2000 Pontiac Grand Prix

By Bob Storck

The Grand Prix is aimed at boulevard cruising, keeping with the Pontiac tradition. Pontiac has made a virtue of muscular performance, and has the engines and handling to substantiate their boasts. The 16-inch wheels fill the wheelwells and the car's proportions disguise its substantial size.

Grand Prix styling harkens back to the glory days of the sixties. It will be the pace car at the 2000 Daytona 500 and a specially equipped silver limited edition will commemorate that occasion. The Grand Prix has a lot in common with a number of other GM mid-size entries — but it has its own character.

It is built on the same assembly line as the Intrigue in Kansas City, KS, but shares few parts. GM is working to create chassis that can support a wide variety of products, and thus reduce their number of platforms.

Although the front-drive chassis is an evolutionary development of the GM-10 platform, it has been reworked from end to end to improve rigidity. Power is supplied by GM's excellent 3800 Series II V6, now with 200 hp, allied with a four-speed HydraMatic automatic. The 240 hp supercharged version of this engine will keep any driver from bemoaning the lack of a V8.