Honda has always been pretty good at squeezing a lot of miles out of a little bit of gas, but they’ve never really been sales leaders with the whole Hybrid thing. Their Integrated Motor Assist is very simple, and the reason why is because all the electric motor does is help the engine; it never powers the vehicle on its own. To their credit they did have the first production Hybrid on the road in the US and it was very frugal, but it was a tiny 2-door roller skate of a car called the Insight. The Hybrid Civic has been fairly successful, but the Hybrid Accord has been discontinued and the new 4-door Insight is much larger (and better) but still no match for the Toyota Prius in any category.
This brings us to the new CR-Z, which is yet another 2-door Hybrid but this time it’s a much more useful car. It’s also fairly sporty and really fun to drive, and the interior is actually pretty cool with some interesting instrument lighting that changes hue the more efficiently you drive. It also has a multi-mode Drive System (with Sport, Normal and ECO settings) to fine-tune your power output. Here’s the thing, though: it’s a two-seater Hybrid, and yes, it is reasonably quick but you would expect it to also be really stellar in the fuel efficiency department. It isn’t, really. The EPA numbers are 31 city/37 highway with the (rather excellent) 6-speed manual transmission. I averaged 33 MPG when I had the car which is not too hot (but it was in the dead of winter). Speaking of which, it wasn’t bad in the snow which is always a plus, Hybrid or no.
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