Car Fun Fact of the Day: The Legend of the Prancing Moose

Moose History 101:* Shortly after the XC90 debuted in 2002, Volvo organized several test drive events, where quite a few Volvo fans came out to see and drive the new SUV's on cone slalom courses to experience the advanced Dynamic Stability Traction Control (DSTC).* One of the courses was a special slalom, where a professional driver would take a carload of folks, accelerate to a high speed, take his foot off the brake and gas, and crank the wheel hard one direction, then the other (simulating avoiding an object in the road).* Any other tall vehicle would have certainly become unstable and possibly lost control or even rolled over, but the Volvo's DSTC took over and kept the SUV in perfect form without a hint of trouble.* This course was the "Moose Avoidance Test," a fairly common test for places that might actually have moose.

Then for the 2004 SEMA Show in Las Vegas, the blue/yellow moose profile emblem appeared on a red concept XC90.* Then Volvo's moose emblem for their 2005 XC90 V8 debut was the black one on the yellow fender (rendition of Lambo's bull). And thus, the legend began.