The image of a hybrid car has been defined by the Prius: you care about the environment if you drive a hybrid but the “petrol-heads” that love excitement and performance will laugh at you.
Quite often people argue that hybrids are by definition too expensive since you have added complexity and weight to a car. They claim this will prevent hybrids from becoming mainstream.
Apparently they have never driven a good one.
One of my friends drives a high-end hybrid and he will never go back to a normal car anymore. He has shown me why. The combination of smoothness and astonishing acceleration is something you normally only get with high-powered and fuel-guzzling V8′s or V12′s. You start to drive differently, especially in cities or busy highways, like having a go-kart. His car has a meter showing how much power is generated by the electric motor. When he put the pedal-to-the-metal (at 80 km/h) the meter showed that the electric motor generated over 200 KW (!) within seconds, adding it to the power generated by his V6 engine. The effect was breathtaking.
Fast acceleration comes without a penalty: the drive electronics prevent the tires from losing grip which prevents excessive wear, accelerating electrically is much, much more fuel-efficient than providing this acceleration with an internal combustion engine.
He convinced me: a good hybrid has so much more to give to a driver. Once people will get used to this luxury they will not go back.
