MetaCars

As we finish a week in Ford’s latest Fusion, the staff of MetaCars is happy to tell you that we’ve selected it over the Porsche Panamera, Cadillac CTS-V Coupe, and the 2007 Hyundai Sonata parked next to it to be our 2010 Car of the Year. Well, announced in 2010. But referring to the 2009 calendar year. But most cars sold in the 2009 calendar year were 2010s.

Oh sure, it was a close one for the new Fusion compared to the runner up for 2010 COTY, the 2007 Sonata. But most other new cars are so badly botched that we had no alternative but to pick the Fusion. Let’s look at the field before getting to the “Fusey” itself.

Competitors: Big, fat, awesome sedans we never expected — well we did expect them, but not until 2005. We’re talking cars like the Aston Martin Rapide (reviewed here) and the Porsche Panamera (blogged here).

Other competition to the Fusion would be the Camaro and Mustang. But the Camaro, it turns out, fulfilled the Camaro tradition of being a fast piece of shit. And the Mustang has those better engines coming next year, so it’s got 2011 MC COTY all locked up.

We considered a left-field COTY option, like the Chevy Equinox. But the rental company was all out of them. That’s why we ended up with a 2010 Fusion.

Some of our staff felt this was gaudy plastichrome. But the majority felt it was just shithouse.

The Fusion is, quite simply, the best American-made family sedan sold in America. I mean, yes it’s built in Mexico (not the spring break part, but in the stabbing part), but it’s still American. Did you see when my Ford stock skyrocketed from $2/share up to $11? It’s not insider trading if they tell you all that stuff in press releases and then I name their car COTY.

Let me tell you about why the Fusion is so great. Even though only 2% are sold with manual transmissions, all the car magazines got to test those. So it has lots of car magazine awards. Nothing makes me want to buy a car than it being the Motor Trend Car of the Year — that’s why I have a PT Cruiser and a Chevy Citation in my garage, not to mention the Ford Probe I bought on Motor Trend’s advice.

Also, the Fusion has something called Sync. It works like a lot of other iPod integration systems, but since I was so overwhelmed by its awesomeness (as well as the adjustable lights in the cupholders), I didn’t have an opportunity to ask the Ford PR man why the interior was already badly worn at just 13,000 miles.

Most importantly about the Fusion, it’s just great to drive compared to its competitors. Although the Malibu, Sonata, Altima, Accord, Camry, Mazda6, and Suzuki Kizashi are either more fun or more comfortable, nothing is as much fun or as comfortable as the Fusion.

All in all, we were impressed with the Fusion’s marketing, with its copious magazine awards, and its ability to be not as slow as we were expecting. A solid effort from Ford. And if that’s not enough for a COTY award, we don’t know what is.

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