Peter Egan's "Side Glances" and the 190E 2.6

[suginami]

I'm a big fan of Peter Egan, who has written the "Side Glances" column in Road and Track since 1983. I purchased a special hard cover edition of his columns 1983 - 1997. If you haven't read his column, purchase Road and Track and check him out. He loves working on cars, vintage racing, etc.

I'm over halfway through the book, and in the May 1993 issue, his column was titled "Ten Years, Ten Favorite Cars", where he listed his ten favorite cars of his first ten years testing cars for Road and Track.

One of his top ten (he didn't rank them) was the 190E 2.6. Following is what he wrote:

"I could have picked several other Mercedes models here, but I chose the 190E because it's the most affordable and it still manages to feel like a Mercedes. Which is to say, it grows on you. The more you drive it, the more you appreciate its rational engineering, excellent road feel, solid luxury, lack of gimmicks and structural integrity. I drove a 2.6 liter 6-cylinder 190E for a week, and for weeks afterward, every other test car felt as if its doors were made of tin." That's all he wrote.

Fwiw, the other cars he chose are: Ferrari Testarossa, Jaguar XJ6 (not the new one, but the last of the previous generation), Mazda Miata, Ford Mustang 5.0 LX, Alfa Romeo 164S, British Motor Heritage MGB, Ford Explorer 4WD, 1964 Corvette Roadster, 1973 Alfa Romeo GTV. He excuses himself for the last two cars because they are not post-1983 models, but he says they were low-mileage "almost-new" examples when he drove them.