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Honda’s Civic Type R may be the hottest of hot hatches, at least among those we can buy in the U.S. It’s an impressive automotive achievement — one of the purest driver’s cars on the market, in spite of its front-wheel-drive powertrain. But the Civic Type R still polarizes car people with its aggressive looks. The hatchback confronts you head-on with its giant rear wing and bright red accents. For skeptics, it’s not a car that a serious adult could own.
Honda has resolved that problem for 2020 with the new Civic Type R Sport Line. This new trim tones the car down by reducing the wing to a small spoiler, swapping red highlights for gray and ditching the red bucket seats for more sensible black ones. The trim also delivers more comfort features; it drops down to 19-inch wheels from 20-inch ones to offer a more forgiving ride, and adds back insulation (stripped out of the standard Type R to reduce weight) to make the cabin quieter.
In short, the Sport Line trim makes the Civic Type R perfect. There’s just one slight catch: this trim will only be available for European customers. Honda told Autoblog that the company saw no reason to bring it to America, since the standard Civic Type R is selling so well. That sound you hear? That’s a sad trombone.
