Bargain Beauty; SVT Focus is one of the best cars out there-at any price.(Brief Article)(Evaluation)

If you test drive just one car this year, make it the Ford SVT Focus. Drive it on the freeway, around the block and through an autocross course, if you can. Accelerate hard, brake harder. Take off-ramps at double the posted ``suggested'' speeds, like one particularly enthusiastic owner. ``Last car I could do that in was my Lotus Europa,'' he said. Then consider the entire experience a lesson on an affordable car done right.

Though the SVT Focus' 2.0-liter doesn't turn out much torque below 2000 rpm, above that the engine feels almost turbocharged. And once you get the hang of keeping revs up, the car is a downright joy to drive. Shifting is easy-with wider ratio gearing in the first three gears and closer ratios in fourth, fifth and sixth-and so much fun that we didn't mind driving the manual in even the worst traffic.

The SVT Focus especially shines at the track, where our test car ran from 0 to 60 mph in 7.32 seconds, besting both the Honda Civic Si (7.82) and Nissan Sentra SE-R Spec V (7.35). The Sentra matched the Focus' performance in the quarter- mile, with the Nissan posting 15.68 seconds at 87.9 mph, but the Focus clearly beat the Civic Si, crossing the line in 15.72 seconds at 88.4 mph vs. the Honda's 15.93 seconds at 87.4 mph.

But the real charm of the SVT Focus lies in its suspension. It's a tighter setup than in the standard ZX3 upon which the SVT is based, ...