The Marathon Runner

Every automobile nut knows that Volvo is the unofficial synonym for the word safety. Maybe the Oxford dictionary will also accept and include this in near future. But guess what, we think that by then Volvo would latch onto some more words... like suave, distinguished and subtle. At least that’s the impression that their latest machine, the V90 Cross Country left on us...

- Hari Govind Nair

I drove my first Volvo about a decade back. It was a nice and smooth drive through the not so nice and smooth highway between Delhi and Jaipur. After that drive, I have driven many-a-times from Delhi to Jaipur. Somehow it has never been the same. I have felt and cursed every bump on the road, I have lost my temper at all that ruckus out there and I have literally hated that highway. But that was not the case during that drive I did a decade back. A few days back, when I test drove the V90 Cross Country, memories came flooding back and I realised why I hate the Delhi-Jaipur highway. It’s not the road. I am used to those kind of highways. It’s the car. Volvos might not have had the super slick ‘cool’ quotient of its German counterparts, but one thing I am certain of is that there is none out there to beat this Swede at the game of comfort. But wait. Something has changed. There is something new about the V90 Cross Country. It is unbelievably comfortable, but there is something else as well. Let’s div