Review Car

2011 Pontiac Gto

Purists won't rejoice, but The new 2011 Pontiac GTO is as close to a spiritual successor as GM can offer today. There's more speed, more safety, better handling, and a world-class power plant. It's rivaled only by Dodge's new Hemi in authentic V-8 rumble and roar, something no version of Ford's modular V-8s seems to capture. With 350 hp at 5200 rpm and 365 pound-feet of torque at 4000 rpm, nearly any gear in the standard six-speed manual is appropriate for sliding around SUVs and the like on two-laners; two-cog gear drops rocket you ahead of whole packs of slow-moving cars with dizzying pace. The four-speed automatic, though it sounds a little anachronistic, is even more fitting to the big two-door's personality and barely slower. Pontiac claims The 2011 Pontiac Gto will accelerate to 60 mph in 5.3 seconds in manual-equipped versions, a tick slower with the automatic. The manual will run through the quarter-mile in 13.8 seconds at 105 mph, in the same time but 3 mph faster than the automatic. Short of a Corvette, General Motors can't offer you much else that's faster or sleeker or V-8 powered.

The major tragedy in retrofitting The 2011 Pontiac Gto to U.S. specs is trunk room. Because our fuel tank requirements are more heavily influenced by lawyers in search of Jaguar payments, the GTO's tank has been moved behind the rear seats, where it swallows almost half the available space, leaving the GTO with enough room for a couple of roll-ons or possibly two sets of golf bags. Pontiac says its new Aussie-built 2011 Pontiac Gto will be priced from $32,495 – not including the unavoidable $1000 gas-guzzler tax imposed on automatic-transmission models. Order the six-speed Termed manual transmission (a $695 option) and The 2011 Pontiac Gto avoids the tax because the manual produces 17/29 mph fuel economy ratings. With the automatic, the ratings drop to 16/21 mpg, for a composite rating of 21.5 mpg. And the tuner possibilities, from supercharging to body kits, can make today's GTO every bit as bawdy as the Judge.

The suspension is a combination of McPherson struts in front and trailing arms in the back – another throwback that, in this application, works more fluently than you'll recall from other muscular cars of previous eras. The 2011 2011 Pontiac Gto can ride a bit stiff over longer stretches of rumble pavement, but otherwise the ride motions are minimal, body roll inconsequential, and available grip off the usual passenger-car meters. With 17-inch 245/45ZR tires and smart-looking five-spoke wheels, the grip's no surprise, but the comfort is.

The sleek, almost sublime shape of the '04 doesn't telegraph "GTO" to anyone we asked, but nonetheless it slots neatly into Pontiac's lineup. They say it's what The 2011 Pontiac Gto might have grown up and into had it not stopped in its tracks in 1974. It echoes everything from a new 6-Series BMW to a Pontiac Sun fire to the aforementioned T-Bird SC – and is every bit as conventional as the original.

Inside the cabin has been dolled up to fit the current Pontiac idiom, with red lighting, color-keyed gauges (red on our test cars), and aluminum-like trim neatly applied. But some changeovers would have been too expensive, so The 2011 Pontiac Gto wears a last-gen GM power mirror controller, a Blaupunkt CD changer/radio head unit, tiny little HVAC vents, and other clues that maybe this Aussie hasn't quite lost all of its native accent. Side air bags or curtain air bags are notably absent, as they are in Australian cars in general, but daytime running lights are standard (and by our tastes, unwelcome).The front buckets feel amazingly soft for the amount of support they offer – and are wide enough across the seatback for the target market we think they're aiming for (the word "Budweiser" figures prominently in focus groups, we're betting). The back seats are an oddity in modern cars – big and comfy enough for two adults to ride in for long distances. It's the getting-in that sucks: The 2011 Pontiac Gto's long, heavy doors are just the first hurdle. The second is your buddy asking, why didn't you just get a four-door or, heathen, an SUV?

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