The final ranking would be decided by how our panel of judges voted in 10 distinct handling categories. To wit:
We broke overall steering feel into three parts. STEERING RESPONSE deals with how a car reacts to wheel inputs. Is the response smooth or choppy? Does the vehicle require constant correction? Is there a big delay between input and direction change?
How well the steering communicates tire distress and road imperfections falls under STEERING FEEDBACK.
ON-CENTER FEEL is as it sounds—you want a little resistance in the steering wheel off the 12 o’clock position but not too much.
Perfect CHASSIS BALANCE, a 10 on our scale, would mean that the car behaves neutrally at the tires’ adhesion limit, neither pushing with its front wheels (understeer) nor swinging wide with its rears (oversteer). Excessive understeer or oversteer would lower this score.
What we call TRANSIENT BEHAVIOR refers to how a car transitions between two vectors. Think of all the things a skier has to do to change direction—are his body movements economical and crisp? That’s what we’re looking for here.
On a related note, excessive roll or pitch would bring down a BODY-CONTROL score.
BREAKAWAY BEHAVIOR deals with how a car reacts to finding and exceeding its limits. Snap or lift-throttle oversteer would shave a point or two from this score.
BRAKE FEEL AND RESPONSE are combined into one category. A brake pedal should be firm and easy to modulate without a dead spot in the first few inches of travel.
ERGONOMICS refers to the man-machine interface. In this test, we limit ergonomics to handling-related aspects. For example: The driver’s seat, pedal placement, and driving position—not the switchgear—determine a car’s score.
FUN TO DRIVE is, well, pretty much self-explanatory.
All six cars, just by virtue of being on this list, are starting with pretty high base-level credentials. But only one will claim the title of best-handling car for less than $40,000.