Tuesday,March, 20,2007 . Today I would like to dedicate to the unsung heroes of the automotive industry, those vehicles that do not receive the attention of their more popular stablemates yet in many ways meet their competition head on. These diamonds in the rough are either richer in content or allow you to be richer in wallet while providing a unique experience to their owners, it's true they may not be as slick or technically advanced but they are often compelling choices to those who take the bold move of acquiring them. Today's diamond in the rough is the Mitsubishi Outlander. The Outlander came online as a decent if not particularly compelling choice in a crowded field. It's only real charm of having Lexus RX styling cue's faded when the Lexus' styling changed. Today's all new Outlander exhibits a night and day turnaround, almost to the point of calling it something new all together. The Outlanders stance is a perfect mix of truck and sports car creating it's own statement without relying on it's competition to carve out it's silhouette. It is chock full of standard safety and convenience features, and although it's engine and chassis do not rival Toyota's or Honda's, the Standard V6 far outruns the standard four in the Toyota or Honda's fourbanger. ( a side note: the majority of Toyota's Rav4's are ordered with the smaller four) In daily life the Mitsu will never feel as polished as it's rivals, this is true, but it's unique curb appeal mixed with a wonderful standard roster of features topped off with a few unique "ah ha" features such as a paddle shifter which sits on the side of the steering column to allow manual shifting or the half tailgate feature create a great overall package, and as a nice fringe benefit it's nice to be unique and not have to see other versions of your truck coming and going at every stoplight. A.D.