It’s been hard to miss the excitement all week over the BMW 8 series with photos of the concept doing the rounds. Speculation about an M version of the 8 Series was then confirmed this weekend with BMW releasing it’s own spy shots of the car in its camo wrap. BMW says the M version of the 8 Series will be unveiled during a presentation at the Nürburgring 24-hour race, but there’s nothing known about what will be under the hood yet.
The big question nobody is asking though… if companies start regularly releasing their own spy shots, will we still call them spy shots?
UK trashy tabloid readers may have seen this Ferrari Dino in the news after a coked up Australian model crashed it into a truck. It happened on the party island of Ibiza, and she reportedly fled the scene to try and get onto her (reportedly of course) London based Saudi Arabian boyfriends private jet. However she was arrested at Ibiza’s Codolar airport before she could get on the plane.
It’s all very tawdry, but worth noting that the reported value of the car before the crash was four hundred thousand pounds. Hopefully the boyfriend will use some more of his heavy cash flow to have it restored, and then not hand over the keys to coke guzzling fools again.
Also over the weekend Takuma Sato became the first Japanese driver to claim victory at the Indianapolis 500 and leaving ‘Murica Man somewhat confused:
Fernando Alonso put in an amazing drive after choosing to run the the 500 instead of driving a McLaren-Honda at the Monaco Grand Prix – partly due to the recurring Honda engine problems that have plagued him through the season. He instead drove a McLaren partnered Andretti Autosport car powered by a Honda engine… which failed him on lap 187 in a cloud of smoke.
Takuma Sato managed to hold off Helio Castroneves from taking his fourth Indy 500 win before dropping a class filled quote that should bring tears to the eyes of any auto racing fan:
“I know Helio is always going to charge,” Sato said. “But he’s just such a gentleman and such a fair player.”
Also over the weekend, the F1 Monaco Grand Prix took place. It’s unlikely any passing was done outside of pit lane, someone probably crashed, someone else no doubt had an engine failure and people got drunk on boats. I don’t actually know. Almost anything is more interesting than F1 so I made some assumptions and didn’t bother watching it.
Lotus finally got itself a new owner. Having found itself somewhat beleaguered and not reaching the potential both the company and car enthusiasts would dearly love, hope is now in sight.
The Hong Kong based automaker Geely acquired a 51-percent share in Lotus from its parent company Proton last week. A Chinese company purchasing a well loved brand isn’t known for bringing excitement to the masses, but having seen the re-invention of Volvo with the money and freedom to build what they wanted it’s a distinct possibility good things will happen. There’s no guarantee of course, but it’s been reported that there’s a fresh air of excitement at Lotus right now and that must be cause for optimism.
“The Germans are bad, very bad. Look at the millions of cars that they sell in the U.S.
Terrible. We’re going to stop that.” – President Donald Trump
Those are the words President Trump spoke while at the UN summit last week, and above is a picture of him with the Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren he purchased for Melania Trump. For extra face palm, Mercedes delivered it to Trump Towers at his request because he didn’t want to go to Europe to pick it up.
And this is him behind the wheel of a 2015 Rolls-Royce Phantom. He’s a huge fan of Rolls Royce who are, indeed, owned by BMW who import them into America. He has also owned a Maybach recently, Maybach being a sub-brand of Mercedes. Then for the triple, he has also owned a car from a brand owned and operated by the Volkswagen Audi Group. A Bentley Continental.
Based on his doing the exact opposite of what he condemns all the time, we have a pool going here at Both Hand Drive on wether Trump will buy an 8 Series.
If you would like more on Trumps complete cluelessness check out this article from a while back.
