By Jeff Stork

KIA showed off their new 2011 Sportage in San Francisco last week.
It’s the fifth all new product in just under two years, following on the
heels of the Soul, the subcompact Forte sedan, the two door derivative
Koup, and the Sorrento SUV.

It’s the third generation of Sportage, and this one looks like
it came from Extreme Makeover: Kia Edition. It has a much larger
footptrint — wider and longer, with expressive exterior styling in the
flavor of a miniaturized Audi Q7 (no surprise to learn it was penned by
former Audi stylist Peter Schreyer) and giant 18″ wheels (standard on
EX) which are worthy of the coolest Tonka trucks. Did I mention that the
target audience is single and male? It’s a stylish and playful look
which has a MUCH more upmarket look than its predecessors. Status
seekers might consider swiping a set of interlocking rings for the
grille. I think the Sportage could carry it off.

A much more upmarket execution permeates the interior as well. I
called it a manpurse inside: a black-on-black compartment with
comfortable, well-tailored leather seats, an Infinity Audio System with
Bluetooth, USB ,Sirius Satellite Radio heated and cooled driver’s seat,
and a ginormous Panorama sunroof. Yes, it’s a lot of black but so is a
Coach bag, and I found the interior much more pleasing and honest than fake wood
or fake aluminum or the fake carbon fibre Europeans love so much
these days. (Didn’t they malign us for our fake wood in the 70’s?
All fashion comes back, I guess.) The storage console is larger now,
the glove box is cooled (Evian, anyone?), and the door pockets are roomy.
All in all, a well designed manpurse, and the rear seat will be more
than comfy for taking the French Bulldogs to Palm Springs for the
weekend. Coming later in the year is Kia’s handsfree UVO system,
developed by Microsoft and bearing more than a few similarities to Ford’s Sync. But
more of that when it comes on stream.

Power comes from the 2.4 litre Theta four-cylinder engine. In this
guise, it produces 176 hp, earning 22 mpg in the city and 31 highway.
Compared to the last gen’s V6, it has a bit more power, a bit less
torque, and quite a bit better highway fuel economy. For those who need
more go, a 270 hp turbo will be introduced mid-year.

Driving impressions are favorable. The Theta engine idles very
smoothly and is quite adequate for the car’s needs, although I think the turbo will be more suitable for sporting drivers. While not a sports
car, the Sportage handled quite nicely on the twisting roads of Half
Moon Bay: the increased width made it feel quite stable, and the ride
was quite pleasant for a vehicle of this wheelbase. Again, a big
improvement over past generations and in no way a “penalty box.”

Possibly the biggest improvement is invisible to the naked
eye: residual value. In the retail biz, the better the residual, the
lower the lease payment and traditionally Kia has not been blessed with
high residuals. However, one of the benefits of Kia’s reinvention has
been an improvement in the residual values that lenders have assigned to
Kia models. In the case of Sportage, the improvement has been dramatic.
A 36 month residual value of 61% has been assigned to the base
Sportage, up twenty-two percentage points over the 2010 model. This is
as dramatic of an improvement as I have ever seen in one year, and 
combined with the price point of the car ($18,990 base and fully
equipped in upper twenties), it should result in a very compelling
affordability story. Perhaps I should have mentioned that first.

So if your taste runs toward the tailored Audi look but budget
constraints preclude such a reality, you might take a look at the
Sportage. I was quite favorably impressed.

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