It’s officially spring! If you’re reading this latest installment of Car Connections as this is being published, that means you’ve probably taken a break from vigorously cleaning your home. Thank you for stopping by! As I always do in this series, I have the Random Word Generator give me three prompts that I then link to automobiles in various ways. Oddly enough, they all have a Texas connection. Yee-haw! This week’s words are tension, aid, and loop. How would you associate these words with cars? Tell us in the Comments section below.
Tension: I wouldn’t say my dad scares easily, but everyone has his or her moments. He had one when I took him and his girlfriend wheeling in a 2016 Land Rover Range Rover HSE Td6 at the Hidden Falls Adventure Park in Marble Falls. Dad was riding shotgun as I went over a stretch of terrain at an angle that gave him what must’ve seemed like an entire windowful of the ground below. I could hear the tension in his voice as I continued to climb. He either was terrified of us landing on his side of the vehicle, what would happen to my career if we did, or both. Fortunately, he was not in need of new underwear after we leveled out.
Aid: Almost seven years ago, I drove a 2019 Ford Expedition MAX Limited back from the Texas Auto Writers Association’s Auto Roundup in Denton. The optional Stealth Edition package added a continuously controlled damping (CCD) suspension, black hood lettering and exterior accents, red interior stitching, and black-painted 22-inch aluminum wheels. About two hours outside of Austin, I ran over something small, and I knew immediately that it was going to cause a problem. Sure enough, the tire pressure monitoring system showed me that I had lost all the air in my rear driver-side tire. Luckily, I was able to pull off the highway to a safe area that was still visible to passing drivers. I removed the onboard tire iron, lowered the spare (which was only 18 inches in diameter), and began loosening the lug nuts of the bum wheel. Soon after I started, a truck rolled up. The driver happened to be a heavy equipment mechanic who saw I had a flat and wanted to help. I didn’t need his assistance because I could’ve changed the tire myself, but he was eager to lend a hand and he had an impact wrench, which saved me a lot of time. I discovered the true kindness of strangers — and we both discovered just how much elbow grease it takes to lift a 22-inch wheel/tire combo.
Loop: Back when I lived in Austin, I would often take performance cars on a loop that ran from my place just outside the city limits to the curvy roads of the Texas Hill Country and back. It was during one of those runs that I fell in love with the 2019 Volkswagen Golf GTI. It was an attractive hot hatch with great handling, a snappy seven-speed automatic, and a 2.0-liter turbo I-4 with 228 horsepower and 258 lb-ft of torque. All those characteristics made the GTI responsive and, most importantly, fun. The more I drove it, the more I loved it.
