1960 Mercedes-benz 190-series on 2040-cars

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Jay Leno tells the story of his Mercedes Gullwing

With all the new and varied machinery stopping by Jay Leno's Garage on a regular basis, it would be all too easy to forget that the former talk show host has one of the largest and most enviable private collections of automobiles in the world. Leno has hundreds of vehicles at his disposal, but the real value of it all is at least as much about quality as it is quantity. Take this gem, for example. Sure, it's a little worse for wear, but it's got a nice patina to it – and it's a work in progress. One look is all it takes to know exactly what it is: a classic Mercedes-Benz 300SL, complete with Gullwing doors. "The McLaren F1 of its day," Jay calls it, and with good reason. Watch the video above to hear the story of the Gullwing he rescued from the desert and is slowly bringing back to life. Related Video:

Lewis Hamilton on pole in France, Sebastian Vettel only seventh

LE CASTELLET, France — Lewis Hamilton seized pole position for the French Grand Prix in track record time as Mercedes, chasing their 10th successive win, swept the front row of the grid in dominant fashion on Saturday. The Formula One world championship leader was 0.286 seconds quicker than team mate Valtteri Bottas. Ferrari's Charles Leclerc qualified third with team mate Sebastian Vettel a distant seventh on a distinctly off day for the German. The pole, in a time of one minute 28.319 seconds, was a record-extending 86th of Hamilton's career and his third of the season. "I'm happy that I got the potential out of the car, the team did a fantastic job," said five-times world champion Hamilton, last year's winner from pole at Le Castellet's Paul Ricard circuit. "We've just been chipping away at improving the set-up of the car," added the Briton, who is 29 points clear of Bottas after seven races — all won by the pair. Hamilton also triumphed in the last two of 2018. Bottas was fastest in the second phase of qualifying but could not match Hamilton's sizzling pace when it mattered in the final shoot-out. "The wind changed direction and there was a couple of corners my line didn't work and I had to work it out but Lewis had a better lap," said the Finn. Mercedes have looked to be in a class of their own all weekend, with Hamilton or Bottas fastest in every practice session with Leclerc, rather than Vettel, consistently the best of the rest. Vettel struggled, backing out of his first hot lap and then failing to string together all the sectors smoothly on his second attempt. "I don't know what happened, I lost so much momentum there was no point to finish that lap," said the German, who starts behind the Renault-powered McLarens of British rookie Lando Norris (fifth) and Spaniard Carlos Sainz (sixth). "Some laps it felt good and others it didn't. I didn't get the best out of the car but it was difficult for me, but some laps I didn't have he grip I had before." Vettel's time of 1:29.799 was eighth tenths of a second slower than Leclerc's best. Leclerc, who starts with Red Bull's Max Verstappen alongside, asked the team over the radio to get Vettel to speed up but the Monegasque said his lap had not been compromised. Australian Daniel Ricciardo starts eighth for Renault and Red Bull's Pierre Gasly lines up ninth for his home race with Italian Antonio Giovinazzi 10th for Alfa Romeo.

Autoblog fan favorite car ads from Super Bowl XLIX

Super Bowl XLIX is in the books, and the New England Patriots emerged victorious. Of course, if you're like us, the big game wasn't so much about the battle between the east coast and west, so much as a fight between the world's automotive advertisers. We collected and collated all of last night's new ads and put them together for you to vote on. And yes, we're limiting this year's contest to last night's new features. That's why you aren't seeing Dodge's epic Wisdom among our collection of commercials, and it's a similar story with Chevrolet's Truck Guy Focus Group series, which highlights the new Colorado. You can still vote for your favorites. We won't be closing the voting on our Super Bowl page, so while the winners and losers are correct as of this writing, it's entirely possible that there could be some changes in the rankings as time goes on. So, without any further ado, here are the winning ads based on your voting. Nissan: With Dad Fiat: Ready For Action Jeep: Beautiful Lands BMW: Newfangled Idea Mercedes-Benz: Fable NASCAR: America Start Your Engines As for those ads that failed to impact you, loyal readers, Toyota was the absolute, undisputed loser. The Japanese brand ran four ads in total – two for Toyota and two for Lexus – and all of them have negative tallies as of this writing. Lexus' Make Some Noise and Lets Play and Toyota's One Bold Choice and My Bold Dad both had very weak showings among the commercials that aired, although they weren't alone. Neither Mazda nor Kia scored particularly well, despite featuring celebrity magic act Penn and Teller and former James Bond, Pierce Brosnan, respectively. Chevrolet was the winner of the losers, as of our writing, recording the fewest downvotes for its audience-punking The Big Game ad. If you want to take a second look at the losing ads, you can head back to our Super Bowl page for the complete collection. But for now, head into Comments and let us know what you think of the results.