Fast Cars

On the same day, Toyota, which is threatening to overtake General Motors Corporation as the world's largest automaker, confirms what has been clearly coming for several years - race cars that look vaguely like the Japanese firm's top selling family sedan will be in the starting lineup at the 2007 Daytona 500 and will be a regular competitor thereafter in America's most popular form of motorsports.

The Speedsource RX8 of Sylvan Tremblay, Jeff Altenburg and Haskell led in the early going, but seemed to suffer from new car development problems, resulting in an retirement from overheating.

Two teens were street racing in Toronto when they both slammed into a taxi cab, killing the driver instantly. They are now being held on charges of criminal negligence. The twist on the story is this - a copy of the video game Need for Speed was found in the front seat in one of the vehicles. People are now wondering if this accident was caused by the video game…. go figure.

According to a fun little test, "Which Sports Car Are You?" -- which I found while catching up with Laura Lee's blogging at The Wide Awake Cafe, and couldn't resist -- this is my automotive alter ego.

13. Your car insurance goes down and your car payments go up.!

Anyway, I've hastened the moment by going and buying a sports car. I'm not really a car nut but I do a lot of driving up and down from London so I feel justified in having a decent car.

With only 23 days and 7 hours until the drop of the green flag which will mark the start of the Great America Race………the Daytona 500, I’d like to try and open some eyes to this bad ass sport. For a while, I was one of those…’NASCAR is a 4 hour left hand turn’ snobs, very akin to the two-plankers who thumbed their noses at snowboarding even though they never tried it. Unfortunately, I used to be one of those snobs. That all changed the first time I ever went to a race. Since Baseball has somehow been labeled ‘America’s sport,’ here is a quick comparison on why going to a NASCAR race is far better than going to watch baseball.

Mercedes McLaren SLR, what can I say about it? It is Mercedes showcase car, just look at the designs, that slick jacknife profile, those shark-like side gills, that formula one front end and those beautiful wheels. It's the ultimate gearhead's toy. The SLR is not just all show and no go, underneath is the superb McLaren tuned engine that sounds like a Spitfire charging down the road. In a word, breathtaking.

First of all, quoting an article from the NBC 5 Chicago website, “Ford said the company’s focus has to be on building cars that consumers want, noting the automaker was slow to shift its product mix away from gas-guzzling sports utility vehicles.” I don’t know if Ford really said this in precisely this way, or it is just poor writing on the part of whoever it is who wrote this article (it is not specified on the page). But doesn’t it make you sit there and chuckle, and say, “Well, duh! I could have told you that, and I’m no economist.” What on earth has their focus been, to build cars that consumers don’t want?

Here's an inside look at the new Sauber F1.06, BMW's first entry in Formula One racing.

For a number of reasons which I hope to reveal very soon, this was a non-trivial experience. You might be thinking, "City driving? Tense, but no big deal. What's all the fuss about?" Suffice it to say, for now, that everything about the driving experience in this position is new. It really is like learning to drive all over again.

Driving experience - few rules of the road appear to be adhered to - Hold on tight!

And whoa. So many luxury cars. Isn’t this supposed to be a college town? Oh ya, that’s right…it’s THAT kind of college town. Anyway, work has started for me, I’m slowly being schmoozed into the lifestyle of the corporate tech-yuppy…and that’s kinda what I expected. 401k’s, expense accounts, and tax deductions…here we go.

If you really want to grasp the enormity of the average American motor vehicle, you should bring one to Budapest. In Europe, most cars are tiny. A 3-series BMW, a small sports sedan, is considered to be a big car. Streets are pretty narrow too. To show you just how narrow, here’s a street in downtown Budapest with a Lamborghini Diablo parked on the left side:

I just responded to a Freecycle ad for the first time ever. If it works out, it would be the perfect thing. There’s a local guy offering a toddler race car bed, and he will deliver! P is ready to move out of his crib (something we’ve been holding off as long as possible to keep him IN his bed, but…) and he just love, love, loves cars, so it would be really cool if it works out. Stay tuned…

It probably stuck a chord in my little mind after I read this yesterday. Same basic thing - envy (although in this article it is cloaked in the assumption of a moral high ground). If it suits your needs to drive a hybrid - great! If, however, you need features only found in an SUV, then that’s OK too. When I lived in the DC area and had a 40+ mile commute, a hybrid sounded fine. Here in the Last Frontier I need four wheel drive and room for stuff

I would be willing to bet that General Motors has their hands on more innovative automotive technology than any other auto manufacturer out there, yet they refuse to put any of it into any of their consumer vehicles. For example…

LOL The boy was playing this morning and said “Hey mom I am going backwards just like Dale Jarrett on TV when he broke a tire and went upside down!” I’m thinking the boy is ready for the NASCAR season to start.

The orange is synonymous with the origins of McLaren, as the team ran its Formula One and CAN-AM racers in the colour for a number of years starting with the M5A in 1968.

My cake… my cake was great. It was a figure-8 with some ramps and bridges on it. Why ramps and bridges? It was a race car track! Complete with tiny race cars and road signs. However, Amanda did take the initiative and see fit to include a ‘crashed’ car that they had smashed with a hammer and stuck onto the cake, complete with road cones and such to divert traffic around it. Supposedly this was me (I tend to be a little spirited in my driving, much to the chagrin of my friends). :-P

In short, he’s building a ultra-light AWD race car of his own design from scratch — think 4/3 scale shifter cart or D Sports Racing car if you follow those. More importantly, he’s documenting his project along the way, including sketches, plans, decision making process, the cost of parts and so on. I’m impressed when someone tries something very difficult and documents it along the way, showing their thinking, their mistakes, their fixes and how they got to the end result.

I have always loved race cars, but even as a kid my favorite winter spectator sport was bobsleding. It was the best part of the Olympics from my prespective. One thing I always noticed was that the USA teams were not really in the hunt for the win. But former Daytona 500 Champion and successful NASCAR driver Geoff Bodine has changed that by putting his NASCAR experience into the design, development and promotion of the US Bobsled team.

Aggressive-Arab-Driver-Guy (AADG for short) drives a late-model luxury car his father bought for him while he was still a junior in high school (Fordson High School). What sets aggressive Arab drivers apart from their peers in other ethnic groups is that Arab brats buy luxury cars that are primarily driven by middle-aged accountants...I'm talking about Lincoln Town Cars people! Where an average American teenager sees a granny-car, AADG sees an opportunity. After AADG is finished accessorizing that Town Car, it'll be sufficiently pimped out as an urban street-fighting machine...your Grandma won't recognize this hooptie.

The driving experience was slightly peppier than I remember previous year’s models, yet certainly not impressive from a true performance standpoint. It was quick handling, also improved from previous years, and smoother shifting. Whether or not it will continue to be a hit with the tuner crowds I can’t say, but I can definitely say that it will continue to be a great choice for girls leaving the nest for college. It handled freeway speeds without exception, yet didn’t pass without a bit of preparation. For a Honda, it was very quiet inside, which I really appreciated.

Only a little over two months from the start of the 2006 Formula One season, I thought I would publish the proposed calender and give my predictions for the upcoming year.

I will be turning 25 in just 4 short hours. Will my car insurance rates go down?! What else is there to look forward to turning 25? Other then being “old?” haha.