The Contenders

2009 Nissan Maxima

What They Did Right: Design and shape is on the right track and the engine delivers the right punch while still offering good mpg numbers

Room For Improvement: The CVT doesn't keep up with sporty feel of the chassis and still too much torque steer

Maybe it's that we've just come out of a marathon political season that seemed like it would never end, but suspicions are bound to arise when hearing promises that sound too good to be true. Nissan claims the Maxima is the best-handling front-engine, front-drive sports sedan in the world. That might be a great sound bite for a salesman, but we aren't fooled. In fact, to rephrase a response from a long-ago political debate: "We know sports cars. Sports cars are a good friend of ours. And Maxima, you are no four-door sport car." So now that we know what it isn't, let's focus on what it is.

The new Maxima has been completely redesigned, making its overall size shorter and wider, with many handling improvements coming as a result of a lighter and stiffer (by 15 percent) chassis. The wider, more angular wheelwell shoulders and hips (giving it a top-view look of an hourglass) accentuate the new lower stance, echoing the styling cues of the GT-R. This we liked. However, that's where the comparisons stopped. The new front-drive D-platform is an improvement over the previous gen, but editors still found the chassis a bit stiff and noisy on some of our smoother drive routes and almost spongy through the tight cornering sections where we would have liked more control. And several test drivers noted a tendency for this front-driver to understeer. That's not something you'd expect from a sport sedan, though it shouldn't come as a huge surprise that a midsize front-drive four-door weighing more than 3600 pounds pushes quite a bit through the corners.

Of note, the newly modified engine does offer 35 more horsepower and is quite responsive; however, the CVT (although modified as well) doesn't manage to turn that added power into driving enjoyment. In fact, as good as the CVT is (thankfully it has paddle shifters), it's a bit of a contradiction for a car that wants to be the best handling (front drive or otherwise) vehicle in its class.

- Mark Williams