In the late 1960s BMW started the sport sedan craze with their 2002 sport sedan. It was a car that offered the straight line performance of a cheap American muscle car with the handling of a well-tuned European sports car, while also being an affordable, practical sedan. That car spawned the 3-series sedan in the late 80s, which kept that same formula but has since grown bigger and more expensive, making it move further and further away from its roots. As a result of this, the sport sedan has been pushed further away from the common man (The 3-series starts at $33,000 but one with everything you want is about $50,000). That doesn’t mean that the sport sedan is unreachable though; enter the new 2015 Subaru WRX.

Previous generations of Subaru’s WRX have just been labeled as glorified, faster versions of the Impreza. In fact, they were called the Impreza WRX, but now it drops the Impreza name to become its own separate model. As a result almost everything is unique to the WRX; only the roof panel, trunk lid and dash are shared with the Impreza. This also gives the car its own unique styling, which I think is good for a Subaru. No it isn’t a beautiful car, but compared to the original bug-eyed WRX from 2002, it’s come a long way. In fact, I believe this is the best looking WRX ever made. Inside the design is also unique to WRX with new sport seats that are both comfortable and supportive, with nice red stitching and a flat bottom steering wheel to give the interior a great sporty vibe.

One thing that has caused a lot of controversy with this car is the available Sport Liniartronic Continuously Variable Transmission (CVT), the first available Automatic Transmission in the WRX since 2009. The problem is CVTs are notorious for being really whinny and for giving a cars powertrain a rubber band feeling since there are no actual gears, but how well will it work in sports sedan? Actually, really well; this CVT is one of the best CVTs on the market today. In normal mode it acts like a normal CVT, which is fine for day-to-day use on the street, but put it into Sport Sharp mode and it becomes a different animal. In this mode it changes the ratios in the gearbox to make it act like an eight-speed close ratio automatic. This change makes this CVT very responsive, losing the rubber band feeling and there is no transmission whined. Don’t worry driving enthusiasts; a new six-speed manual is standard, which is the best manual transmission Subaru has ever made. It’s light clutch and shifter action is easy to use on the street with the stereotypical rifle bolt feeling in the shifter, which makes the car fun to row through the gears.

Also new for 2015 is Subaru’s new 2.0 liter turbocharged flat four cylinder engine. It makes 268 horsepower and 258 lbs-ft. of torque. This new engine is both more powerful and more efficient than the old engine. This new engine is a sweet heart; it’s plenty powerful yet also smooth for a Subaru engine. Also this is the first WRX with a real exhaust note. It gives this engine a nice raspy note. This also gets rid of the intake snort of the old car.

This engine also helps the 3,330 pounds WRX to perform. It did a 0-60 mph. time in 5.3 seconds in the manual equipped WRX sedan. Subaru says the CVT WRX will do the same in 5.8 seconds.

The engine also gives the WRX much better fuel economy. Subaru estimates 21 miles per gallon city and 28 highway for the manual and 23 city and 30 highway for the CVT in our testing we were seeing the mid 20’s for both transmissions, which is better than the low 20s we got with the previous generation WRX.

The handling is another thing that Subaru got right with this car. Here, Subaru decided to benchmark the WRX against their BRZ sports car, which was a great decision because it gives this car the handing it needs. I’m not saying the old one handled terrible but they were just not up to the level of control a driver could get in this car. The steering is an electric power steering rack, which doesn’t give the car great feedback from the wheel but it gives the driver so much control that they know exactly where the car is going. The chassis is also stiffer thanks to a new uni-body and it is also gripper thanks to new Dunlop tires. The new stiffer chassis also gives the car a firmer ride, but it is actually bearable on the street.

The value of this car also makes it shine. You can get a fully loaded WRX with HID head lights, navigation, a new Harmon Kardon sound system, heated, power leather seats and the CVT for under $30,000, or you could get a stripped version with the manual, heated cloth seats and a cool performance display in the dash for less than $25,000. One thing I would skip is the navigation system it. It’s very slow to respond and looks way too cartoony. I was expecting Mario to jump across the screen any second.

Great handling, great performance, useful practicality and a cheap price tag. This is what a sport sedan should be.

2015 Subaru WRX sedan

Base price $25,000 (est.)

Price as Tested $30,000 (est.)

Vehicle layout Front-engine, AWD, 5-passenger, 4-door sedan

Engine 2.0L/268-hp/258-ft-lbs turbo DOHC 16-valve F-4

Transmission 6-speed Manual, CVT

Curb Weight (front/rear bias) 3330 lbs (59/41%)

Wheelbase 104.3 in

Length X Width X Height 180.9 X 70.7 X 58.1 in

0-60 mph time 5.3 sec (manual), 5.8 (CVT)

Lateral Acceleration 0.96g (avg)

60-0 braking 106 ft

EPA Fuel Economy 21/28 mpg (manual) 23/30 (CVT)

CO2 Emissions 0.82 lbs per mile