2016 Nissan Maxima SR

Our culture is currently grappling with questions of identity, the ability to change ourselves. So what, you may ask, does that have to do with the new Nissan Maxima? This is a sedan that has long claimed (without much credibility) to be a four-door sports car, or 4DSC in Nissanese. As far as automotive identity crises go, this is the one to have. We’d love to get a sports car trapped in a four-door body, but that’s easier said than done.

Much of the Maxima’s spec sheet reads as if it comes from a family sedan. It has a transversely mounted engine, front-wheel drive, and a continuously variable transmission. These are hardly the physical attributes of a sports sedan, let alone a sports car. And yet, nothing on the spec sheet would matter if the Maxima transcended these parts to deliver a sporting driving experience. It doesn’t.

Our test car’s SR trim is the Maxima at its most athletic. The 19-inch wheels are an inch larger than on other models, and the springs, anti-roll bars, and shocks are all retuned. Nearly all SR models come with 245/40 Goodyear Eagle F1 Asymmetric All-Season tires developed for this application, but our test car came equipped with like-sized Bridge­stone Potenza RE050A summer tires. That is stickier rubber, available only as a dealer-installed accessory. So, cheater tires, sort of.

The SR’s ride is more sensitive to the road than the luxurious Platinum trim level we also drove, and those summer tires hold to the skidpad with 0.87 g worth of grip. That’s a respectable achievement for a mid-size sedan, but it’s not something we’d call sports-car, or even sports-sedan, worthy. Let’s put skidpad grip aside; it’s just a number, after all. What’s really bothering us is that the Maxima isn’t much fun.

Great sports sedans are instruments of joy when you give them the whip. Switching the SR’s Drive Mode Selector to sport enhances the throttle sensitivity, changes the transmission’s shifting strategy, raises steering effort, and then lets in more of the engine note. None of that overcomes the dynamic handicap that is born of having 61.4 percent of the mass carried by the front tires. Lay into the Maxima on a road like California’s Angeles Crest Highway and, despite excellent body control, this sedan never comes alive, it just understeers—inescapable, grinding, shuddering understeer. The solution is to slow down. But sports sedans shouldn’t ask for a breather.

It turns out, though, that the Maxima is actually a credible luxury car. The front and rear seats are spacious and soothingly comfortable. Touches of fake suede, diamond-patterned stitching, and metallic trim are welcome embellishments. At night, ambient lighting subtly illuminates the instrument-panel trim and doors. The simple and elegant round gauges have a seven-inch multi­colored screen between them to display information and route guidance (navigation is standard on all Maximas). An eight-inch touch screen on the driver-oriented center console can be also be ­controlled by the knob behind the shifter. It’s quiet inside, too. At a steady 70 mph we measured 66 decibels, and a full-throttle whack only produces 74 dBA. Indeed, it’s quieter than the Mercedes-Benz S550, the epitome of luxury.

Nissan clearly worked on turning down the volume on its mainstay V-6. To combat the big six’s former predilection to buzz like the coffee grinder at Starbucks, there is a new oil pan to stiffen the bottom of the block. A Bose noise-cancelling audio system and acoustically laminated windshield glass and front windows work to mute other errant sounds that might reach the cabin.

According to Nissan, 61 percent of the V-6’s parts are redesigned. Among them are the valves and the intake manifold. From those new parts comes a boost of 10 horsepower for a total of 300. We’re a bit surprised at the lack of direct injection, but the V-6 doesn’t need it to return 22 mpg city and 30 highway in the EPA cycle. We achieved only 18 mpg, but that included a demanding strafe over the San Gabriel Mountains.

The revised engine isn’t just quiet and efficient, it’s also able to move the relatively light 3545-pound SR from zero to 60 mph in 5.9 seconds. But again, speed alone does not a sports sedan make. Accelerate at normal traffic pace and the transmission provides a smooth stream of calm progress. With a strong 261 pound-feet of torque there is enough grunt at low rpm that the CVT doesn’t have to rev the engine mercilessly.

Nissan has programmed the transmission to act like a conventional automatic, shifting through preset ratios when the accelerator is held beyond three-eighths of its travel. But despite the programming, a more efficient chain, and lower-viscosity oil, every big hit of the throttle results in a delay of power delivery as the engine feels like it has to churn up the transmission’s butter before providing acceleration. Even CVTs that pretend to have gears aren’t sporty.

We actually preferred the slightly softer Platinum trim level to this SR. Without the latter’s sporting pretensions, the Maxima comes across as sophisticated, luxurious, and refined. On 18-inch wheels and the non-SR chassis, the Maxima is still taut for its class, but the ride remains relaxed. So while the adjective sport may not apply here, the adjective luxury definitely does. Asking the ­Maxima to be a sports sedan is like asking Caitlyn Jenner to get back into her decathlon shorts. It just ain’t gonna happen.