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New BBC Top Gear season is off to a great start

The past few years have been very demanding for Top Gear fans. The Jeremy Clarkson Top Gear got too big for itself, and the core quality of the series degraded as stunts and jokes gradually became more and more stale. Things came to a head with the Fracasgate, with Clarkson punching a producer in a very nice hotel in Yorkshire with a very nice brass plaque commemorating "The End of Clarkson's BBC Career". Fast forward to a year ago, when the BBC produced a new series of Top Gear, with famed breakfast show person and shouting enthusiast Chris Evans hosting. Laden with personnel and curiously lacking any direction, the first new season collapsed onto itself with Evans eventually quitting the entire shindig. After that, viewers received a new, Amazon-produced Clarkson-Hammond-May series called The Grand Tour, which was often brilliant and just as often hampered by writing as hackneyed as the last Clarkson years of Top Gear. Now the slate is clean. Evans is gone. The first Grand Tour season has aired. The BBC has had a good long time to re-evaluate its strategy. And the first episode of this season's Top Gear has aired in the UK - and will air March 12 on BBC America. Your first extended look at all new #TopGear, coming 5 March. See you there pic.twitter.com/lYoYOtrWxR — Top Gear (@BBC_TopGear) February 23, 2017 What an improvement! It seems like the producers have taken an ax to everything not strictly necessary for making a great car show, and they've left what is absolutely crucial. There are the three car guys, Matt LeBlanc, Chris Harris and Rory Reid. There is a new studio. There is a new track car. There is a celebrity, but it's not painful to watch. There are easy jokes, there are car jokes, there are Ronin jokes. Ronin jokes! It's as if Harris, by dissecting continuity errors in the 1998 film's BMW chase, is reaching out to us fans, saying he's one of us, and he did notice the wrong wheels when the black BMW falls from the bridge. (Other mistakes are wrong-colored tach needles, for instance.) The first car film is a quality Ferrari FXX K piece, with Harris enjoying one of the 40 built track-day specials on the bankings of Daytona. It's remarkable it was Harris who was allowed to drive the exclusive Ferrari, as the first "outsider" (in his words) to drive one; years ago Harris was one of the most vocal critics of Ferrari's practices, resulting in him getting banned from driving press Ferraris. But then again, this is a customer car.

This is the amazing Christmas wonderland Ferrari builds for kids every year

Granted, when we think of a "Ferrari Christmas Wonderland" our dreams naturally manifest something like a red FF with a bow on the hood and keys on the seat, parked in front of a Fiorano Circuit that's ours for the day. A guy's gotta dream, right?
But, luckily for a lot of beaming children and their grateful, non-selfish parents, Ferrari's gift back to the people of Maranello is far more festive. The Italian automaker clearly pulls out all of the stops for its annual Kids Christmas party to celebrate the season. The event, which sees the Ferrari grounds transformed in to a veritable amusement park in a holiday theme, seems pretty massive of scale and impressive in its detail.
Click through to the video clip below to see what we mean, and pay special attention about two-thirds of the way through, when a special contingent of 'Santas' drop by to say "Boun Natale."

That aluminum-bodied '69 Ferrari Daytona barn find sold for $2.2M

Barn finds are a strange thing. The idea that some beautiful or rare car can simply be locked away and forgotten about seems unthinkable to many enthusiasts. Still, there's entire communities and several television shows dedicated to unearthing these vehicles. One of the most notable finds in recent memory was the sole road-going aluminum-bodied 1969 Ferrari 365 GTB/4 Daytona in existence. The car just sold for about $2.2 million at an RM Sotheby's auction this past weekend. According to the auction house, this is the 30th of just over 1,200 Ferrari Daytonas ever built. This particular car was found stowed away in Japan, having sat collecting dust and dirt for nearly 40 years. While five aluminum-bodied Daytonas were built for racing, this is the only known street car with aluminum body panels. According to an evaluator, the engine and transaxle are both numbers matching. The odometer reads 36,390 kilometers, or about 22,611 miles. That number is believed to be accurate. All the aluminum body panels wear the correct Scaglietti markings. This car has Rosso Chiaro paint over Nero leather (red over black). Other options include Plexiglas headlamps and power windows. The interior is said to be in surprisingly good shape. The car sold for just more than its initial estimate. Let's hope the new owner gets it back into running condition. Related Video: Featured Gallery 1969 Ferrari 365 GTB/4 Daytona Berlinetta Alloy View 25 Photos News Source: RM Sotheby's Ferrari Auctions Coupe Classics