[jyl]

Enthusiast cars are not going away yet. Today you can buy a mid-priced four-door sedan with more horsepower, acceleration, and handling than almost any Porsche you could buy before 1990, and a fraction of the emissions. Tommorrow you'll be able to buy a sports car that does 0-60 in 4 seconds and uses no gas at all. Actually, you can buy that today.

Enthusiast cars are changing, that's all. Any they always have. In 1960, when our beloved 911 was born, someone was probably moaning that they didn't make Blower Bentleys any more.

At some point, technology, emissions, and fuel prices won't be the biggest challenges to the enthusiast car. "Relevance" will be the challenge. When a hot mom Volvo hybrid minivan has 400HP and gets to 60MPH in 5 seconds, what will an enthusiast Porsche have to do? 700HP and 3 seconds? Where will you drive such a thing? How long will you stay out of jail, or morgue? Look at what's happening to the autobahn in Germany. The performance of enthusiast cars is going to outstrip the ability of roads to safely accomodate them. We'll all have to move to Nevada, or do our driving at 3AM.