Car Magazine politics

[meFiSTo]

It's hard to argue with some of the cars in this recent list of top cars with manual transmissions:

http://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/g6427/20-best-cars-with-manual-transmission/?slide=16

But after all the raving about the Fiesta ST and its success in admittedly subjective comparisons, these folks picked a Fiat Abarth and a Mini Cooper over the Ford. Smells like advertiser politics to me. Whatever. I get it. The Focus RS is on this list, as is the GT350. But when "expert" reviewers actually DRIVE the Fiesta ST, they choose it almost unanimously over the Mini and Fiat options in the one area where having a stick shift matters -- driving experience.

Just had to get that off my chest.

 

[frankiefiesta]

Maybe they forgot about the fiesta ST?? Lol who knows. But you're right, when in direct comparison the fiST won.

I've noticed the politics over the years.. Motortrend loves GM and VW
Car and driver loves BMW

 

[FatGuyInALittleCar]

Funny... You think Road&Track is a car magazine! Not since Larry Webster got his hands on it and "reinvented" it. Now it's like a cross between a Men's lifestyle mag, the Robb Report and Cigar Aficionado. Not worth the paper it's printed on.

 

[2Cool]

Normally you can determine the winner without reading the article just by looking at the ads in the mag, the company with the most advertisements wins the comparison.

Even if their product fails in every category, the magazine will fluff it with a bogus subjective category. Example is Motor Trend's "Gotta Have It" grading they added way back when they compared the new for '05 Mustang GT vs. the Pontiac GTO. The Goat actually killed the GT in every category, but lost due to the brand new grading category. Coincidentally Ford was a major advertiser that year.

Read the mags for entertainment, then make your own judgments based on multiple testing sources.

 

[Wimp Lo]

I saw one magazine claim that the Fiesta ST was left out of a comparison because it hadn't been updated, you could get the same car last year (this was 2015).

There is a big discrepancy in advertizing, the 500 is Fiat's main car, their entire ad budget goes to it and the Abarth is the halo version. Mini is the same. Ford hardly mentions the Fiesta ST in the US.

I don't mind very much, it lets my car keep a low profile.

 

[Sourskittle]

Saw an article in "car and driver". It was called , "cheap speed".

The supercharged and way way slower and more expensive and a way way way way way slower and way way more expensive honda car was picked over the cheapest and fastest car, the srt4 because..... The srt4 had the most aggressive exhaust. Lmao... Really? "Cheap speed" and the most expensive and slowest car wins??...

Pretty much every since then, I've realized, even with fords, the latest, newest model is always the better tested car.

Also noted that when cars first come out, they run one set of times during testing and 5 years later, those times are now slower and the new car runs the same times at the old ones ( like EVO 8's running 13.0, then when the evo 9 came out, it suddenly runs 13.9 and the new evo runs 13.1. Then the evo 10 comes out and runs 13.4 and the evo 9 now runs 13.9 ).

 

[Joker328]

Jalopnik did a similar list today and the FiST was on there at least: http://jalopnik.com/these-affordable-enthusiast-cars-prove-were-in-a-new-go-1758571029