Lifestyle Legitimizer
Is it a car? A truck? A crossover? Why does it matter. Well, sure it kind of does. But people who have specific trucking needs already know what they want out of a vehicle. Sometimes what we need is an all-rounder that perhaps veers towards a certain mindset, but still has enough grace to cover the more mundane aspects of daily motoring. Why do you think the crossover is king? But its reign doesn’t need to be revolting. Within this cover-all subsect, there’s still room for adventure in both design and purpose – and that’s where we can find vehicles like Hyundai’s Santa Cruz.
It looks like a Tucson – and as we’ll soon learn, drives like a Tucson. But it’s not a Tucson. It’s not a Chevy Silverado either, or a Ford Ranger for that matter. It may in fact, be a little better. Let’s go to bed. The bed. Hyundai’s Santa Cruz may not tickle the fancy of your typical trucker, with a rather stumpy, but smart bed, complete with an integrated retracting cover, tie down points, drain plugs, storage compartments and built-in lighting. The tailgate can be adjusted to help accommodate longer items, but if trips to the lumber yard are your forte, you’d be better suited looking elsewhere than the Santa Cruz
Hyundai bills the Santa Cruz as a Sports Adventure Vehicle. SAVvy. It looks the part with its higher ride height, chunky fender cladding and a towing capacity of 5000lbs. Cottage trails and dirt roads beware! Under the hood is a 2.5L turbocharged 4-cylinder good for just over 280 horsepower and 311 lb-ft of torque, paired to a salaciously wet 8-speed dual clutch transmission and an AWD drivetrain which Hyundai say can handle road, snow, mud and sand. Canadians may have to take their word on that last one. The engine feels punchy and never leaves you wanting more. A week of mixed driving saw around 11.2 L/100km in fuel economy.
Like its face suggests, there is a lot of Tucson in the Santa Cruz. It’s no longer a suggestion when you step inside. It seems virtually identical, down to the lack of physical buttons which we have previously bemoaned. It’s interesting that Hyundai, a brand with no consistent interiors across the board, chose to transplant in this case. Financially, it makes sense. But given the amount of work it took to design an entirely new body around the Tucson’s face…
It's not a bad interior by any means. There are a lot of creature comforts on tap – but no heated rear seats, oddly enough. We also are not a fan of Hyundai’s infotainment screen displaying a massive Android Auto logo during phone projection. Every waiting room television screen in Ontario with burnt-in CP24 graphics gives us fear of eventual burn-in on this infotainment screen. We also found phone projection was rather slow to reconnect, and would sometimes require multiple plugs and unplugs to get things right.
Dedicated trucks like Toyota’s Tacoma or the GMC Sierra have a distinct driving feel. It’s almost rough and unrefined but fitting. You won’t get that in the Santa Cruz. Its crossover origins mean it’s perfectly palatable on most drivable surfaces. There is a little bit of body roll if you take a corner with gusto, but really, this ‘SAV’ was not made to do that. It’s an enjoyable drive, until you try to change lanes. This thing has an absolutely horrendous blind spot thanks to a much smaller rear window coupled with a massive pillar. Thankfully there is a slew of safety features including some blind spot monitoring, but it’s really not ideal that you almost have to depend on these rather than being able to perform a shoulder check.
So it drives nicely, ticks many boxes, looks rugged and ready for adventure and is smartly designed. How much will it set you back? Our tester, the fully loaded Ultimate spec, rung in at just under $45,000. That puts it around the same price as a well equipped Ford Maverick, ringing in at just over $42,000. What do you get for that extra $3ish-thousand? We’d argue you get a little more refinement and focus on a comfortable daily driver with a whiff of adventuring prospects. The Maverick is a little clearer with its intent and capability, while the Santa Cruz is better suited for those who save their adventuring for the weekend.
With many of us feeling cabin fever thanks to a global pandemic, nature’s call can feel more powerful than ever – and anyone with romanticized visions of rugged road trips to the cottage or national parks may imagine some rougher terrain along the way. Not necessarily the type of ground a sedan might be suited for. We want something with capability, but still compact enough to get us around the city or suburbs in style and comfort – and if the crossover is getting a little too amorphous for your liking – the Santa Cruz, though not perfect, just may be perfect enough.
Σχόλια