Who says hybrid cars have to be boring, or expensive even! The Honda CR-Z is out to shatter all those myths as Muntaser Mirkar revels in a bit of nostalgia and then drives the 2011 Japanese Car of The Year!Metallica, Guns N’ Roses, Bon Jovi, Back to the Future, MTV, Atari, Group B rally cars and Fuel Injection – the 1980s was probably the most influential decade for the current generation. It also saw the end of the Cold War, the Chernobyl disaster, the assassination of John Lennon and the massacre at Tiananmen Square. The IBM 5150 which is highly regarded as the first ever personal computer was released in 1981. But why exactly are we talking about things that happened 30 years ago apart from the fact that a major chunk of the ZigWheels staff was born back then? Well, it was also the decade that saw sub-compact sports cars become a cult - small, light, powerful and fuel efficient - these cars were the quickest and cheapest way to get closer to fast acceleration figures for citizens of growing economies. And among these was the Honda CR-X - a two-door hatch from Japan with a 2+2 layout that raked in huge sales figures in the US and in Europe as well as the Middle East. But the CR-X' biggest success story isn’t really from all those years in the past. It is in fact one that has taken place in the present day - in the form of the Honda CR-Z - Japan's 2011 Car of The Year, spiritual successor to the legendary CR-X.
That said the CR-Z is as different a car to the CR-X as a zebra is to a horse. Standing in the cold chill of an approaching Japanese winter, the blood-red CR-Z basked in the warm sun and showed off its curves in splendid galore. The basic body style harks back to the original car from the 80s with its low bonnet-high boot config, but that was just about it. The best part is that Honda’s designers haven’t attempted a CR-X redux, but started afresh with heavy 21st century technology injected in its DNA. Modern-day norms have dictated the CR-Z’s styling quite a bit as can be noticed in the absence of a sharp front end or even the missing flared wheel arches - all sacrificed in the name of increased pedestrian safety, but none of that takes away from the fact that the CR-Z is a super-hot I’d-exchange-one-for-my-girlfriend kind of car. All the way from the horizontal slats on the massive front grille to the split-window rear, it's as if the CR-Z is just tempting you to take it for a drive, and that we did. Strapped into the driver's seat you immediately notice how the CR-Z has been designed around the driver with all the necessary controls centered towards making life behind the wheel as less of a stretch as possible. The small-diameter steering wheel and the funky three-pod instrument cluster that changes colour depending on what mode you’re driving in and how efficiently you’re using your right foot extends the sporty feel that the car's styling starts out with on the outside. The air-con controls are all next to the cluster mound and even the optional sat-nav screen is ever-so-slightly biased towards the driver's view. Then you slot the 6-speed manual transmission into gear and your life changes.
