Theory of Evo-lution

Call it what you will - track car, rally car, cop bait - the 10th generation Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution MR is a test of willpower: Are you brave enough to drive this car to its fullest?

Well, are ya, punk?

All kidding aside, it helps to be of a certain mindset if the Evo - as it's popularly known - is your daily driver.

First, you have to like your cars dressed full Cleveland, with all of the bad boy accessories that typify this breed of boy-racer transport. There's an outrageously sized spoiler, low-profile tires fitted with BBS wheels, aggressive hood scoops with air inlets, rudely bulging fenders, giant Brembo brakes that stop quicker than you can say "yes, officer" and snug Recaro bucket seats that are not for the Twinkie-obsessed.

Second, you have to get used to a car that caters to your worst tendencies. Behind the car's firewall resides a turbocharged, in-tercooled, double-overhead-cam two-liter, four-cylinder engine that produces 291 horsepower. It rockets to 60 mph in 4.6 seconds. It's way too easy to exceed that because the speedometer places 60 mph in the spot where 30 mph resides on most cars.

Steering is lightning quick, with infinitesimal steering wheel movements causing quick response. Cornering behavior is almost supernatural; there's no body lean, even on the most twisted roads. The car remains flat, like a well-toned tummy.

The ride is extremely firm, but there's no need to get out the kidney belt. It's forgiving enough on the Virginia Department of Transportation's abysmal highways.

Finally, you better like your car high-tech. An all-wheel-drive system transfers all that power to terra firma through either a five-speed manual transmission or a new six-speed Twin-Clutch Sportronic Shift Transmission.

The car also has three terrain modes: tarmac, gravel and snow. Most of the time, you'll use the first. If you live down a country road - and need to traverse it quickly - you'll use the second.

The whole package will make the safest, sanest driver fall under the Evo's seductive spell. Rapture overtakes you as you put it through its paces. But what else would you expect from a rally car designed for street use?

Still, some details spoil the mood. The Evo starts life as a humble Lancer, a $15,000 grocery getter. There's lots of hard plastic in-terior trim, which is only partially helped by a leather-wrapped steering wheel and shifter. The doors clang with a sound that speaks to cheapness, not cheap thrills. And the optional technology package, with Bluetooth and touch-screen navigation, includes a 65-watt audio system whose sub-woofer reduces trunk space to a Lilliputian 6.9 cubic-foot.

Will boy racers care? Nope.

This rally car is the most refined edition of the Evo yet produced and driving it is easy, whether on the track, on the trail or on the street.