How many times in the past few years have you read, or been told, that we are currently experiencing a Golden Age of automotive performance? It’s easy to see why people would feel that way. The horsepower has never been higher, and the laptimes have never been lower. You can buy a nine-second supercar, a ten-second family sedan, or an eleven-second SUV. Honda will sell you a Civic that runs the Burgerkingring faster than a 996-generation Porsche Turbo. Today’s F-150 Ecoboost will smoke yesterday’s 32-valve Mustang Cobra in a drag race. Yeah, I’d say things are pretty good.

As has been the case with so many other pieces of good news in this country over the past decade, however, this performance Renaissance has mostly taken place on the fancy side of the tracks. If you can afford to spend more than the average new-car transaction price in America, a situation that puts you pretty high on the charts for income, risk tolerance, or both–well, my friend, you have some great choices. If, on the other hand, you’re looking in the bargain bin, then I’m afraid your choices for enthusiast-friendly rides are worse now than they’ve been in a long time.

Blame automotive fashion, for making small cars tall and tippy when they used to be low and sleek. Blame the government, for loading these already sluggish and heavy vehicles up with extra airbags and plenty of crash-test-friendly structural steel. Blame the automakers, most of whom have outsourced the engineering of everything smaller than a Camry to one of the low-cost countries. Unfortunately, playing the blame game won’t do a thing to restock the showrooms with low-cost, high-excitement compacts and subcompacts. If you want to haul the mail for Parcel Post rates, you’re going to need either a time machine or access to Craiglist, stat.

We’re going to go back to the Last Days Of Cheap Speed, and we’re looking for cars that have the unholy trinity of: fiery four-cylinder engine, enthusiastic compact chassis, and available clutch pedal. After a long stroll down memory lane and a thorough examination of my trackday notes from as long as seventeen years ago, I’ve come up with a few cut-price superstars that offer at least the pace of today’s Civic Si or VW GTI, for a quarter of the money. Now’s the time to pull the trigger on an old-school muscle compact, before they are swallowed by a combination of rust, deferred maintenance, and avoidable contact with various roadside obstacles.

The Hammer: Dodge SRT-4

Dodge

Available for just three model years, this car was the purest expression possible of the pace-over-perfection sport-compact philosophy. Mopar would sell you dealer-installed adjustable-boost kits to run a mid-twelve-second quarter-mile and stainless-steel German coilovers to break hearts at a trackday. The engine component list read like a tuner’s dream: everything was drop-forged and over-specced. 2004 and 2005 models have a limited-slip front diff; the 2005 ACR is the one to have if you can find one that hasn’t been abused to within an inch of its life. Be aware that the plastics will crumble and the seats will sink, if they haven’t already. Seven or eight grand should get you a decent one, but make sure the engine holds compression, since some of these were boosted to 500 horses or more. For a cheaper alternative, consider a 2002 Neon ACR or SXT for $3k, with an SRT swap down the road.

Afterburner Breadbox: Mazdaspeed 3

Mazda

It’s tough to say this right up front, but you have to put the 2010-and-up models of this five-door thrasher out of your mind. The facelifted MS3 put on a lot of weight and lost a lot of its edge. No worries, however; not only is the original model more fun, it’s also much cheaper. For around six thousand dollars, you can run low fourteens in style. The vast majority of these were modded to hell and back, so make verifiable originality a more important selection criterion than mileage or paint condition. Be aware that the MZR engine is not nearly as bulletproof as the SRT-4’s Mexican four-banger. Take a good look under the hood before you buy–but once you do, the coast is clear for you to take scalps from pretty much every factory-tune GTI ever made. Just hang on to the wheel nice and tight when you hit the gas.

If you’re worried about turbo reliability, choose a Civic Si from the eighth generation of 2006-2011–but be aware that you’re going to pay more and get much less pace in return.

The Athlete: Chevrolet Cobalt SS Turbo

Chevrolet

It’s easy to make an argument that the Cobalt SS, in turbocharged form, was the purest and most involving sport compact ever built. Start with the chassis, which outclasses the Neon by at least two generation of suspension-geometry design. Then consider the engine. In stock trim, it’s in the same neighborhood as the Neon and the Mazdaspeed, although it doesn’t respond quite as well to tuning. These cars are trackday killers; with a set of Hoosier tires and performance brake pads you’ll be cleared to hunt pretty much everything short of an E46 M3 or a 987S Boxster. Plus, all the parts are dirt cheap.

The Turbo SS is such a cult car that it’s virtually impossible to find one on the used market. Your best bet is to join a few forums and be ready to pull the trigger on short notice for the right car. Low mileage examples continue to fetch over ten grand, but if you have cash in hand it’s possible to find a driver-grade example for seven or eight. Supercharged SS coupes are worth maybe half that; if you are really on a budget then it’s not a bad option. And look on the bright side: you’d still be faster than pretty much all of today’s “sporty” small cars.

These three aren’t the only options out there–you could try a MINI or a GTI if you’re feeling adventurous, or one of the highly underrated 2.3-liter Focus ST4 sedans from 2006 or 2007 if you aren’t–but no matter which car you buy, now’s the time to do it. The final glory days of the supercar, or even the ponycar, might still be ahead, but the best years of sporting small cars are long past us now. Will they ever come back? I doubt it. We’d need a perfect-storm combination of: an economy with plenty of high-paying entry-level jobs, an automotive-fashion change back to traditional compact and subcompact proportions, and a willingness on the part of the automakers to put all these coffee-grinder turbo two-liters into something besides a 3500-pound crossover. I believe that you should never say never, but… it’s never going to happen. So buy now, or forever hold your peace.

This doesn’t mean that compact-car enthusiasm is dead forever. It could come back five or ten years from now, in the form of electric cars with low-riding bodies on “skateboard” backbone chassis. The low center of gravity that results from big battery packs and relatively flat electric motors won’t hurt either. But if your idea of automotive nirvana includes the whooshing noise of a blow-off valve or the siren song of a twin-cam engine at 7000rpm or above, now’s the time to do something about it. If you need further justification, just imagine that it’s 1975 and you’re in a position to buy a Sixties musclecar at pennies on the dollar. You’d do it, right? Here’s the thing about every Golden Age: there’s a silver lining for those of us who can make the right choices afterwards.

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