There are some reasons why eBay always seems full of low-mileage Elises, though. Either they got their miles on the track and are beat to hell or, more likely, someone bought them and decided (or their better half decided) that the compromises were too great.

The general non-car-loving public really don’t get sports cars. I have a 1991 Miata which is pretty spartan compared to current cars but feels like a Cadillac relative to the Elise. I used it for a daily driver for years and made a couple of cross-country trips. Yet I get a lot of comments from people about how one can live with such a tiny car and how unsafe they are. I just ask them why they need to haul around three empty seats and an empty moving crate just to get to work by themselves?

Or the perfect weekend toy for the guy who really does like cars more than his Porsche-buying, mid-life crisis peers.

T minus 7 years to my Elise.

It’s “good” to see so many detractors. It would make owning one all that more delightful.

The handeling and grip is truly amazing, acceleration is also quite good from such a small car.

Since reading your article i would love to try out the American version with the 189 hp.

You don’t even have roll bars and a roof I can’t imagine they let you race or use the tracks.

Did you know that without any roll bars and roof you more likely to make your head a burger patty.

I saw your car picture. I can’t imagine using a roadster. Did you put Sway bars? it looks like the rear end is almost scratching the floor.

I good advise from a street racer please do not use roadster it can kill.

By the way, Speed Channel had a show about Lotus Elise and Top Gear drove one. Both shows liked it. really a Race/Commuter car

If you want a car buy the Mitsubishi Lancer Evo X FQ400. This car will change the structure of your world of car racing.

Just like they say about Mitsubishi: If you go Mitsu you will never come back.

From this review:
“The Elise driving experience is usually described as “go-kart-like” by jerkoff auto-journos who have never turned a single lap in a true racing kart.”

Oops.

If you see a car as a transport device, this ain´t it.
If you want your driving to feel like you´re in your favorite sofa, this ain´t it.
If you want to impress people with fantastic bhp numbers, this ain´t it.
If you want to eat,drink,shave etc in your car, this ain´t it.
But if you drive your car, this is it.

I didn’t realize that along with an Elise purchase came a requirement to never buy or rent a more practical car when the need arises.

90s subcompacts had the benefit of being subject to 90s impact and crash requirements, airbag requirements, and emissions requirements. A lot of additional junk has been mandated since then, and making a 1900 pound car that can be sold today, much less doing so relatively cheaply, is a pretty significant achievement.

If your definition of a vehicle is “something to move things”, I’d reckon it’s a safe bet you’re not in the target market.

And all cars are compromises, because they’re designed with finite funds and bought with finite funds. The Prius sacrifices fun in favor of being very, very functional. The Lotus, in turn, sacrifices any and all functionality in favor of being able to go very, very fast through any given corner. If that doesn’t seem like a compromise, remember the definition of a vehicle: something to move things. The Lotus was not designed to move things in any useful way. It’s just an expensive toy.

And so here we have it: the perfect car for single gay guys/gals that live in a rented apartment next to a grocery store. Anybody else really should try to come up with something better to spend money on.

But… but… Prius owners hate cars. It’s a proven fact, because I keep hearing it.

It makes no sense that they’d want a Lotus Elise, too. Human beings go into neat little boxes that are easily understood. Didn’t you get the memo?

The Atom seems an even better driver than the Elise, but apparently it’s only a kit car, and not legal in all states.

Not having a cage definitely gets the adrenaline going….

You don’t even need 127 horse either…

I’d say even an sv650 in a similar situation would be good.

I know I will never ride my gsx-r to even 5/10 on the street but you can still have an unmatchable amount of thrills on it just getting up to an allowed/legal highway speed.

Then, you call the Lotus a Radio Flyer?

Too funny.

Not trying to one up, just the idea of the Boxster as the perfect car is absurd. It could have been the perfect car, but the Porsche marketing department didn’t want that to happen.

Your comment about the Elise being like a Chrysler Newport in comparison to the Lotus 7 makes my point. The ride is perfectly acceptable and plenty comfortable. Where it excels is in having nothing in between the driver and the road. No distractions, no girly frills, no junk. The Porker is loaded up with crap and you can feel all 1,000 of those extra pounds.

…now if only I could get an Atom registered in my state…

As much as I love cars, nothing tests your limits like riding a motorcycle. Columbus to New York City in February? Check. Scare the living &*^*$ out of yourself because you overcooked a corner? Check? Triple-digit speeds in four seconds? No big deal for motorcyclists. Comfort? On two wheels it’s a fiction. Exposure to elements? Ever get a hornet between your leather jacket and your skin (five stings at speed, fun!)? You don’t know what wet is until you’ve been caught in a massive summer downpour and had the car in the oncoming lane hit you with a 10-foot-high wall of water. I wouldn’t give any of these experiences back. As I said, I love cars. But hurtling along a back road in New Hampshire (as I was doing this weekend) on a 127hp sportbike at one with the process, nothing but your skill and the machine keeping you from becoming a news item in the local paper blows the doors (literally) off even my best car-driving memory.

Having said that, the Elise does sound pretty cool.

I owned a Superformance S1, which is a clone of the late-sixties-era Lotus Seven, and drove it from Columbus, OH to Bowmanville, ON, in the rain, and drove it for dozens of laps at Mosport before driving it back. More than once.

The interior temperature of the Seven could and did reach 110 degrees. There was no climate system, no hard top, and the “windows” were plastic sliders. Every 200 miles the transmission would require a fluid check. Don’t get me started as to how this was done. Finally, after 11,000 miles, the frame’s rear crossmember snapped in the middle of Mosport’s Turn Two.

I appreciate your attempt to out-tough-guy me, but next to what I’ve owned and driven, the Elise is a Chrysler Newport. Wait. Do we have a photo where I’m driving the car without doors at triple-digit speeds? Yes. We. Do.

http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i15/viergang/trunk.jpg

Wow. Talk about not getting it. The Elise is for a man who wants to drive a car without compromise. No stability control, no painted crests, no automatic tranny, no choice of color for the thread of the leather stiching. The Elise is designed to be the best driving machine it can be for the money. Even the door hinges are a work of art. Nothing on the Elise is without purpose.

The Boxster, on the other hand, is a giant compromise, specifically engineered not to be as good as the flagship 911. But you will find plenty of room for the giant box of tampons you just bought for your wife at CostCo. It’s a car so easy your secretary could drive it. And probably does.

For fifty grand, you can get a Boxster which surpasses it in everything but the fabled 10/10ths track and street driving.

For fifty grand, you can also get a D Sports Racer which will bitchslap anything short of a Daytona Prototype around a racecourse.

So the Elise buyer is a (wo)man who wants the track experience on the street. There are enough of those people to keep Lotus busy.

@Stingray: I was alive for the second-gen Elan, but the Lotus other-engine philosophy goes back to the Seven, with bizarre diversions into Renault transaxles for the Esprit :)

I don’t entirely disagree with your point though. I’d say the S2000 probably isn’t as good on a track (not that I’d know first hand) but could probably be considered a more completely developed package as a whole car. I’m going to have to covet both of them anyway though.

I think that, if I owned an Elise, I would be booking track time very often. I also would likely have a few other options in my garage should I want something that resembles comfort.

Those of us who can’t afford an automotive smörgåsbord are kind of stuck with, at best, Swiss-Army-Knife cars that run the gamut from the Civic Si to the BMW 5-Series.

I don’t think it’s money wasted in the sense that those of us who have to make those kinds of compromises understand “waste“. Or, perhaps, if you scale the concept down to objects we can afford.

And the core purpose results in an entirely useless car. How will you explore the limits of such light tossability on American roads that are straight as an arrow? What speed camera isn’t going to catch you as you spin your turbocharged engine to redline? Bottom line, you’ll have to drive like our infamous writer to ever fully enjoy this car. Since most of us will never be that ballsy todrive like him, you’ll be wasting your money on a contraption like this.