COUPE IMPRESSES, BUT NEEDS A FEW TWEAKS
I’ve always had a soft spot for coupes. They’re not all that practical, but there’s something about that styling that does it for me. And if they can back up those looks with performance, that’s even better.
Infiniti makes a looker out of its Q60 coupe, and it packs decent power into my top-end I-Line Red Sport tester. But there are some lacklustre spots, and while they don’t entirely ruin the car, fixing them could turn this car’s fortunes around.
Overhauled into a next-generation model a couple of years ago, the Q60 enters 2019 with just a few changes.
The base four-cylinder engine offered last year is gone, and the three trim levels — Luxe, Sport, and I-Line Red Sport — all use a 3.0-litre twin-turbo V6, along with a seven-speed automatic and all-wheel drive.
In the Luxe and Sport models, the V6 makes 300 horsepower and 295 pound-feet of torque, but in the Red Sport, it’s beefed up to 400 hp and 350 lb-ft. The Red Sport also adds an electronically controlled dynamic suspension, 20-inch wheels (instead of 19s on the base cars), and performance exhaust, along with a blacked-out grille and a carbon-fibre deck-lid spoiler.
Pricing starts at $53,795 for the Luxe and $55,795 for the Sport, while the Red Sport begins at $65,295. Funny, that: The Red Sport comes in seven colours, most of which add $750 to the bottom line. But if you actually want it in red, it’s an extra $1,000.
My tester also added a “ProActive” package of such items as lane-departure mitigation, adaptive cruise control, adaptive headlamps, blind-spot intervention, and automatic high-beam headlights — many of which I would have expected to be standard, not added in for the $3,200 cost of the package. The package also adds Direct Adaptive Steering,
a quicker-ratio version that lets you select settings for Sport and Sport-Plus, Standard, Snow, and Eco.
What’s never in question here is the Q60’s power plant. The engine knows exactly what it’s supposed to do, and it propels this coupe with authority. It’s quick, acceleration is linear with virtually no turbo lag, and it keeps pulling strong and hard from first press of throttle, through to über-effective passing power at highway speeds.
The transmission is a proper mate to it, with swift-smooth upshifts and satisfyingly blippy rev-matching on downshifts. And I like that it’s a standard PRND shifter, not one of those ghastly electronic push-pull things.
Clad in bright red calipers, the brakes have good bite and are easy to modulate.
Alas, the weak link in all of this is that optional steering system. It’s a steer-by-wire system, all electronic without a physical connection between steering wheel and steered wheels (a mechanical clutch bolts it all together if something malfunctions).
Infiniti has made considerable improvement over the first iteration of the system several years ago, but it’s not there yet. Even with the optional adaptive version set into the sport modes — and despite “direct” as part of its name — it lacks the crisp, direct response and feedback that’s part of being a sports coupe. The suspension also feels tuned more for comfort than sporty performance.
It’s a shame, because everything else points to this being a canyon-carver: The muscular good looks, the supportive seats — roomy up front, headroom-deficient in the rear — and the Red Sport’s sparkly silver carbonfibre interior trim, which sounds over the top but actually looks great in person.
The Q60 uses a dual-screen centre display that falls on both sides of the fence. I like that the navigation screen stays on up top and other functions are handled through the bottom screen, so if you’re following the map, it doesn’t disappear when you adjust something below.
And there are hard buttons for the climate control, as well as to quickly access the screen’s home or audio pages. But within those pages, things tend to get too fiddly.
A dial-and-button setup on the centre console for some map and camera functions seems detached from the rest of the system. The screens and their icons look dated. And Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, rapidly becoming the gold standard for the features lists on even economy grocery-getters, are noticeably absent.
There are many competitors in the $60,000 segment and drivers are comparing the Infiniti to some pretty heavy hitters in the sport-coupe market, and they generally want the latest and greatest.
The Q60 is gorgeous and that 400-hp engine is a winner, but it should handle better and you have to pop on some pricey options to outfit the car with several features that mainstream brands bundle into cars that cost thousands less.
Tighten the steering, adjust the add-ons, and the Q60 could kick some serious butt.