Gearhead Street Customs - The Bandit Has Landed

First we pulled the T/A out onto the highway and prepared for the "How Many Gears can it Chirp" test-First gear, no problem; Second gear, easy; Third gear, simple; and Fourth gear, music to our ears. If the car owners near us at the start of our gear shifts were giving us the "wow" look seconds later, we couldn't tell, as they were too far back in the rear-view mirror to see.

Next came our "How Does the Car Ride on the Street" test. Though the wheels/tires may not be ideal for dragstrip or road course use, they were just fine for the street. The T/A passed the "Goldilocks" test, that is, it didn't feel too hard, or too soft, but just right. We then passed over a set of railroad tracks; there was no harsh bump, spine-jarring vibration, or noticeable body-flex. The KW non-adjustable coilovers felt very well matched to the application.

Third was the "Downshift and Accelerate" test, as many owners would do to enter or pass on the highway. Were we to expect torque to be soft when we smashed the gas pedal? Absolutely not. Pushing through to Third, Third to Second, and Second to First, the T/A had impressive torque response in the 1,600-6,500 rpm range.

Finally, how about its looks? The 2010 T/A is one of the most attention-getting cars HPP has tested. The public's positive reaction was exactly as we had been forewarned-overwhelming. We expect hard-core Pontiac fans to instantly fall in love with the GSC 2010 T/A, but the passion for the car is universal; it transcends age groups, brand loyalty, and economic status. This fact was made very clear to us when a driver in a BMW 3 Series convertible motioned at a stoplight with an ear-to-ear grin and as many thumbs-up as his two hands would allow. A younger driver in a Mustang asked us where he could buy the car, and whether they'd take his Mustang in trade. A third driver in a Kia Sedona shouted at us, "You're driving my dream car. When's GM coming out with the new T/A?"

With some grassroots public opinion gathered and the street driving impressions complete, instrumented testing was next.

Dragstrip
The temperature at Gainesville Raceway during our testing ranged from 84.0 to 88.0 degrees. Barometric pressure was measured at 30.00 hg and the dew point was 70 degrees. The track is 167 feet above sea level and density altitude ranged from 2,033-2,300 feet, so we'll use a factor of 0.9744 for e.t. and 1.0269 for mph for 2,200 feet to chart the theoretical best performance at sea level on the best pass. The other numbers are the actual e.t.'s, uncorrected.

We used three drivers for the dragstrip testing, Source Interlink's Evan Smith, the author, and Associate Editor Kevin DiOssi. Smith went first. After lightly roasting the tires, he launched at 2,500 rpm, shifted the gears at 6,500 rpm, and set the best time of the day at an uncorrected 13.08 seconds at 111.32 mph. DiOssi was next. He treated the T/A to a tire-smoking burnout and put down two consecutive passes, a 13.33 followed by a 13.26. The author made the last quarter-mile pass, no burnout, and pushed the T/A to a 13.31 e.t. at 110.92 mph. (See chart.)

Road Course
We set up Gainesville Raceway's road course for one of its most-difficult configurations: a 1.06-mile circuit that included eight turns (one of them a treacherous 260-degree turn), a 1,000-foot high-speed straightaway, and a tricky and hard-to-conquer S-curve. DiOssi was this test's driver. He made four laps, of which we've listed the best two.