continues, “Because by chance there was a fairly large rock sitting at the side of that road. My vehicle got onto that rock and stopped. So, I’m still alive.” Even then, long before he earned his Ph.D. in Mechanical Systems Design Engineering from Tohoku University, Sawase-san was thinking like an engineer. In his mind, he began comparing the first rear-wheel- drive car he drove as a student on those very roads, to the front-drive car he piloted on the night of his near- death experience. “So, actually I learned the effect of the different, dy‑ namic systems of the wheels using my own life,” he says, recalling an early, unplanned, unrecommended experiment. This led him to ponder the “critical difference” between front- and rear-wheel control, how it makes for dif‑ ferences in cars generally, and specifically in those competing at the World Rally Championship (WRC). He came to a startling, life-changing realization.
“After that experience, and then watching the WRC races,” he says, he carefully assessed the four-wheel- drive vehicles in the race. He made it his professional mission “to make a four-wheel-drive vehicle that runs well and also allows me to keep my life.” More laughter. Today, the S-AWC system in the 2022 Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV and across the line-up seamlessly re‑ flects his and the engineering team’s goal of making an all-wheel-drive vehicle that responds realistically and effectively to driver inputs while taking into con‑ sideration weather and road conditions. The goal is to deliver “critical safety benefits” in a vehicle that re‑ sponds precisely and predictably to driver inputs, re‑ gardless of driving conditions. So, he adds, the vehicle must perform as the driver operates it, using “technology that optimally distrib‑ utes the drive force between all four wheels,” he says, adding that AWD technology at its best allows drivers
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