont Car Club—until it was time to head home.

  Speaking of heading home, it’s worth noting that the Aston Martin behaved phenomenally on this trip. It covered 851 total miles, some seriously frigid temperatures, and below-zero wind chill without even a hiccup, blowing warm air, playing music, and keeping warning lights off the dashboard the entire time. Suffice it to say I’m starting to gain a little faith in this car. Not a lot of faith, though: the entire time we were out on the ice, I didn’t once shut off the engine for fear that it wouldn’t restart again. You can never be too careful.

  Can You Daily Drive the Alfa Romeo 4C?

  Originally published on Jalopnik—April 27, 2016

  Whenever a new exotic car comes out, enthusiasts always ask the same question: can you daily drive it? Regarding the Alfa Romeo 4C, I’ll answer this question with another question: You could daily drive a riding lawnmower. But do you really want to?

  In order to find out if you can daily drive an Alfa Romeo 4C, I spent the day with one, courtesy of Cyrus at exotic rental car firm Broadway SuperCars. And while I don’t want to reveal all of my thoughts just yet, I will say this: at the end of the day, when I returned the 4C and drove home, the Aston felt like one of those giant Lexuses that incredibly old people lose in parking lots after a symphony performance.

  So I will start with comfort. Plainly speaking, the 4C has none. By this, what I mean to say is that the 4C is uncomfortable to get inside, uncomfortable to sit in, uncomfortable to ride in, uncomfortable to steer, and generally lacking any sort of comfort assistance or aids, such as adjustable seatbacks, or reasonably sized sun visors, or, you know, seat padding.

  With that said, I admit the 4C is more comfortable than my old Lotus Elise in every single way. It’s easier to get in and out of, it has more room, it has a smoother ride, and it’s a little more luxurious, what with high-end equipment like parking sensors and a center console. With that said, this doesn’t mean much. Saying a car is “more comfortable than a Lotus Elise” is sort of like saying an object is “more fireproof than a forest in central California.”

  Then there’s practicality: the 4C has precisely three in-cabin storage spaces. Two are found between either door and either seat; small black leather-wrapped slots that are large enough to hold major items such as a notecard, but too small to hold gluttonous extravagances such as a tissue box. For something like that, you’d have to consult The Box, a small storage box between the seats where you could fit a midsize tube of toothpaste, or a full-size tube of toothpaste, or a small child, assuming he is no larger than a full-size tube of toothpaste.

  Of course, the 4C also includes a trunk. More on that in a moment. For now, I’ll say that the 4C offers a mere 3.7 cubic feet of cargo space. By comparison, the Porsche Cayman offers fifteen cubic feet. That boat.

  And then there’s visibility. In front, the blind spot is nonexistent. To the side, the blind spot is minimal. In back, the blind spot could hide a regional airport. Fortunately, Alfa Romeo has developed a solution for this: in the 4C I drove, the roof comes off, so you can stick your head out the top and accurately assess the situation in back. I am not sure what you’d do if you have a 4C Coupe, but I suspect the pesky roof could come off with a little elbow grease, a can-do spirit, and a giant gas-powered chainsaw.

  Like all Italian cars, the 4C also has some quirks. And I am not referring to quirks such as “the door handle is at a funny angle.” I mean quirks as in “before creating this vehicle, did the engineers ever spend time in an automobile?”

  My favorite “quirk” is the trunk: there is no exterior release. It’s hard to explain how annoying this is until you actually daily drive the vehicle and you realize that you’re stuck with a combination of a) no storage space on the inside, and b) no way to open the trunk from the outside. So you have no alternative when you want to bring something with you: you walk up to the car, you unlock the doors, you reach down and unlatch the trunk, you walk around to the back of the car, you open the trunk, and you stick your something inside. If you forget something, you must repeat the process again.

  So is there anything good about the Alfa Romeo 4C? Uh, yes. Get it out on the open road and it’s a truly thrilling car; one of the most exciting, sporty, tossable vehicles I’ve driven in years. It goes wherever you tell it, it feels leagues more stable than my old Lotus, and it sounds like an exotic supercar despite the fact that it is, on paper, a three-fourths copy. And while it doesn’t have three pedals as I wish it did, the transmission is actually pretty good considering that we’re talking about a low-volume Italian sports car whose music USB port is a wire dangling down from the passenger side of the dashboard.

  So what’s my verdict? I would love to have a 4C. I would drive it on Sunday mornings, down curvy roads out in the country, feeling the rush of its acceleration, musing at the excellent cornering, and listening to the beautiful sound.

  And then, when I was done, I would return home and park it in my garage until the following Sunday.