By the time I get through reading the various companies that rank the best vehicles for each year, I feel like my head is going to explode. That being said, the boys over at Strategic Vision sure seemed to make things easier on me for the batch of 2009 vehicles they evaluated, just read their criteria for ranking and you too will see. And although I don’t necessarily agree with every pick, I was pleasantly surprised to find that some unexpected vehicles took top honors. Hit the jump.

Here are some of the most notable winners in their respective categories:

Small Car: Ford Focus Sedan

Mid-Size Car: VW Jetta

Large Car: Nissan Maxima and Pontiac G8

Specialty Coupe: VW Beetle

Premium Coupe: Chevrolet Corvette (DUH)

Minivan: Honda Odyssey

Mid-Size SUV: GMC Envoy and Toyota 4Runner

Large SUV: GMC Yukon XL

Standard Pickup: Honda Ridgeline

Full-Size Pickup: Dodge Ram

There are of course several more categories however I feel that when a car falls into the ‘Near Utility’ or ‘Small Multi-Function’ category, it doesn’t tend to matter much.

I was happy to see the Dodge Ram ranked among the top pickups, but was quickly dismayed when the Honda Ridgeline took the Standard Pickup category. Why do I hate the Ridgeline? Well besides being called a truck with a V6, front wheel drive, independent suspension, there is the fact that it looks like a Chevrolet Avalanche on estrogen. Moving on. The GMC Envoy was a surprise to me, as was the GMC Yukon taking top honors over the Cadillac Escalade ESV. VW came in strong with more category winners than anyone, giving them the title of best overall brand in terms of consumer-rated quality. Bravo, Germany (I can think of one person in particular that will jump for joy *cough*, Joe). Also, I was happy to hear that the Ford Focus beat out a host of imports to take the Small Car title [Ed Note: and by doing so throws the entire thing into question]. Way to go Mulally. For the rest of the category winners hit the following think. [Source: Strategic Vision]