Coupes light up the Detroit Show

Environental issues may have been to the fore at Detroit – but there was no shortage of high-performance coupe action on the show floor.

And in some cases, manufacturers had managed to combine alternative powertrains with exciting-looking sports cars. Even Ferrari has gone green, showing a biofuel-capable version of its F430 Spider model

Most notable was Fisker Automotive’s Karma plug-in hybrid sportscar, a vehicle that’s bound to debunk the vision of hybrids as dull-but-worthy commuter boxes. The Karma is an $80,000 sports car capable of a 0-60mph time of just 5.8 seconds and a top speed of 125mph. But according to CEO and designer Henrik Fisker, it is greener than a Toyota Prius.

Fisker, who designed the BMW Z8 and Aston Martin DB9, said the car was “an environmentally friendly car without compromise” that would make ‘green’ seem sexy.

More conventional, but certainly sexy is the Lexus LF-A Roadster, a soft-top version of the coupe shown 12 months ago. With a 500bhp, front-mounted 5-litre V10 it’s nowhere near as green as the Fisker – but it would give Toyota’s luxury car division a genuine supercar flagship to reinforce its up-market credentials.

A less expensive, but no less important coupe is the Cadillac CTS Coupe, a surprise unveiling at the show. The angular-styled 3.6-litre V6-engined two-door might just be the car to kick-start Cadillac’s flagging UK sales, giving a genuine BMW M3/Audi S5 rival, though production is still a couple of years away.

Volkswagen calls this sleek, low-roof derivative of the Passat a Crossover Coupe, or CC. It bears the same relationship to the regular Passat as the Mercedes CLS does to the E-class. It’s a four-door coupe that carries a premium over the more conservative sedan. UK sales start in late summer, and the range will include a 300bhp 3.6-litre FSI engined version with 4Motoion four-wheel drive and DSG gearbox.