It’s the most won-der-ful time of the year! It’s time to announce the 2024 DoubleClutch.ca Car of the Year!
Hard to imagine now, but there were a few occasions earlier this year where we found ourselves worried. In the spring, we discussed amongst ourselves that our car schedule had been pretty bleak for the most part, and the upcoming few months didn’t look any better. I think it was right around then that we got a call about the Lamborghini Huracan Sterrato, and things went completely off the rails after that.
Once again, we found ourselves inundated with a wealth of fabulous cars new and old, borrowed and blue. In a year where we thought we’d be scrapping for stories, we found ourselves spoiled for choice, and had much to debate when it came time to pick our favourites of the year. We also tweaked things very slightly this year, adjusting the price split for performance cars and adding an extra category—because having a Mustang GT on the same playing field as a 911 GT3 seemed silly.
As always, when choosing a winner, we try to favour vehicles that are new or updated in the past model year, but as you’ll see, sometimes there are exceptions to the rule. So, let’s get to it.
Mainstream Car of the Year: Honda Civic Hybrid
This was uncontested. We’ve always liked the Honda Civic, and this newest-generation has been adored by us for its ability to do quite literally everything very, very well. It’s handsome inside and out, drives and handles beautifully, and has enough passenger space to make a lot of compact crossovers blush. The addition of the hybrid powertrain from the brilliant Accord makes an already pretty perfect recipe that much better, delivering more zip than the zippy Civic Si, with fuel economy that’s hard to top. Crossovers may have replaced little cars like this as the default mode of transportation, but no car asks a more poignant “why?” than the Civic Hybrid.
Premium Car of the Year: BMW 5 Series
This was a hotly contested category, with the votes split between BMW’s own 7 Series, and the Mercedes-Benz S-Class—the S 580e plug-in hybrid in particular generated a lot of goodwill for the brand around here. But the i5 ended up taking the crown for its blend of brilliant driving dynamics, breathtaking performance on the spicy M60 model, right-sized footprint, and excellent interior accommodations. Regardless of whether the 5er is powered by fuel-fired thunder or tamed lightning, it’s a winner at whatever it sets out to do—and to be frank, the fact that it’s much less bold in its exterior design than the big 7 tipped the scales in its favour.
Performance Car of the Year under $50,000: Mazda MX-5 Miata
Tastefully tweaked with subtle improvements and some meaningful quality of life updates inside, Mazda’s MX-5 Miata returns to its rightful home as the best budget performance car you can buy. To that end, it’s one of the most connected, satisfying, classically engaging driving experiences out there at any price. Still, we had a surprising amount of excellent options in this category with six nominees—seven, if you split the Toyobaru twins. We have to give an honourable mention to the Hyundai Elantra N for delivering fantastic fun and practicality in one package, but after all, the answer is always Miata. I don’t make the rules.
Performance Car of the Year between $50,000-$100,000: BMW Z4 M40i
This was our most stacked category with eight nominees, but the votes were unanimous. The BMW Z4 M40i was already a brilliant modern sports car by virtue of having one of the best-tuned chassis in the business, a sweetheart of an engine, a lovely cabin, realistic practicality for a convertible—and all the joys of the open-top driving experience.
As I covered in my video review, the addition of the Handschalter package—a six-speed manual transmission—pushes the Z4 over the top. It’s not only the best modern sports car, but also one that very successfully calls upon all the elements of a classic sports car that we crave so much in a numb, automated world. In other worlds, an ultimate driving machine, if you will.
Performance Car of the Year above $100,000: Chevrolet Corvette E-Ray
We added this category because, between standouts like McLaren’s baby Artura, the Huracan Sterrato and Tecnica, Porsche’s incredible 911 GT3, Lotus’ brilliant back-to-basics Emira, the gorgeous Aston Martin DB12, and BMW’s frankly absurd M5—review coming soon—this year has been an embarrassment of riches. Despite all these dream machines clouding our minds, it was “just” a Corvette that took the top nod.
This is because the Corvette E-Ray is not “just” a Corvette. It’s a monument. Like all of our winners, it’s a car that does it all. Sure, like every Corvette, it’s surprisingly well mannered and comfortable, it’s one of the easiest mid-engined cars to live with ever built, and even has a targa top for extra degree of fun that most can’t match. But the addition of an electric motor between the front wheels transforms America’s Sports Car into an unequivocal, bona-fide supercar, delivering performance and a driving experience that embarrasses cars two- and three-times its price, with zero compromise.
Green Vehicle of the Year: Hyundai Ioniq 5N
This is an increasingly messy category. The only key qualifier is really whether or not a vehicle qualifies for green plates in Ontario—or wherever you may be reading this from—but the voting wasn’t messy at all. We were so in love with the Hyundai Ioniq 5 N that it almost usurped the Z4 in the performance car category before we decided to split them up, after which they were both unanimous winners.
Nothing made us laugh harder this year than the 5 N, and laughter is an important measurement around these parts. It is, by a wide margin, the silliest car you can buy, packed to the brim with tech and trickery that we all thought would be gimmicky, but immediately learned to love. Not only is it mind-bendingly quick like we’ve come to expect from EVs, but it’s also fun and playful like few other cars can match. It’s a real-life roller coaster that you can park in your driveway, and because it’s an Ioniq 5, can act as a completely normal, comfortable commuter.
Mainstream Crossover/SUV of the Year: Mazda CX-70
Year after year, we try to avoid picking the same winner twice in a row. So it was very convenient that Mazda introduced the CX-70, a two-row variant of the CX-90 that took home this prize last year. With the exception of deleting a row of seating, the CX-70 is almost exactly the same as the CX-90, which means it’s still very pretty, has a fantastic chassis and powertrain, and its interior is beautiful. It blurs the lines of what “premium” means so effectively that it was also the first nomination thrown in when we started discussing the next category, and it does so at a very compelling price point.
Premium Crossover/SUV of the Year: Jaguar F-Pace SVR
The Lexus GX 550 seemingly had this category locked up until someone chimed in with, “what about the F-Pace? Come on, we all loved it!” It’s not new for this year, or even new at all—but it is, without a doubt, wonderful. It looks great and has a commodious interior, but its claim to fame is its bewilderingly excellent chassis, and the cherry on top is the mighty characterful supercharged V8. It’s an SUV that’s well-appointed and practical like people want, and is also a better, more entertaining driving experience than a lot of dedicated performance cars we drove this year. This is what a Jaguar should be—grace, pace, and space—and a cacophony of eight-cylinder fury with a backing vocal of carried away cackling.
Truck of the Year: Ford Ranger
I called this one months ago. We drove and liked a lot of trucks this year, like Toyota’s new Tacoma and the updated Ram 1500, but none of us even bothered to submit them as nominees. There’s a clear theme to all of our winners that being the ability to do everything well, and Ford’s Ranger does everything the best.
With a lot of trucks, there’s a sweet spot. For example, I liked the hybrid-powered Tacoma Trailhunter but didn’t feel so hot about the base TRD Sport. The Ranger, conversely, doesn’t miss. The Raptor is damn near unflappable, the base four-cylinder is more refined and more frugal than its coarse competitors, and the optional Ecoboost V6 elevates its truck experience above what all of its competitors are doing, while undercutting them all. Ford has finally taken all the engineering brilliance from the F-150 and transplanted it into a package that fits in a normal parking spot, and it’s pretty well unmatched in our eyes.
Overall Car of the Year: Chevrolet Corvette E-Ray
There were six pairs of eyes glaring at me. We were seated around a table, tired of arguing, and had conducted a three way vote to wrap this up. Two for the Z4, two for the Ioniq 5 N, and two for the E-Ray. I decided to abstain from voting, and was now the tie-breaker.
The Z4, being a straight-six roadster with a six-speed manual, is a wonderful love letter to what the Ultimate Driving Machine used to be—and in fact, still can be. We all love golden-era BMWs around here, and the stick Z4 shows us all that they definitely “still got it” when they want to. It’s everything we love about cars in one package.
The Ioniq 5 N came out of left field, doing everything wrong, being the opposite of the Z4, and almost upended it. Where the Z4 is classically satisfying, the 5 N is fun, and I cannot state enough just how fun it is. But, beyond being incredibly fast and hilariously good fun, the 5N moves the needle. While we all recognize the efficacy of EVs as alternative commuter cars, they give us pause in that, for all their capability, they lack soul. The 5N has that synthesized mechanical soul nailed, and is the first EV that really showed us all that the future can still be fun. It’s a beacon of promise.
The E-Ray marries these two concepts together. It is the best of everything we love about the cars we grew up with, with its thundering small-block V8 eager to incinerate the rear tires, and an electric motor on the front to hook it all up and make it the quickest and most usable Corvette ever. I love that it still uses an naturally aspirated pushrod V8 that can trace its origins to the 1950s, paired with a flawless gearbox. The electric motor mounted on the front axle is unencumbered, able to deliver instantaneous, otherworldly power all at once. And it handles fabulously. And it looks rad. And it’s a targa. And it has two trunks. And, and, and … it just doesn’t end.
For being able to blend the startling performance of the fastest EVs with the righteous rage of a V8; for making the unnatural feel natural, and for doing it all semi-attainably, the Chevrolet Corvette E-Ray is the best of what the world has to offer. It seemed important to us that above all Annual Awards 2024 winners, our 2024 DoubleClutch.ca Car of the Year should move the needle in some fashion; the E-Ray certainly does so without losing any of what matters.
