It's easy to be down on General Motors these days — everyone's doing it and, we'll admit, the company does seem to keep giving good cause for the negativity. And we'd be remiss not to mention that it's equally easy to dismiss a car coming from Buick, the company that you may think should now be called something else. Like, say, Pontiac. But the 2011 Buick Regal has something good going for it — and that is, it's a 2010 Opel.
Set to go on sale during the second quarter of 2010, the Regal will be available only with 4-cylinder engines: GM's 2.4-liter Ecotec direct-injection four and a (better) 2.0-liter turbocharged four, which pounds down 220 horsepower and 258 lb-ft of torque. The Regal is set to compete with the likes of Acura's TSX and the Volvo S60, and there's even a manual transmission available on the turbo model. Also, if you intend to buy the new Regal when it first hits showrooms in 2010, you should know that it will be available only in CXL guise (that's GM speak for "top of the line"). Other trims will follow, of course.
You can have your Regal with Interactive Drive Control, which is much like Audi's Drive Select, adjusting throttle response, shock stiffness and steering effort across three ranges: Normal, Tour and Sport. Normal and Sport are self-explanatory, and you can think of Tour as comfort mode.
It's too early to guess on pricing, but you can expect the Regal to fit in somewhere around TSX range (that car starts at $29,310).