Why can I not use vif when my model is made from a matrix

Question

I'm using an example based on cars for my inquiry here.

I can use vif from the car package when the model is listed out.

vif(lm(mpg ~ wheels + tires + weight))

But let's say I combined wheels, tires, and weight to a matrix called "car_specs". Now I can no longer use vif on the model.

vif(lm(mpg ~ car_specs))

I want to use vif in the second case for a function I wrote

Model_and_VIF <- function(...){
  #Getting list of names of the variables
  argnames = toupper(unlist(lapply(as.list(sys.call())[-1], deparse)))
  #making a list of vectors
  args = list(...)
  #Making a blank matrix
  data <- matrix(unlist(args[1]), ncol = 1,nrow = 4019)
  colnames(data) <- c(argnames[1])
  #Adding columns of other variabls
  for (i in 2:length(args)){
    data <- cbind(data, unlist(args[i]))
    colnames(data)[i] <- c(argnames[i])
  }
  dep <- data[,1]
  indep <- data[,2:ncol(data)]
  print(c(argnames[1], "vs.", argnames[2:length(argnames)]))
  print(summary(lm(dep ~ indep)))
  vif(lm(dep ~ indep))
}

Why will vif no longer work?

Here is some sample code

mdat <- matrix(c(1:150, 151:300), nrow = 100, ncol = 3, byrow = TRUE)
colnames(mdat) <- c("boat", "coal", "grain")```
boat <- mdat[,1]
coal <- mdat[,2]
grain <- mdat[,3]