’20 SHELBY GT500: PONY EXPRESS MUSTANG

Posted on November 14, 2020 by MartynL

Saddle-up, it's going to be a wild ride in Ford's outrageous 760-horsepower GT500, the most powerful factory Ford ever. CGC Road Test Editor Howard Walker takes the reins of a ’20 SHELBY GT500: PONY EXPRESS MUSTANG and goes Supercar hunting! Let me introduce you to Juno. This NASA space probe, currently doing loop-di-loops around Jupiter, has the distinction of being the fastest man-made creation ever. How fast? When it left Mother Earth's gravitational pull back in 2011, it was acceler...

SMOOTH OPERATOR: ‘21 ROLLS-ROYCE GHOST

Posted on November 12, 2020November 12, 2020 by MartynL

Behold the smoothest-riding car in the world, and the quietest. Road Test Editor Howard Walker takes this SMOOTH OPERATOR: ‘21 ROLLS-ROYCE GHOST silent knight for a hushed spin. Wait, what happened to the bump? I clearly saw the gnarly, Detroit-style pothole looming fast. Waited for the ker-thump as a tire dropped into it. Waited for the thudder-judder in the steering.What happened was... nothing. Here, perched oh-so-stately behind the wheel of the all-new ‘21 Rolls-Royce Ghost, it seems...

MERCEDES-BENZ: C111 ROTARY ICON!

Posted on November 10, 2020November 10, 2020 by MartynL

Roue Watch designer Alex lervolino blogs about the MERCEDES-BENZ: C111 ROTARY ICON!, a gullwing masterpiece that started life as a laboratory car. Stuart Schorr, Vice-President Communications & Marketing, Jaguar Land Rover, with the C111 at Pebble Beach. In 1969, Mercedes-Benz surpassed all expectations revealing a super sports car well ahead of its time. With gullwing doors and a Wankel rotary engine the C111 was a research vehicle that quickly became the absolute dream car of the 1970s. ...

‘SUPER MARIO’ ANDRETTI: INDYCAR THRILL RIDE!

Posted on November 3, 2020November 3, 2020 by MartynL

Racing legend Mario Andretti may be 80, but he's still blisteringly fast. As CGC Road Test Editor Howard Walker finds out on a hot lap of the St. Petersburg Grand Prix street track: ‘SUPER MARIO’ ANDRETTI: INDYCAR THRILL RIDE! Breathe. Suck in one last gulp of H20 before all hell breaks loose. Breathe, to try and calm the jack-hammer that's currently doing a full heart-pounding tap-dance in my chest. Right now I'm strapped - a little too snuggly I must say - in the back seat of a scream...

BMW-LITE: NEW M235I xDRIVE GRAN COUPE

Posted on October 19, 2020 by MartynL

Based on the soft-roading X2 compact crossover, the ’20 BMW-LITE: NEW M235I xDRIVE GRAN COUPE should be Prozac on wheels. It's far from it, says Road Test Editor Howard Walker. Now this is a first. Let's take a play-in-the-mud sport utility and turn it into a sports sedan. Give me that again? In its seemingly never-ending quest to fill every niche in the automotive marketplace - well, perhaps not the pickup and minivan markets - BMW has given us the cute, but somewhat confusing, 2-Se...

ULTIMATE CARGUY: CARROLL SHELBY!

Posted on October 8, 2020 by MartynL

High-performance automotive historian Scott Oldham blogs about the horsepower and heritage of Shelby American and America’s ULTIMATE CARGUY: CARROLL SHELBY! Photo: Mike Matune @ Laguna Seca With the possible exceptions of Henry Ford and Mario Andretti, Carroll Shelby is America’s most famous automotive personality. That was probably true before the movie Ford v Ferrari hit it big last year, and it’s certainly the case in its wake. He’s been called America’s Enzo Ferrari. It was meant as ...

MID-ENGINED CORVETTE: STINGS LIKE A RAY!

Posted on October 3, 2020October 3, 2020 by MartynL

The Supercar world got all shook up last year when GM pulled the wraps off the long awaited mid-engine 'Vette. Now Road Test Editor Howard Walker has tried it for size and says all the hype is for real, the MID-ENGINED CORVETTE: STINGS LIKE A RAY! If you're a lover of adrenaline-pumping, finger-tingling, punch-in-the-solar-plexus Supercars, I have two little words for you: New Corvette. Just feast your eyes on the thing. There's more visual drama here than RuPaul and Gaga combined. More...

GNX: MAXIMUM MUSCLE FROM BUICK!

Posted on October 2, 2020October 2, 2020 by MartynL

The 1980s were lean years for musclecar enthusiasts. There were some bright spots: Corvette, 5.0 Mustang, IROC Camaro, Firebird Trans-Am and turbocharged-intercooled Buick Grand National/GNX. Arguably, the rare, high-boost GNX was the car to beat on the street and strip. If heavy metal music were a car, it would be a GNX: MAXIMUM MUSCLE FROM BUICK! “The GNX is an ax-wielding barbarian laying waste to everything in its path. It rockets to 60 mph in 4.7 seconds and squirts through the qua...

TOP TEN: DEALER-BUILT MUSCLECARS

Posted on October 1, 2020October 1, 2020 by MartynL

Scott Oldham, who grew up with a ’69 Baldwin-Motion 427 Camaro in the family garage, blogs about the TOP TEN: DEALER-BUILT MUSCLECARS in the 1960s-1970s. 1967 Royal Pontiac Bobcat GTO During the horsepower wars of the original muscle car era, it wasn’t just the car companies duking it out for supremacy on the street and strip: Many dealers also got into the ring, adding cubic inches and horsepower over and above what the factory was offering. They were building some of the quickest muscl...

DYNAMIC DRIVING: ’21 JAGUAR F-TYPE R

Posted on September 25, 2020 by MartynL

Seven years after launch, Jaguar has given its athletic F-Type two-seater a mid-cycle makeover to sharpen its lines and re-boot its appeal. Road Test Editor Howard Walker takes the 380-horsepower DYNAMIC DRIVING: ’21 JAGUAR F-TYPE R-Dynamic for a spin. OK, so let's get the kitty-cat puns out of the way before we drive. Yes, Jaguar's newest-generation F-Type convertible could well be the purr-fect sports car with its fur-midable performance and paws-itively awesome handling. Certainly...