From the September 2018 issue

Try to keep this on the down low. There’s a road about an hour and a half north of Los Angeles that is nearly empty every weekday, and it’s one of the best any of us has driven. Oh, and here’s a map and directions, but, again, let’s just keep this between us. Come on, be cool.



View Photos Marc Urbano Car and Driver

Forest Highway 95 begins west of Frazier Park, a pine-scented hamlet perched nearly a mile high in the San Emigdio Mountains, just off Interstate 5. Drive 13 miles past Frazier Park on Cuddy Valley Road and you’ll pass right over the San Andreas Fault, where the Pacific and North American plates stand at a détente for the moment. But the real earth shaker is ahead. There’s no Forest Highway 95 sign, so keep an eye out for the Mil Potrero Highway as you cross into the Los Padres National Forest.

Mil is Spanish for “thousand,” and a potrero is a large clearing or meadow, a flat chunk of land on a mountainside. If you’re swept up by an overwhelming urge to have a picnic, or you think, “Hey, a horse would look great there,” chances are you’re looking at a potrero.

View Photos Marc Urbano Car and Driver

While there probably are a thousand places along this highway to lay a gingham blanket or park a horse, we’re flying too fast in the new Genesis G70 to notice. The third sedan from Hyundai’s fledgling luxury brand, the G70 has a serious shot at giving Genesis some sports-sedan credibility. It’s certainly sized for battle. A 111.6-inch wheelbase and 184.4-inch length give it roughly the same dimensions as the segment’s progenitor, the BMW 3-series. Built on the same rear- or all-wheel-drive platform as the Kia Stinger, the Genesis snips almost three inches from the wheelbase of its hatchback cousin and is about half a foot shorter, too. Like the Stinger, the G70 can be had with either a ­turbocharged 255-hp 2.0-liter inline-four or our test car’s twin-turbo­charged 365-hp 3.3-liter V-6. Unlike the Stinger, there’s a manual option for the 2.0-liter.

A short front overhang, blunt face, and ample dash-to-axle length—the distance from the base of the A-pillar to the front-wheel center—give the G70 the proportions, if not the appearance, of an Alfa Romeo Giulia. The body flares out below the thick boneline that begins in the front fender and runs the length of the car. Have you heard Coco Chanel’s advice about removing one item before leaving the house? Well, the Genesis design team hadn’t, because there’s a gratuitous copper-tinted-chrome boomerang stuck on the front fender. Misstep aside, the G70 allures from every angle and treads the line between elegant and menacing. As mentioned, it has a whiff of the Giulia, but also a schmear of Infiniti Q50. And yet, aside from the Bentley-like wings of the Genesis badge, there’s nothing in particular a lawyer could point to and shout, “Intellectual property infringement!”

View Photos Silly Genesis! Apparently it doesn’t know that, in the modern premium-car segment, all knobs, gauges, and switches are to be replaced by screens. Marc Urbano Car and Driver

The first five miles of Mil Potrero might have you shouting expletives prefaced by “holy” as the road climbs and falls through multiple derivatives of and variations on Laguna Seca’s famous corkscrew. We move the G70 out of Comfort and switch the drive mode to Sport. The dampers stiffen slightly, the steering requires a bit more muscle, and the eight-speed automatic begins to hold on to lower gears. Paddles on the steering wheel allow for manual control, and the G70 won’t upshift or revert to automatic mode if it detects cornering. Even in Sport mode, the transmission isn’t programmed aggressively enough and inevitably selects too high a gear when left to its own devices.

If you’re going to encounter a car on this 29-mile drive, it’ll happen in the first five. They lead to Pine Mountain Club, a small community whose log buildings house a couple of restaurants. It’s also the last chance for gas for about 30 miles. A late-’90s Chevy Silverado refuses to pull into a turnout, so our attention turns to the G70’s interior. Unlike most of its competition, the G70 doesn’t have a controller between the seats to operate its infotainment system. Instead, there’s a responsive 8.0-inch touchscreen with redundant buttons to quickly select various functions—audio, phone, navigation, and vehicle settings. In front, soft leather seats have lateral bolsters that can be set to inflate whenever you select Sport mode. And it’s not just the seat that wraps the driver. The center stack is canted to bring its screen and switchgear closer as well. It’s enveloping and intimate, but not spacious. Neither is the rear seat. The 60/40 split-folding bench is supportive and headroom is adequate, but legroom is lacking.

View Photos Marc Urbano Car and Driver

Getting stuck behind another vehicle on Mil Potrero is no reason to fret. Freedom is on the other side of Pine Mountain. While the occasional camper or motorcyclist is seen on this stretch, it’s rare. On a Monday morning, we don’t come across a single vehicle traveling in our direction. Along with traffic, the pines and picnic spots vanish a few miles west of Pine Mountain. The road tightens as it cuts into the mountain, and sage supplants pines. Without any fanfare, Mil Potrero ends and becomes Hudson Ranch Road. Sun-dried asphalt rises skyward. The G70 traces a ridge above two ­valleys that stretch to the rest of the San Emigdio range. As the clouds edge closer, the real fun begins.

Even past 6000 feet, the G70’s twin turbos ensure that there’s no discernible loss in power. A hint of turbo lag is the only evidence of unnatural aspiration—well, besides the unnatural hit of 376 pound-feet of torque at 1300 rpm. The V-6 easily calls up big numbers in the head-up display. But while altitude doesn’t appear to affect output, something does seem a little off. In testing, our rear-drive G70 Dynamic Special Edition ran to 60 mph in 4.7 seconds, 0.3 second behind the 150-pound-heavier rear-drive Stinger. Our quarter-mile trap speed of 106 mph was five off the Stinger’s, too, which points to a lack of power. We’re eager to test a different G70 to see if those numbers improve.

View Photos Marc Urbano Car and Driver

Hudson Ranch’s tight corner combinations highlight the G70’s chassis tuning. It keeps roll in check, and the spring rates and damping deflect the worst dips and midcorner yips the road can throw at it. The Dynamic Special Edition comes with staggered Michelin Pilot Sport 4S tires that provide a stable and impressive 0.95 g of stick. While the steering doesn’t bristle with the feedback of a sports car, it gels with the suspension’s responses. Like all great sports sedans, the G70 provides a back-and-forth dialogue through the controls, and its consistent reactions to inputs urge you to press harder. When it is time to slow down, the G70’s Brembo brakes can stop it from 70 mph in 164 feet. One gripe: Rolling into the throttle while exiting a corner awakens the Dynamic Torque Vectoring Control system, which clamps the inside rear brake to induce a slightly unsettling yaw that sends a twitch through the rear end. Remember grabbing your Big Wheel’s brake, the one that made it spin out? The same principle applies here. The goal is to reduce understeer and redirect the car’s nose inward. But it’s too abrupt and is unnecessary in a chassis that is other­wise precise, fluid, satisfying, and eager to please. Shutting off stability control disables the system, but we like having a safety net on Hudson Ranch.

About 20 miles in sits the Bitter Creek National Wildlife Refuge and the last of the tight stuff. Home to about 80 California condors, the 14,097-acre site is set in rolling hills bleached blond by the relentless sun. The road flattens. Corners and straights pull farther apart. Actual horses dot the landscape. All is serene inside and out. Even in Sport mode, the ride remains civil. A mere 65 decibels intrude at 70 mph, and it’s barely louder at 90 mph. The G70 begins to show its luxury side, effortlessly coddling and gliding across the land. Should you want to turn up the volume, the G70 comes with an Active Engine Sound feature that brings more of the engine into the cabin by playing it through the Lexicon audio system’s 15 speakers. In our wide-open-throttle test, there’s not much of a difference between Off, Minimized, and Normal modes.

View Photos The G70 should be slightly quicker than the heavier Kia Stinger, with which it shares its 365-hp twin-turbo 3.3-liter V-6. But our example was not. Marc Urbano Car and Driver

Noise levels fall further with the drive mode set to Comfort or Eco. In these settings, the transmission slips into neutral when coasting to boost fuel economy. We recorded 20 mpg in nearly 500 miles, but we saw as high as 25 mpg on 129 miles of freeway driving. EPA numbers of 18 city and 26 highway fall short of competitors’.

As we go to press, Genesis hasn’t announced the G70’s most important number: the price. A base 2.0-liter version should start around $34,000 when the G70 hits dealerships this month. Re-creating our fully loaded Dynamic Special Edition test car will likely require a $50,000 check. Limited to 400 units, the Special Edition comes with the G70’s most aggressive chassis tune, tires, and Dynamic Torque Vectoring Control, which may explain its overtness. Our nits are pretty minor. We could do without the copper chevron on the fender and handling hinkiness introduced by the brake-based vectoring. That’s pretty much it.

After 29 miles and a few name changes, we reach the end of Hudson Ranch Road. The G70 has proved to be a true sports sedan that is up to the challenge posed by one of our favorite roads. Over every dip, turn, and straight, the G70 has amused, captivated, and even soothed us. But maybe we’re not done after all. Instead of descending into Maricopa on State Route 166, we turn around. We want more. A U-turn makes this terminus another genesis.

Competitors

Car and Driver

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