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By James Gaffney Automotive writer It was a dark and stormy night. But that’s getting ahead of the story. A wise friend and self-described nocturnal creature once opined that in life, daytime is merely rehearsal for what happens at night. If so, perhaps the same might also be said of luxury cars — or, more precisely, that time when...

Photo by James Gaffney/The Times-PicayuneBy James Gaffney
Automotive writer

It was a dark and stormy night.

But that’s getting ahead of the story.

A wise friend and self-described nocturnal creature once opined that in life, daytime is merely rehearsal for what happens at night. If so, perhaps the same might also be said of luxury cars — or, more precisely, that time when their elegant charms and élan can be best appreciated and savored by owners.

At least this seemed to be the case in the 2009 Hyundai Genesis. This luxury sports sedan’s sophisticated attributes during daytime hours become downright goosebump-inducing after the sun goes down and its phalanx of cool-blue interior cab console and electroluminescent dashboard gauges come on, giving the driver the feeling of being inside the cockpit of a private jet. Soft interior curves and supple black leather seats seem to whisper — never shout — that the driver is behind the wheel of an upscale ride that has already garnered rave reviews from the nation’s top automotive zines, which have favorably compared this full-on luxury car to its far pricier counterparts like Mercedes-Benz, BMW and Lexus. None less than Edmunds has touted the ’09 Genesis and its $30,000-to-$40,000 MSRP as “a cleaner interpretation of a Benz S-Class” that “looks and feels very much like a top-line Lexus.”

Talk about bad company.

Photo by James Gaffney/The Times-PicayuneFast Talk
In fact, if Hyundai’s penultimate luxury sports sedan has any drawback, it’s only that it looks and drives so much like its Mercedes-Benz and BMW counterparts that Genesis owners might look for ways in which the vehicle sets itself apart from the pact — only to discover that the car instead embodies the best of all possible European automotive design worlds: high-end styling, upscale appointments, finessed accoutrement, road-worthy performance, ample roominess and plain old-fashioned sumptuousness up the kilt.

“If you didn’t know anything about who made this car or how much it cost,” said one passenger, inspired by the sheer class act that is the Genesis, “you’d feel right at home driving it to a meeting with the British Prime Minister at 10 Downing Street.”

And don’t let this fully appointed four-door’s soft ride and easy handling lull you into thinking this is merely some dreamy-to-touch, 4,000-pound cashmere sweater on wheels. This baby is quick. The six-speed transmission on the Genesis, with its 373-hp V8 packing an impressive 333 pound-feet of torque, can hit 0-60 mph in a more-than-respectable 5.9 seconds.

Safe Harbor
Yet speed is often overrated. Too often luxury cars are test driven in largely optimal weather (does anyone ever test drive a car during a storm?). Potential buyers rarely get the chance to see first-hand how the vehicle handles under rough road and weather conditions. As luck would have it, these are precisely the conditions under which the Genesis was driven this week when a nighttime trek across the Causeway included not only constant rain but also hazardous fog conditions that would test the resolve of even the bravest of drivers.

First, the progressively firm brakes and anti-lock braking system proved worth its weight in gold on more than a few occasions when a driver in front slammed to a stop without warning. The Genesis hugged the highway like a champ without so much as the slightest swerve on the road when the chips were down. The car’s rain-sensing wipers proved excellent in gauging the amount of water on the windshield and automatically controlling the wipers, leaving the driver free to focus on the task at hand — namely, getting a

Tags: Hyundai

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MAKING A SPLASH: Hyundai's luxury Genesis earns its safety props on the rainy highways of the Big Ea was originally published by New Orleans Auto Reviews: Hyundai. Read the full story by clicking here.