Squint a little bit at this Ford Territory and tell me you don’t see a little bit of Ford Freestyle/Taurus X in the body lines. Think about those cars for a second…do you think that they are capable of making any kind of headway on a dragstrip? I have a family member who owns a Freestyle, and the only kind of hauling that thing does well is in respect to cargo. The engine (and unbelievably awful CVT transmission) are more in-line for a Taurus than anything. But the Territory is a Ford Australia product entirely, which means it’s related to the Falcon. Which means that the Barra inline-6, quickly becoming one of our favorite non-V8 engines around here, came in them stock. So did all-wheel-drive, which means that the Territory can come off the line with minimal fuss and with all four wheels scratchin’ for traction. How does mid-11s in the quarter out of the family wagon sound? Sounds good to us, sounds like another day in Australia to them.
There is quite a lot of lag time from when he flicks the shifter and the car actually shifts. But still what a sleeper.