2006 Honda Civic Si

You could call it a return to form. You could call it an automaker coming to its senses. You could call it about freakin' time. Whatever you decide to call the 2006 Civic Si, Honda prefers you forget about the model it replaces. Pretend it never existed. What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.

Honda hopes for our collective amnesia because its new Si is less a reinvention of the outgoing model than a natural evolution of the 1999-2000 edition, the car engineers and execs acknowledge as the apex of the Si timeline.

That will change. The new Si is a fantastic car, nimble and responsive, bred with the reflexes of a jungle cat. It's the offspring of enthusiast engineers who commute to their East Liberty, Ohio, offices in Integra Type R's, S2000s and modified Civic hatchbacks.

It's the car that results when you shift priorities like "safety and packaging," the bean-counter mantra to which the '02-'05 Si fell victim, and let performance guys make the coffee. It's the car that'll stretch the Si bell curve skyward again.

Rethinking A Winning DesignIt starts with styling. No design in recent Honda history, with the possible exception of the Element, so polarized its fan base like the current EP3 Civic Si. The car that the missus identifies as "that snail car" couldn't find a home in either red or blue states. But design was not the EP3's fatal flaw, as we argued to Honda execs when they revealed no plans for a hatchback variant.

The Si badge is synonymous with hot hatch performance, we reasoned. Not only that, but every Honda hatchback produced in the '90s has a rabid following. Problem is, the EP3 ain't so hot. In engine terms, it's tried to get by on a macrobiotic diet while others in its class juice natural growth hormone. And it handles like a Cigarette offshore boat.

Given the context, Honda needed a proven format-the 1999-2000 Si (EM chassis). Dimensionally, designers trimmed six inches from the new Si's length, sliced eight inches from its roofline, and pulled the sides out 1.5 feet compared to the EM. They gave it a sharp windshield rake and meat on its flanks starting just below the window line and spanning from the taillight to the TSX-like banded headlights.

Combined with the Civic's largest tire offering yet in North America-215/45R-17 (with an optional 18-inch wheel/Yokohama package to follow)-the Si carries itself as subtly as a short skirt matched to leather boots.

Still, we can't let Honda's wheel choice go unmentioned. The Si rollers remind us of mutant daisies dipped in alloy, the kind of vision we thought possible only with the help of strong hallucinogens. It's an alarming trend of cheap-looking rims that started with the 2005 RL and bodes well for the wheel aftermarket.

Good Interiors: We're EntitledSettling into the Si's cabin reveals very few surprises. Call us part of the entitlement culture, but Honda has nailed interior fit-and-finish for so long that we just expect it. It wisely retained the EP3's seat design and upgraded it with extended bolsters, dual-density foam and the familiar red stitching that causes delusions of car-handling skill.

But look around and you'll notice the new dual-level gauge design. A tachometer inviting you to 8000 rpm is recessed behind the top half of the steering wheel hoop while above it, closer to eye level, a digital speedo monitors your evaporating hopes of eluding the police.

Despite a disproportionate bulge concealing its airbag, the leather-wrapped steering wheel carries solid heft, is the same size as an S2K tiller and further's one's delusions of car control.