Seat goes large

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under News, Seat

It’s been quite a while since I saw a decent sedan from Seat, and I must say this one came very much as a surprise. A very pleasant one, too. Exeo is looking like the kind of car that makes the Passat a buying prospect only for retired old men and people upgrading from an older Passat version. Not to mention Skoda Superb.

To be honest, I see Exeo as a competitor for Mitsubishi Lancer, because they both appeal mostly to younger, performance oriented clients, the difference being that those who’re after opulance choose the Lancer and those more secure with themselves will go for the Exeo. And, withiut saying the Lancer is a bad car, what a bloody good choice that would be.

Expect it to hit the market sometime in the first half of the next year. It’ll have most of the VAG engines, so there won’t be any shortage of choices for either petrol or diesel fans. The vehicle on show at Paris had a 2.0 litre TSI engine and a double exhaust pipe to match. Which is nice.

Hami left frustrated again

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under Entertainment, Motorsport

What has happened to F1? Where are all the boring laps and people shaking hands at the end of the race? Do they really want to win it this time? Every single one of them? Do they want to win it so bad that they’re turning every race into a Destruction Derby? It seems so. It’s Carmageddon time, as The Clash would sing it.

Well, you couldn’t see much from all the rumble and debris flying everywhere, but the main story is that Hamilton finished 12th while Massa got two points after Sebastien Bourdais was given a time penalty. Hamilton’s lead in the driver’s Championship Table has dropped to only five points. All these should make the following two races something to die for, and, given the latest developments, I might just mean that literally.

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under Entertainment

This is the new SEAT Ibiza SC commercial you’ll be seeing when you go to the movies. There are a few things you should know before you watch it: first, the guys scrambling for the car are SEAT race drivers and second, the hand that whishes us a very rich and varied sex life in the end, belongs to a woman. She too is a pilot for SEAT in DTM. Now watch it!

Mini Mazda 6

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under Mazda, News

The new Mazda 3 Sedan will be making its debut at the Los Angeles Motor Show later this year. Well, if you like more precise dates, on the 19th of November 2008, between 12:20 and 12:45 local hours. There isn’t much to say, except for the fact that the previous (actually, current) Mazda 3 is the bestseller of the Mazda range, with one sold for every three other Mazda models. If you liked the Mazda 6, you’ll like the new smaller one at least just as much, because we all know smaller things tend to look better.

COYS is enjoying the financial crysis

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under Entertainment

Yes, it’s not just the Pope who’s jubilating at the thought of people loosing money, others are happy about the state of the global financial system. COYS, a London based auction house, is selling historic cars by the bucket.
From mid September, they have sold cars in a total estimate of 8.5 million dollars. That, I would call, good business, and so would Chris Routledge, the COYS Managing Director. Responsible for a good part of those 8.5 million USD is a 1955 Aston Martin DB3S, which sold for over 2 million pounds. In a selection of the other cars sold by COYS you can find a 1955 Mercedes-Benz 300SL Gullwing or a 1996 Ferrari F50 or a Lancia Aurelia B24 Spyder.
People seem more willing to invest in a classic car and put it to rest inside a garage than risk on the fluctuating stock market. And who can blame them.

It’s Peugeot Time

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under News

The Paris Motor Show has started so that means that all the French manufacturers are so busy showing off their new cars and concepts that there’s nobody left to bake a baguette or to buy one. There isn’t anyone left to shout at president Sarkozy either, and that can’t be a good thing.

Peugeot has been extremely active, more so than Renault and maybe on a par with Citroen. I’m not talking about volumes, I’m talking about quality. The RC concept is stunning, and I haven’t used that word to describe things that come from France too often. Also, the 308 CC looks better than I expected and I expect the Prologue to strike a sensible chord into those who want to drive an SUV-ish car but dont appreciate all the negative publicity.
So if you were anxious to hear a bloke speak English like he’s lived in France for the last five years (which he probably has) and also laugh at him when he says “hi-tech technology”, watch this short film about Peugeot’s stand at Le Mondial de l’Automobile.

The Uban Adventurer

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under Renault

Have you ever heard the term “urban adventurer” before? No, it’s not Indiana Jones passing through a city or moving into the suburbs. It’s a new car from Renault, and the Frenchies think that this describes it best. Why? Because it’s small and nimble, although it actually isn’t, and because it offers open-air driving for the passengers on the back seat. If you ask me, though, I think they call it that because it sounds good and because “Urban cruiser” was already taken by Toyota.

The Renault Kangoo be bop is another utility vehicle turned into a recreational one. This one has (only) four seats and no matter how much I tried I couldn’t figure out how anybody can reach the two back seats. Arguably the only nice part about it is the rear end, where a glazed sliding roof and a tailgate window that also slides out of view leave the back of the car exposed. Why would you want to do that in a tall and odd looking car is beyond me, but I’m neither French nor Indiana Jones, so what do I know?

It’s nice to be NICE

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under News

It’s also nice to have a NICE. You get motoring costs of about 2p per mile and you are exempt from road tax or congestion tax in downtown London. And, of course, probably the reason why you bought it in the first place, you have zero emissions.

The NICE MyCar was launched at the British International Motor Show this summer and it didn’t take long until it got an accolade. It won the electric vehicle of the year 2008 prize at the GreenFleet Awards, mostly for its practicality but also for its design. And you have to agree that although it looks like the kind of thing you would buy for your 3 year old son, it’s not any worse than a smart ForTwo.

The people at NICE were delighted and I must say we’re enjoying this too. The company has only been active for two years, but in this short time span it has changed the way people look at electric cars more than any other. So next time you see a MyCar passing you by, take a deep bow and take off your hat too.

At night, when the freaks come out

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under Motorsport

What the hell was all this? F1 racing at night? Why? Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for variety, but before they start throwing a few Tyrannosaurus Rex on the track or randomly place landmines on the pit lane, let me just make one point clear: we want more exciting races, but I don’t think placing obstacles is the way to do it. What’s next? A Siberian snow circuit?

Ask somebody what they liked the most about the race and they’ll say it was the Ferrari engineers running down towards Felipe Massa’s car that looked like a foetus with the umbilical cord still attached. The similar Coulthard incident was fun, too, but I suspect neither of them was appealing for two of the engineers (one for each team) who went to the hospital with a neck brace and a broken angle, respectively.

In the end, Alonso won it. And he deserved it. He dominated the free practice sessions and probably would have qualified on a higher grid position if it wasn’t for some technical problems during the final session. Still, he made the most of the abandons and penalties and cut his way to the lead.

Raikonnen seems to make a habit out of dropping out with a few laps to go until finish, so betting on him running out into the scenery in the final lap next race might not get you very high odds. Hamilton had a quiet race and finished third, thus changing the gap between him and Massa to seven points.

Nothing is done yet, and if we weren’t so close to the end of the season I wouldn’t completely rule out Alonso either.

Golf Mark VI GTI Concept - a world full of surprises

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under Volkswagen

I don’t know if my heart can take shocks like these anymore. A new GTI… And just look at how radical it looks. But wait, this is just a concept, who knows what the final production version will look like.

WTF? It looks just as you would expect it to, given the new Mark VI. Not bad, just incredibly unsurprising. And, again, that’s not really a bad thing. It’s got smoked tail lights and red contoured radiator grille, 18” ‘telephone dial’ rims and meaner looking headlamps, bottom-flat steering wheel and black glossy dashboard and a 2.0 TSI engine that develops 208bhp. That means that dynamic-wise it takes the new GTI 7.2 seconds to reach 62mph from a stand-still, and if the road is clear it doesn’t stop until it reaches 148mph. These numbers make it the faster GTI to date, which tells a story about the older GTIs and how badly the R32 is needed in order to keep in touch with the hot hatch category.