Honda S2000 Edition 100 (2009) CAR review

one thing that has stopped me from buying S2000, and indeed made me buy a zippy Civic, is the styling. bland beyond belief.

my wives have been reasonably knowledgeable of cars, but I could not convince them that S2000 is something I should remark about when passing.

well, they also hated TT, Z4, Boxter and the old SLK. and the new SLK too.

sporty car should also look sporty, musclebound, masculine. the above do not. they are butch in LGBT sense. and S2000 is mousy.

at least the present Civic hatch is bold. and 1990 civic 2-door was classic shape (now aped by C30 and Scirocco among others).

would it have been too much to ask for some bulges, some louvres and a double headlights????

I really liked this car, and I was tempted to buy one instead of my Elise.    Both have a kind of "purity" the Honda is an embodiment of using "standard" engineering solutions to produce an exhiliarating and affordable car, the Elise one of automotive minimalism.   I test-drove the S2000 and I found it great fun, though this was before they sorted out the tendency for the back to overtake the front, so fun tempered with caution....  Highlights were the engine and gearbox, but the whole car was pretty damned good.   I don't recall that I found the cabin or materials in any way "cheap", or "tatty"  but I guess that's largely a matter of taste (or the lack of it).    Compared to the Elise it was very luxurious!

I bought the Elise, and I don't regret it, apart from the nasty  K-Series motor, which works fine, but doesn't live up to the car's poise & dynamics.    Of course many people like myself with K Series Elises are bunging Honda motors in them (though not that in the S2000) .  The frantic rev-band is fun, and the lack of low-down grunt not a major issue in an 800Kg car...

JB - May I suggest that you try being objective for once in your life; it could be an enlightening experience for you. How can you comment so vehemently on a car that you have not driven? If you did, you would find that the S2000’s gearbox is the finest manual ‘box in production bar none (far better than anything Porsche or BMW can produce). The engine is a masterpiece, and the interior is just so – everything is to hand and it is certainly not cheap & tacky as you say. I am saying this from a buyers perspective; one who has looked into and driven Boxters & Z4’s (a Boxter’s interior is really nothing to write home about, and a Z4’s is bland beyond belief, and no more or less solid), and came to the conclusion that the S2000 was a superior car, hence I made the decision to buy it based on real world experience, rather than your unsubstantiated and clearly biased opinions. And that is before we get to the driving experience, which again from having driven all three models I concluded that I garnered more enjoyment & pure driving pleasure from the S2000.

Then, you say (without authority) that the NSX was no match for a 911? Please, my friend, you truly are one uneducated individual. Firstly, you have obviously never driven an NSX. If you had, you would know that the car wiped the floor with the opposition when it was released, and forced Ferrari and Porsche to get their acts together and produce the cars that they do today. The car was still a force to be reckoned with right at the end of its production life (you obviously never heard about the NSX Type-R, which was EVO’s Car of the Year in 2002 and beat a Porsche 911 along the way, along with every other significant performance car released in that year). Now that is some accolade my friend, and rather contradicts your weak argument that the car was in production for too long.

To sum up, the way in which you express yourself does not win you any respect, and I think you should consider your opinions rather more before mouthing off without any authority or experience of the car in question.