More For Your Money.(Hyundai Tiburon GT)(Brief Article)

You get a lot in a Hyundai Tiburon GT: 3023 pounds worth. Yes, that's right, the Hyundai weighs about 500 pounds more than a Toyota Celica, 300 pounds more than an Acura RSX and 250 pounds more than a Ford SVT Focus. Granted, the Tiburon's weight is on par with the bloated Mitsubishi Eclipse GT and yawn-inspiring Mercury Cougar, but we're still talking about a heavy car here-Colin Chapman would not be impressed.

As part of the U.S. intro, we were given the opportunity to work the V6-powered Tiburon out at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, where the failure of the Hyundai engineers to ``add lightness'' became evident. While the six-speed GT has a slick shifter and a motor that pulls strongly and smoothly, its suspension was certainly not tuned by Lotus.

In a straight line, the Tiburon seems sporty and capable, but hit the autocross course and the vague, overboosted steering always leaves you a step behind the terminally understeering car. With a 64/36 front/rear weight distribution, the car pushes on turn-in, and there's no ``flicking'' it to bring the rear end around. Stiffer springs or a change in the antiroll bars should be in order before Hyundai is allowed to call this ...