Payne: Subaru Outback’s sensible chic

Posted by hpayne on December 8, 2014

Outback has maintained the loyalty of Ben & Jerry’s-Chunky-Monkey-eating hipsters while making the most vanilla-looking cars on the planet. Who needs heels to climb Mt. Everest?

2015 Subaru Outback

‘There’s nothing I can’t reach in my Subaru,” goesthe Subaru ad. I get carried away with that sometimes.

A new, 2015 Subaru Outback crossover arrived in my driveway just as the first winter storm pummeled Detroit last month. Armed with a ‘Ru, I was determined to pummel right back.

I jumped in. It fit like a glove. Surveyed the cockpit. All-wheel drive. Yup, it’s a Subaru all right. Tore out of my driveway through three inches of snow, stabbed the brakes, rotated the Symmetrical All-Wheel Drive with X Mode system (that’s AWD for short) at the apex, and … plowed straight across the road, through my neighbor’s lawn, and into a drainage ditch.

Dang. Fortunately, there nothing a Subaru can get me into that it can’t get me out of. With Outback’s healthy, 8.7-inch ground clearance and all four wheels churning, I straddled the ditch and eased effortlessly back onto the main road. A minor detour. No harm done.

Mrs. Payne called me at work a short time later. “Were those your tire marks across the neighbor’s lawn?” (Sigh. Murphy’s second law: Your wife or a cop will always be there when you screw up.)

I blame Subaru marketing.

The new Outback comes shod with the same torque-vectoring technology as their all-wheel drive sports sedan, the WRX STI. You’ll recall I blew up Laguna Seca Raceway in this $38K, heat-seeking missile last February thanks to its apex-hugging AWD system. Arm the more rugged Outback with the same technology? Banzai!

Thanks to the affordable off-road Outback and on-track STI, Subaru has managed the unusual feat of making loyalists (“evangelists” Subaru likes to call them) out of tree-huggers and motor-heads alike.

With its rugged, all-wheel personality, the versatile Outback has long been a favorite of liberal bark-munchers from Maine to Washington state. Meanwhile, the fire-breathing, Sopwith Camel-winged STI has been the envy of carbon-swigging, beer-belching hot rodders from California to the Carolinas.

The bipolar personality is not as illogical as it appears. The Outback caters to athletes who enjoy exploring the outdoors — the WRX to rally jocks who enjoy conquering the outdoors. But it all makes for some interesting bedfellows.

Subaru is as at home partnering with environmental groups like the National Park Foundation as it is with high-performance oil companies like Motul. Heck, my wife and I have as much use for greenies as a fish does for a bicycle. Yet we own a compact Impreza wagon because it is the perfect intersection of sport and utility — it shares the same platform as the WRX, yet provides my wife the winter security of AWD.

The Outback, on the other hand, should never be mistaken for a sports car. My accidental, off-road antics being Exhibit A.

I attacked my snowy, cul-de-sac turn like a STI might attack a dirt road. But the Outback is 10 inches longer and walks around on stilts compared to the squat STI. Result? Neighbor’s-lawn-exploring understeer. Oops.

Once I stopped treating the tree-hugger like a motor-head, the Outback is a joy.

It is affordable and competent. Night or day. Sun or snow. Its buttons are where they should be. Roomy, heated front seats. Plenty more room in the heated rear seats to seat more. Lotsa cargo space in the hatch for their stuff. The Outback isn’t so big that you have to worry about collecting a wall while backing out of a parking space — and isn’t so small you have to worry about getting flattened against a wall by a wayward pickup. It does what you ask. It’s as loyal as a beagle.

“It’s not every day you find a companion as loyal as a Subaru,” goes another adorable ‘Ru ad. “Love. It’s what makes a Subaru a Subaru.”

Which is a good thing too, because only a mother could love something as homely as the Outback.

Not ugly, mind you. Just homely. Which is a major improvement from the turn-of-the-century Subarus which were as frightful to look at as a bulldog in an argyle sweater. Indeed, one of Subaru’s most remarkable attributes is that it has maintained the loyalty of Baby Boom, Ben & Jerry’s-Chunky-Monkey-eating hipsters while making the most vanilla-looking cars on the planet.

Mindful of this shortcoming, Subaru has been making regular trips to the beauty parlor, and the 2015 Outback — like the remade WRX and Legacy sedan before it, has received a fashionably handsome hexagon grille.

Outback is part of a Subaru lineup that crams the mid-size segment with remarkably affordable vehicles. At a ridiculously low $26,995, the Outback sits on the same chassis as the Legacy sedan. For five grand less you can get the Subaru Crosstrek crossover which is similarly twinned with the compact Impreza sedan. Crammed between them is the Forester crossover. That’s a lot of product in a $22K-$27K space.

Outback owners swear by its bulletproof dependability, AWD durability, and award-winning safety credentials (run one off a Lake Michigan pier and it’ll probably float to safety on its eight air bags). So they can be forgiven its shortcomings.

The Outback (like Brother Legacy) is noticeably noisier than its competition despite an acoustic glass upgrade. The 2.5-liter BOXER engine buzz is drowned out only by the wind howling across the slim A-pillars. Despite its friendlier grille, the Outback’s flanks are plain while the black cladding along its skirts is as out of place as knee pads on a cheerleader.

“So what?” an Outback would say if it could talk.

Plain is hip, people. Do rock climbers wear heels? Do mountain climbers pack Perrier in their canteens?

The Outback is the anti-brand brand. If you lust for brand identity then you can pay $52,000 for a BMW X5 with 13-cubic feet less interior volume. Or $31K for a much smaller Jeep Cherokee. The Outback was a hip crossover before anybody knew what a crossover was. In fact, the Outback is really a station wagon sitting 8.7 inches off the ground.

As for me and my wife, we’ll stick with our Impreza wagon. Though come spring I’ll keep my eye out for a mouth-breathing, 305-horsepower WRX STI in my driveway. I wonder what my wife will say when she sees I’ve been doing doughnuts in our lawn …

2015 Subaru Outback

Vehicle type: Front-engine, all-wheel-drive, five passenger crossover

Price: $26,995 base ($31,535 as tested)

Power plant: 2.5-liter, dual overhead-cam, BOXER 4-cylinder

Power: 175 horsepower, 174 pound-feet of torque

Transmission: Continuously-variable automatic transmission with six-speed manual paddles

Performance: 0-60 mph, 9.3 seconds (manufacturer); towing: 2,700 lbs.

Weight: 3,593 pounds

Fuel economy: EPA 25 mpg city/33 mpg highway/28 mpg combined

Report card

Highs: Gobs of interior room; all-wheel drive

Lows: Noisier than most; vanilla styling

Overall: ★★★

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