Moving stuff and hauling ass in a diesel Ford Transit - RoadandTrack.com (blog)
Originally published in the June 2015 issue of Road & Track. I was reminded of this two days ago, when I drove to Seattle from Road & Track's home in Ann Arbor, Michigan. (Old job: Executive Editor. New job: Editor at Large. Most of our house went into a moving truck. The rest came with me, in a diesel Ford Transit van borrowed from Dearborn. The Ford left the Midwest holding my dog, my friend and co-driver Jeff Diehl, and boxes of fragile stuff I wanted to keep an eye on. Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, North Dakota, Montana, Idaho, Washington. You expect a fully loaded cargo van to drive like garbage, a mule with too many bags. The Transit, a bright light in the current flock of European-style vans, sat carefree and comfy at 85 mph, bounding along on a wave of torque. Pile into a tight corner, and the stiffly sprung rear axle would just kind of roll-spit you out the other side, like an old Mustang on Percocet. It made the Ford Econoline feel like the Chrysler Building on wheels and most other modern vans seem to have been drawn up by apes. There was babbling about the Transit's greatness to no one in particular. ") In the mountains near Bozeman, Montana, I became consumed by an absurd, titanic battle with an Audi A4 Avant, countering the Transit's lack of pace with a hefty dose of bravado. When we finally passed the Audi, Jeff looked into the driver's window. "Every van dies. Not every van really lives. Source: www.roadandtrack.com
