2001 Mitsubishi Montero Review

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Review:

"What does it take?" had to be the question of the hour for Mitsubishi executives on the eve of the 2001 Montero's April debut. This stalwart amongst full-size sport-utility vehicles boasts an 18-year track record, a trophy case full of off-road competition honors (particularly for its near domination of the famed Paris-Dakar Rally), and a sales surge in 1999 of almost 25 percent.

But those sales totaled a mere 5,115 last year, scarcely two-thirds of the results for rarefied Range Rovers costing twice as much. Amongst full-size SUVs--in a market characterized by almost irrational, indiscriminate demand for these hulking brutes--the Montero is pointedly off the pace. It can scale the dunes of Mauritania's Trarza wastelands; it just can't seem to find its way into yuppie garages North America. No wonder, then, that Mitsu is one of the early announcers of a new vehicle for the 2001 model year. Starting afresh with a nearly blank sheet of paper, Mitsubishi has unveiled a brand-new Montero that gives nothing away in the technical capabilities department while nevertheless looking for love in all the right places. Gilt with such marketing slogans as "rugged yet refined," "toughness with style," and even "brutiful," the 2001 Montero is determined to transform itself into a status buy.

I can tell you a thing or two, by the way, about the new Montero's Scamper Factor: In the unforgiving arroyos and sierras of the Santa Catalina Mountains northeast of Tucson, Ariz., Mitsubishi recently turned loose a gaggle of auto writers in their new Monteros. For starters, I drove an "entry level" XLS model (base: $30,997) through a variety of highway and unpaved conditions. But it was in a fully equipped Limited version (base: $34,997) that I tackled the most technically demanding scramble up and down a mountainside at walking speeds and often with only three wheels on the ground.