It’s that time of year again! October means a chill in the air, chili in the Crockpot, and Window Shop arguments over winter beaters and how much to spend on one.
Our last two winter challenges set the budgets at $5000 and $7500, and our “Most Reliable Used Cars for $5000” challenge was a de facto winter beater episode. This year, the panel got to spend a whopping $12,000 to survive three months of whatever’s going on with the climate (and inflation). Given a full roster of six contestants, we’re proud to admit almost none of them used the money wisely.
Road & Track senior editor John Pearley Huffman applied his laser focus to the word “beater,” then went to Colorado to find one. We’re not sure why so many cars in that state look like they’ve been dragged out of the Grand Canyon, but we’re pretty sure Pearley would have done better with one of the Grand Canyon mules. The mule would have been a nicer shade of brown than the car, and at least as reliable.
Senior editor Joey Capparella, whose nose for older Japanese economy cars is unmatched, hooked up an unmolested Subaru WRX. The plain black wagon spoke so deeply to executive editor K.C. Colwell that Colwell did all the speaking for Capparella’s presentation.
Senior editor and SoCal dweller Elana Scherr might not even believe in snow. She was so put off by the concept of winter that she didn’t read her listing carefully and ended up buying half an Argo. Don’t try to understand that sentence, just watch the video and let her explain.
Contributor Jonathon Ramsey went for luxury, because Ramsey going for luxury is even more reliable than winter of late. His calculus: A bulletproof German engine surrounded by potentially dodgy German electronics that only have to last three months? Isaac Newton, the inventor of calculus, would approve.
Colwell, rested from his Subaru presentation, returned to the speaker’s lectern to show an English rectangle with a German engine, making it doubly dodgy—unless it isn’t, which is always possible with English cars.
And editor-in-chief Tony Quiroga emerged from left field with another automotive marsupial. He won huge style points. But the car might do as well in a real Michigan winter as a mammalian marsupial would. (Hint: Not well.)
Your wonderland awaits, and it includes the line, “The windows only suck when you want to use them.”
