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<\/p>\n<\/div>I\u2019m on the country roads of northern Virginia horse farm country chasing an Audi S7. Through the twisties. Over fox-hunt hills. In a three-row GMC Acadia SUV.<\/p>\n
Payne, have you gone mad?<\/p>\n
Some background: I lived in northern Virginia for a good chunk of my young adult life. Its Blue Ridge Mountains and leafy forests sprawling west of the nation\u2019s capital make for some of the East\u2019s most beautiful vistas. I would take my first sports car \u2014 a little red Porsche 924S<\/a> \u2014 to these roads to play like an unleashed pet liberated from Metro DC\u2019s streets. There were two kinds of cars in the Virginia countryside: galloping sports cars and trucks that got in the way.<\/p>\n Not anymore. These days it is fashionable to write that we\u2019re in the midst of an electrified auto revolution. Maybe. The Tesla Model S is a glorious car though challenged by the same physical realities that doomed EVs a century ago: cost and range anxiety. Meanwhile, a quieter revolution is transforming the light-truck world.<\/p>\n Twenty-five years ago SUVs were built on the same simple, body-on-frame platforms as pickups. Ford Explorers and Chevy Blazers offered utility but were moving roadblocks on back roads. As utes have displaced sedans as Americans\u2019 chariots of choice, however, demand has grown for car-like handling. The 2003 Honda Pilot<\/a>sparked a stampede to unibody, midsize construction.<\/p>\n Now comes the next generation of chassis. Behold the 2017 GMC Acadia and 2016 Mazda CX-9: They are wolves in sheep\u2019s clothing, sporty midsize SUVs (that is not an oxymoron) on stiffened spines.<\/p>\n I came up fast on the Audi S7 near Hume, Virginia, the big GMC Denali grille filling his mirrors. When traffic cleared, the Audi took my bait. He leaped forward to shake my shadow. But this isn\u2019t your average, hulking SUV. Or even the first-generation, hulking Acadia.<\/p>\n For its Gen-Two Extreme Makeover, Acadia shed an eye-popping 700 pounds through downsizing and chassis light-weighting. At about 4,250 pounds, a three-row, AWD, unibody Acadia is actually lighter than an all-wheel drive, 4,500-pound S7 cruise missile<\/a>. Over rainy hill and dale, Audi and GMC danced an unlikely duet.<\/p>\n Did I stay with him? Are you kidding?<\/p>\n The $85,000 Audi has 500-gazillion horsepower, tires as wide as the Potomac River and a driver who knew these roads like the back of his hand. He gradually pulled away. But not without a fight. When he turned into the driveway of his multi-million-dollar horse ranch \u2014 its house bigger than the Pentagon \u2014 I tooted at him. He\u2019d remember this $40K SUV.<\/p>\n That\u2019s because his Audi and my Acadia share more than he knows. Sure, the GMC\u2019s high saddle makes it look like a camel next to the S7 cheetah, but underneath the GMC is built on the same bones as the athletic Cadillac XT5,<\/a> a midsize ute to rival Audi\u2019s Q5. You\u2019ll recall I flogged the featherweight XT5<\/a> \u2014 itself 650 pounds lighter than a comparable Mercedes GLE \u2014 across California\u2019s curves earlier this year chasing Porsche Cayennes.<\/p>\n The GMC also shares the Caddy\u2019s 310-horsepower, 3.5-liter V-6. I like these sibling hand-me-downs. Maybe Corvette will share its 6.2-liter V-8 (as it does with GMC\u2019s hot-rod Sierra pickup<\/a>) with the Acadia and the next time I\u2019ll put tire tracks over that Audi\u2019s hood. This chariot is a long way from the ox carts I used to see on Virginia roads.<\/p>\n Mazda\u2019s impressive CX-9 is all the more remarkable because it has no luxury jock bro\u2019 with which to share hand-me-downs.<\/p>\n