Why I Bought A Honda Civic Si Over A VW GTI, And Why My Porsche Boxster Is ‘Too Good’: Members’ Rides

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Today’s featured Member is Phillip, an awesome guy who owns only blue cars. All day and all night, every car he sees is just blue. Neither of which are blue Corvettes. Nor do they have blue windows, he may have a blue house, I don’t know. I didn’t ask about that. Sorry, I couldn’t resist. (If you’re not familiar with the Eiffel 66 song, give it a listen, then let me know how bad you hate me after.) It took over the world for a few months way back when. Anyway, back to Philip.

Tell me about yourself.

I’m a 25-year-old who loves all kinds and eras of cars. I do have a predilection towards cars from the 80s-2010s though. Even as a baby I always liked riding in cars, but what really got me into cars was the PS2 version of Need for Speed Hot Pursuit 2. It had all the cool, exotic cars from the 90s and early 2000s (including a Carrera GT concept). Playing a game where you drive these cars around on beautiful back roads really left an impression on me. I think that’s also part of the reason most of the cars I’m really interested in are as old or far older than I am.

So what’s in the garage currently?

• 2024 Honda Civic Si in Aegean Blue
• 2001 Porsche Boxster S in Lapis Blue

Are you feeling blue?

It was totally unintentional that I got two blue cars. Sometimes I feel like a bit of a doofus when they are parked next to one another because it looks like I wanted to assemble a blue crew. The Si is my daily driver, and it replaced a 2018 GTI that I had previously. The Boxster I bought on a whim last year because I wanted a proper sports car experience.

What made you pick the Si over another GTI or any of the other options?

I had my 2018 GTI for 6 years and 60k miles, so I did not want to get into another VW. I enjoyed that car but as some wise person/chef once said: variety is the spice of life. The Civic Type R is too expensive and I know I would not be utilizing its full capabilities, and the same goes for the GR Corolla as well.

The WRX gets such poor fuel economy that I could not in good conscience drive it and put that many boring highway miles; it would always feel like a waste of money. GR86/BRZ are lovely cars and can probably be used as a daily pretty easily, but I think the rational part of me could not justify owning 2 RWD sports cars, even if one of them has vestigial rear seats and a trunk that’s big enough to be practical but small enough to still be a nuisance.

It really boiled down to the Elantra N and the Si, and even though the N is quite a bit more fun to drive, I think the Civic Si is overall just a nicer car and easier to live with. Add in the fact that it’s cheaper and gets near 40mpg on the highway and you have a winner.

How is it?

Better than I thought it was going to be. It’s such a pleasant car to own. It has a nice, usable interior, with a great sound system and comfy seats. When you drive it normally, it’s a pretty standard 11th-gen Civic experience. Which just means that you are in a very nice car. When you push it a bit harder, there’s a surprising amount of depth to the experience. The limited-slip diff really enables you to throw it in and out of turns. The suspension is set up to be compliant but quite settled in corners. And believe it or not, the car will pretty easily achieve some lift-off oversteer. Honda clearly wanted to make this thing feel like a “driver’s car” version of a normal Civic, and they pulled it off with little compromise.

How does it compare to the GTI?

More engaging, but slightly less refined. I prefer driving the Si to my GTI actually because I can have more fun with it in corners and the gearing is quite short in the Si. The shifter in the Si is also leagues ahead of the one in the GTI, which always felt like moving a stick around a bucket of Gak. This new Si really feels like Honda’s take on a mk7 GTI, and they nailed it.

What made you get rid of the GTI?

It was totaled in an accident. Nothing major and no one was hurt thankfully. I quite liked the car and didn’t really have plans to get rid of it any time soon, but life happens and the silver lining was that it led me to the Si!

Did you want the blue for this one or just what was there?

My GTI was white, and since then I made a vow to myself to always try to own a car that was an actual color. So many people drive white, black, and silver cars, and even though I was buying a pretty common car, I at least did not want to contribute to the sea of gray! Blazing Orange was my first choice, but that color was discontinued for 2024. The blue was my second choice after that and it’s a surprisingly nice color, I quite like it.

What’s your favorite thing about the Si?

Probably the chassis. It’s better than it has any right to be and feels so rigid yet light on its feet. The car is 16 inches longer than my GTI but weighs about 300 lbs less at roughly 2900 lbs. The whole car just feels more communicative and satisfying to push around than my GTI. Honorable mention goes to the shifter, which makes even the most boring of driving situations interesting.

You said you bought the Boxster on a whim, what’s the story there?

I bought the Boxster last year and at the time I only had my GTI. I wanted a far more connected driving experience, and instead of trading in my GTI for something practical and engaging, like a Civic Type R, I decided to just get a proper sports car.

Initially, I wanted a Miata since it’s kind of just the go-to in my brain for “persons first sports car” but this blue Boxster S popped up on Bring a Trailer with the Sport Classic wheels and I decided to go for it. I figured that most people liked Porsches, so now is as good of a time as any to see if I fall into that camp or not by actually owning and driving one. I won the auction and drove down to New Jersey to pick up the car and drive it back, praying that I did not actually need to actually bring a trailer. Thankfully bringing it home was a pretty smooth process.

My only requirements were under 3000lbs, manual, RWD, good steering, and had to be a proper sports car. The fact that the Boxster was mid-engined was just a fun little bonus, and the flat-6 didn’t hurt either.

You said it’s taught you that you are not a Porsche guy, how so?

Maybe it’s just me, but I think for my use case this car is just too good? It’s very clear Porsche makes their cars to be not just excellent sports cars, but also excellent daily drivers, and this Boxster, despite being 23 years old, fits that role perfectly. It’s lovely to drive near or at the limit, and it’s lovely to drive day to day, but because of that I sometimes feel as if I’m always in the wrong car.

I don’t actually drive this car daily because I own a far more efficient, safe, and comfortable vehicle, and when I go out for a nice backroad blast, I wish the car had a bit more of a defining characteristic. Don’t get me wrong, it’s excellent and fun on a twisty backroad, with great steering, a lovely engine note, and a chassis that always puts the power down and rarely fights back.

Miatas are whimsical, Corvettes are brutish, Elises are raw, etc. A Boxster is just … really good. I don’t know what else to say about it. If I were the first owner of this car, and it was my only car, I probably would have fallen in love with it pretty quickly since it really is such a great little daily while driving how a proper sports car should be driven. However, I’m the fifth owner of this car, and I use it purely as something to enjoy. I just know that there are cars out there that are more fun, albeit less practical, and I don’t need to have my second car be practical.

What has been your favorite thing about it?

Probably the engine note and placement. I don’t think there are many cars you can get for under 20k that sound this good. It is a pleasure to listen to every single time I wind the car out. Having all the engine noise coming from behind you and the intake right next to your left ear makes it even better.

What’s the most annoying?

The gearing. For a car with a 7200 rpm redline, 250hp, and a lovely engine note, this car’s gearing is unfathomable to me. It’s the one thing about this car that I can definitively say is bad.  First is good for 30mph, which makes sense, but second is good for 72mph and third is good for, I don’t know, 100? Something around there. It makes absolutely no sense that 2nd and 3rd are that tall.

I want to hear this car rev out as much as possible! But by the time I do it twice, I’m breaking every speed limit in NY. I’ve heard that early Boxsters with the 2.5-liter have much shorter gearing to make up for the relative lack of power, so one of those might be the way to go if you want a Boxster but don’t want the silly gearing.

What makes you want to replace it with a Miata?

Miatas just feel more fun to me. I think Miatas are competent sports cars because of how fun Mazda wants them to be. Boxsters are fun sports cars because of how competent Porsche wants them to be. The end goals are similar, but they are achieved in opposite ways. Neither is bad, and I’ll certainly have a good time in both, but the Miata just feels more my speed. No doubt if you wanted something you could drive every day however, the Boxster would win out. Then again, who is driving a convertible every day? I know I wouldn’t be in NY.

What would be in the dream garage?

• Something similar to the Si for a daily
• Lotus Elise
• Lancia Stratos

What do you like about each?

Cars like the Si (aka hot hatches and hot hatch adjacent cars) are just the perfect recipe for daily driving. Fun, practical, efficient, easy to live with, and crucially, cheap. At the end of the day, it’s an economy car. Its sole purpose is to be driven in all manner of conditions and situations. You’ll never feel bad about the chips, scrapes, scratches, and miles they’ll accumulate because that’s what they are meant to do. I hope that as EVs become more prevalent there will be some quite compelling electric hot hatches for sale. Currently I’m quite interested in the Rivian R3.

For the Elise and Stratos, they just seem like some of the most engaging cars you can ever hope to drive for their respective prices. The Elise is somewhat affordable still, although it still financially eludes me. The Stratos will probably be forever unattainable for me, and with the probable maintenance costs, that’s just fine.

I just like them so much because driving them just seems like it would lead to sensory overload, which makes it all the more special. The same goes for pretty much any sort of homologation race car, as they usually have a pretty special driving experience and a good story to boot. I certainly wouldn’t mind owning a Delta Integrale or a 190E 2.3-16.

At the end of the day, I want my daily to be reasonable, fun, cheap, and worry-free. Every other car I own has to feel special and be as engaging/insane as possible for the price.

Thanks Philip!

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