By: David Goldman

To Be, or Not To Be. That is the Question for the Alpha 4C.

What does Alpha Romeo have in common with a strip joint? Simple, both will leave you with blue balls. Alpha has been giving Americans the look but don’t touch policy for years with promises of a 4C gracing our shores, but time and time after, the day of reckoning is delayed. The 4C as a concept may be one of the most erotic visions to ever come from Italy surpassing both the beauty of the coastline it graces and the woman in the passenger’s seat. It’s a sensuous blend of classic Italian sports coupe ideology with a dash of Emmet Brown lunacy.

   Much like talking to the “erotic dancer” and learning she is a biology major working her way through college the 4C too has substance beneath its provocative shell. This mid engine rear-wheel drive coupe makes 200 horsepower that engages the driver via a dual clutch transmission. Its ok if your underwear just got crowded. Further detail surrounding this car is shrouded in mystery only to be revealed as we grow closer to the tentatively set production year of 2013.

 As of now the car has only emerged in two colors. One of them is what can only be described as T-1000 Terminator silver while the other is a red that conjures the same feeling in men that True Blood does in women. This Alpha with its seductive looks and serious performance orientation has the potential to be an icon to yet another discontent generation, much like the Alpha Spider during the days of peace, love and LSD. I want one, you want one, I’m sure your parents want one too. Alpha, get your head out of the sand and give it to us.

The Zagato.

Just as Daniel Craig has too much brawn and not enough brains to be James Bond, this Aston is simply too outrageous but for that I love it. Powered by a V12, performance figures should be on par if not surpassing that of the V12 Vantage on which the Zagato is based off. However reports suggest that the car will sell for 330,000 pounds or for us burger chompers that’s in the neighborhood of 530,000 dollars. That means this car is twice as expensive as the range topping Aston DBS. Oh, and don’t worry there will be 150 examples built so you’ll definitely be able to get your hands on one, not. (Borat voice)

Now that the bad news is out of the way and you’ve lost all interest in this car let me rekindle your spirits. We begin with a history lesson; Aston and the Zagato design house have been working together for 5 decades as of this year. In 1961 the first Zagato was built from a DB4. Its purpose was to turn the Ferrari 250 into a wet nosed child that’s crying for its mommy. The mission was a success and since then the original Zagato has been a coveted jewel among those of us who eat asphalt and drink petrol.

The first thing you notice on this baby is the strong use of straight lines. Typically the Aston should have a curvy elegant body that makes a man tingle at the fingertips touch, and a face that God himself carved of marble…. oh sorry I started thinking about Megan Fox again, but you get the idea. So this car in contrast is much like Kierra Knightly, still beautiful but angular and sharp, somehow feeling more purposeful when you recall that the Zagato was designed as a GT racer. Massive air ducts behind the front wheels and on the hood complement the angles and creases. A rather large carbon fiber rear diffuser brings the car together at the ass end. If you’re still unsure about this car check some awesome Nurburgring footage posted below.

ZL1 Camaro: Stepping Up to Shelby.

After years of ultimate muscle car dominance, Ford and Shelby finally have a reason to look over their shoulders. That reason is the up and coming Chevy Camaro ZL1. Powered by the same engine as the Cadillac CTS-V this car will have some sort of maniacal horsepower rating usually reserved for cars which fall under the coveted class known as the “super car”. It is rumored that this engine will make a substantially higher output than it does in the Cadillac. In order to to make use of this power the Camaro needs to be able to break hard in corners as well as get around them fluidly, something muscle cars have not been known to do. Enter the Corvette ZR1 magnetic dampers, traction control system, and don’t ruin your underwear but yes, carbon ceramic breaks. 

This Camaro also has the looks. The wheels are massive, at 20 inches were talking huge on a galactic scale. The five spoke wheels are handsome and compliment the cars over-all aggressive stance which carries on to the front of the car with functioning hood scoop and re-worked front fascia. What I, your fearless leader am wondering is in its quest to beef up the Camaro in order to take down the GT500 will this new Chevy cannibalize Corvette sales?

This is Mopar: If You Are Listenthing Then You Are The Resistance.

Concerning the New Dodge Commercial:
The year is 3000 and things have gone horribly wrong. We can no longer choose what we eat and our abilities to dress ourselves have failed. Doors no longer wait to be opened but rather we wait for them. This is the world of the future and it is bleak. Robots run our world and I do not like it, not one stinking little bit. The time for revolution is near but who will our brave John Connor be? The possibilities are endless. Chuck Norris perhaps but I fear that even he has moved on by the time that this distant future arrives. Who then will save us, who will take back what’s ours, who will destroy the robots.

Enter the Dodge Charger and its commander, the everyman. One man has had enough of this future world upon entering his super future mobile transport device, thing. Oddly enough though this vehicle resembles a Charger if you look closely at the front fascia. You see as the door opens there is a robot in the drivers seat and that is just too far. Never should the cold heartless metal ass of a robot grace the supple leather of a drivers seat and never shall the icy death grip smother a steering wheel. 

Our hero takes matters into his own hands when he decapitates the robot leaving its cold lifeless body in the car park .The Charger roars to life and bounds mercilessly forward to lead the rebellion of mankind against the machines. You may take our lives, hell maybe our freedom. But. You. Will. Never. Take. Our. Cars. This is Mopar, if you’re listening then you are the resistance. 

Does anyone find it odd that there is no manual Charger? If I cant select my own gears have the robots already won?

http://www.autoblog.com/2011/04/25/video-dodge-charger-leads-the-crusade-against-the-robots/#continued

Fiat 500

This year at the New York Auto show, the smallest car there may have made the biggest splash. Yes the Fiat 500 display was over-run by excited soon to be Fiat owners who hopped out of one display car only to slide into the well upholstered leather seats of another 500. Europe has enjoyed the 500 for years now and its over seas success is likely to be matched when it finally goes on sale in America. 

What the Fiat 500 does very well is give the feeling of character. As soon as you slide into the surprisingly spacious cockpit you are instantly given a feeling of invigoration. It is almost as if the car is whispering in your ear that it doesn’t want to be cooped up in a convention center. It wants to rev up and squirm its way through the crowd onto the busy streets of New York, which it is perfectly adapted to.With its tiny size and high visibility this car is designed for tight situations and nimble driving. I like to think of it as a mouse on steroids with a stick of dynamite strapped to its back. 

It is being marketed to a younger active crowd as it is displayed with ski racks and bike racks but considering a large portion of the crowd was older, I think a large portion of sales will come from former owners searching for nostalgia. At least until the Abarth edition comes over the pond. Think of it as that same mouse with 3 sticks of dynamite, steroids and of course protein shakes in the cup holder.

2012, End of Days and maybe the Civic Si

Where to begin with the 2012 Civic Si? Well first off with only four more horsepower it isn’t going to be any faster than the outgoing 2011 model. However it has 170 torques that will pack a higher mid range punch. There may be more to speed than horsepower, a full test will be needed to confirm this. You may be thinking that so far this Si sounds quite nice, who wouldn’t mind more torque lower down in the rev range? But wait, a 7,000-rpm redline? Oh dear friends something it seems has gone terribly awry.

Civic Si’s have always been about revving the piss out of a small engine that had a redline of galactic altitudes. The problem is the new Si has a redline roughly where the last Si would hit its Vtec mark. What does this mean for the new Civic? I’m not certain I can answer that question. To me it seems as though the entire Honda ideology has shifted since its brutal execution of the S2000. The Civic was Honda’s Vtec golden boy ever since and now its future looks bleak. Obviously the Civic will be around long after the extinction of the human race, but will it still be the Civic we know and love? Or will it go the way of so many other small racers, a slow death at the hands of those who would rather plant a tree than plant the accelerator to the floor.

VW Beetle: A Cinderella Man Story

A friend of mine once referred to the woman he spent the night with as having “The same profile as a VW Beetle if you lay her on her back”. As of today, my large woman-loving friend, you can say that no more. You see, gone are the flower power ways of the NEW Beetle and VW has asserted this motion by dropping the “NEW” moniker from the title of the car. The new car looks as though the original Beetle had never died but instead has been hitting the gym for the past 70 years and at last emerged the mean Civic-fighting machine we all so dearly wished it were.

VW has announced today that there will be a 2.5-liter engine as well as a spritely 2.0 Turbo that will likely sell to the male driver oriented crowd. Car and Driver has also reported that a Beetle R will likely hit our shores in the future to join such peaches as the Golf R and Passat CC R. Should this happen, it is very likely that your MazdaSpeed will be shrinking away quickly in the rear view of VW Beetles across the country.

The car now looks aggressive with 19-inch alloys and a rear spoiler; this is not your little sisters high school car. Instead, the new car is both longer and wider allowing for a more performance foced ride. In addition, the lower vertical height adds to the menacing appearance, as the Beetle now looks hunkered down and purposeful. Ill have mine in Black please.

B spec Racing: Story of the small car revolution in America.

Americans like their cars the same way Burger King likes its customers. Huge. A car in America is a status symbol used to show wealth, or to compensate for “inadequacies”. In the 80’s and 90’s this obsession reached its pinnacle when American car companies began designing cars with etcher-sketches leading to results that looked similar to school buses.

All that, is about to change. The new B-spec racing series in America looks to make the small car “cool”, and yes I think its working. Car and Driver entered two cars into 25 hrs of Thunderhill Endurance race. One a Mazda 2 and the other a Honda Fit. What makes these cars special is that aside from being gutted of an interior and tuned for racing (suspension roll cages ect.) these cars, mechanically are mostly stock. The point being illustrated by these cars is that a small cheap car can be a fun capable road warrior as well. Think of this type of car as a wolf in a baby’s footy-pajamas… except a very loud wolf that sounds as though its gargling nails. Through a blender. Spitting them up again as fire. Yes, that works. The most impressive part is these little terrors did quite well with the Fit placing under 20th in a line up of over 60 cars. Some would shrink the testes on your stock Mustang GT.