Long-Term Test: 2016 Ford Explorer Sport – Part 3
Story and photo by John LeBlanc
One of the advantages of a 60-day test drive is that it allows us to experience and report back on a new vehicle in a variety of scenarios the typical one-week road test cannot afford. Take for instance our latest adventure in our 2016 Ford Explorer Sport: a middle-of-the-winter, near-2,000-kilometre road trip.
At the three-quarter mark of our eight-week review of the U.S. automaker’s popular three-row crossover, we’ve already experienced the $50,399 Explorer Sport as an urban errand-runner, as well as transportation for a day of winter outdoor activities. But the demand to be at our younger daughter ringette team’s tournament just east of Toronto in Whitby, Ont., the same weekend as the start of this year’s North American International Auto Show in Detroit, required the Ford to be put to the test for a week-long Ottawa to Detroit round-tripper.
Not that we knew it at the time, but the first leg of our 2016 Explorer Sport winter roadie would arguably be the easiest.
Needing to be in Whitby on a Thursday afternoon, and Mrs. Automotive Journalist deciding to drive down on her own the next day, left the seven-seat Ford with only two passengers to carry: yours truly and my daughter.
With rare sunshine and above-freezing temperatures, we decided to forgo the typical Highway 416 to 401 four-lane routes and take the two-lane Highway 7 west, then hook up with the 115 at Peterborough to the 401 and on to our hotel destination.
With our hotel’s address plugged into the Explorer’s nav system, we needed to only cover a little over 250 kilometres for the day. With the road conditions more like early May than early January, we were making good time, which allowed for a nostalgic side stop in Queensborough, Ont., just west of Tweed, to show my daughter where one of my aunts used to live, yet still leaving us plenty of time for our pre-dinner arrival.
Along the way, multiple USB outlets in the Explorer Sport’s front cabin (standard in the Limited, Sport and Platinum models) allowed both my phone and my daughter’s tablet to be plugged in. The drive also reinforced the improvements Ford has made to its MyTouch infotainment interface for 2016. The touchpad buttons on the centre dash have been swapped out for real buttons for the climate control system. You still have to go to the touchpad for changing the audio source or warming up the steering wheel, but the overall ergonomic design is much improved.
The next three days in Whitby proved the Ford crossover’s flexibility as a people-and-cargo hauler.
As we’ve mentioned, you can opt for a pair of second-row captain chairs in the Explorer. But our Sport version came with three-across seating, which was needed several times over the weekend when the “can you take my daughter(s) to the rink” requests came in.
While the weekend tournament games were being held at Whitby’s Iroquois Sports Centre, closer to the town’s Lake Ontario harbour, our hotel and team dinners were located closer to Ajax. That added up to more than 300 kilometres of 20-minute suburban sprawl trips, shuttling between the rink, hotel, coffee shops, grocery stores and restaurants.
After a somewhat disappointing loss for my daughter’s team in the tournament’s final game late Sunday, I jumped into the Explorer Sport for my solo evening drive to Detroit before the first media day on the Monday morning, while my wife and daughter drove back to Ottawa. And while the temperature had dropped from plus 6 to minus 8 degrees, nothing had prepared me for the snowpocalypse scene I ended up driving through.
Apparently, while I was in the rink Sunday, a freakish flash-freeze snowstorm of some sort ripped across Highway 401 west of Toronto along the London to Windsor corridor. By the time I started to pass through that evening, there were tens of cars and jack-knifed tractor-trailers off the road as a result. However, the highway conditions were fine by the time I drove through, and I was able to make the just-over-400-km distance in a respectable five hours, arriving in my Detroit hotel around midnight.
Assigned to cover the luxury car debuts at this year’s Detroit auto show, I left the Explorer Sport parked in my waterfront Detroit hotel, which was only a 10-minute walk to the show’s Cobo Hall venue. But after reporting on the early Tuesday Acura and Lincoln presentations, I said my so-longs to the Driving crew at the show, walked back to the hotel and jumped into the Ford for the longest leg of the trip: an all-day, 800-km straight shot from Detroit back home to Ottawa, along the 401 and 416 routes.
Except for some delays caused by a few flurries around London, the Ford was a terrific highway companion for my solo ride home, allowing for lots of time to assess the Explorer Sport as a highway flyer.
With so much four-lane time, we were finally seeing some reasonable fuel economy numbers, averaging an indicated 12.4 L/100 km for the trip. The value of having proper winter tires, like the optional Toyo Observe GS-i5 rubbers our Explorer wore, was proven time and time again; while some drivers struggled when it snowed, the Explorer felt confident in any of the various winter road conditions we encountered. Plus, the Sport model’s GPS-linked onboard weather trafficking feature meant we could keep on eye on any problems we may be driving into.
In the end, after six days and 1,784 kilometres clocked on the odometer, the 2016 Ford Explorer Sport proved itself as a flexible winter road trip machine. It can not only handle the rigour of a bunch of 11-year-old girls and their gear, but it can also be a confident companion for long, solo winter highway drives.