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24 Hours of Le Mans live update part three

We tasked surfing journalist Rory Parker to watch this year's live stream of the 2016 24 Hours of Le Mans. What follows is an experiment to experience the world's greatest endurance race from the perspective of a motorsports novice. Parker lives in Hawaii and has an associates degree in dropping f-bombs. For Part One, click here. Part Two is here. Really hoped I'd be able to grab an hour or two of sleep before the sun rose over Le Mans. Dark dark dark, couldn't figure out what was going on. Commentators struggled at times as well. But I couldn't do it. Endurance racing is just too exciting. Grabs my attention with both fists. Screams, "watch these men DRIVE!" A neighbor invited me over for drinks. Told him, "Can't do it, gotta watch Le Mans!" Maybe not exactly. I'll admit, at times my attention wandered. I did a load of laundry. Ate some snacks. Half listened to the commentary. Threw a hump at my wife. I learned that Patrick Long, driving #88, is big brother to Kevin "Spanky" Long. Spanky's a bit of a legend in the skate world. Always weird how top notch talent can run in families like that. Kind of surprised I've never heard that before. Worked for a skate mag for a years, met Spanky a handful of times. Someone must've told me that he has an older brother who drives race cars. Dash cams at night are scary. High powered headlights in the P1s reach almost 300 meters. Cars outrun that distance easy. Seems like they're just steering into the black and hoping for the best. But that can't be the case. People'd be dropping dead let and right. Very amused by how the guys in GT are like, "Dude, stop flashing your fucking lights before you pass." But the LMP's are all, "Suck a dick! I do what I want." Top three stayed neck and neck nearly all night long. As the sun gets ready to creep back over the horizon the top three are separated by only eleven and a half seconds. Toyota 5 and 6, Porsche 2. Audi 8 is two laps behind Porsche, beleaguered 7 is dealing with constant trouble eleven laps from the front. GTE Pro sees Ferrari 82 in first, Ford 68 and 69 right behind. To win you've gotta drive perfect, build perfect. Fours cars retired so far. I'm beginning to appreciate the endurance aspect a little more fully. Only really considered the drivers at first. The mental and physical stress driving these cars at these speeds at length would inflict. But keeping the damn things running is the real deal. To win you've gotta drive perfect, build perfect.

Volkswagen Group previews its wares on eve of Geneva show

The Volkswagen Group is comprised of 11 brands producing 240 vehicles across 49 factories throughout the world. So the best way to show off the range of the VW family is to cram a few thousand journalists and VIPs into a massive makeshift stand to outline the Group's goals, what's in the pipeline and what you'll be able to buy later this year.
To that end, VW pulled out all the stops on the eve of the 2012 Geneva Motor Show, bringing along 10 vehicles from across the range. We'll be delving into the details of each over the next two days of show coverage, but before that happens, you can read all about what we saw tonight from the cheap seats after the break.

Porsche, Hyundai invest in WayRay augmented reality for road and track

A number of incipient future technologies such as solid state batteries, Level 5 autonomy, and augmented reality simply await the breakthrough moments that will enable mass-market scalability. The last one of those took another step closer to its breakthrough with news of Porsche leading an $80 million Series C investment round for six-year-old Switzerland-based AR startup WayRay. The German carmaker was joined in the augmented reality play by Hyundai, JVCKENWOOD, China Merchants Capital, a group of sovereign wealth funds, and Alibaba Group, a previous investor. Porsche tied up with WayRay earlier this year on an AR project during Startup Autobahn, a European initiative devoted to automotive innovation. Sounds like the cooperation proved fruitful, with Porsche saying, "Their innovative ideas and products have great potential. We are convinced that on this basis we'll be able to offer our clients customized Porsche solutions," and putting its money where its windshield is. Blue chips have apparently backed the company because its AR solution is better than others out there, being smaller than competitor units, adaptable to any make and model, and usable over a much wider field of view, easing the strain on a driver's eyes. Hyundai said it wants to use the technology in its cars, and for applications beyond vehicles like an entire AR ecosystem incorporating smart buildings and smart cities. On the mundane safety side, the AR system could highlight crosswalks, warning signs, parking spots, construction zones, and provide more precise navigation directions all within the driver's natural line-of-sight. Porsche, unsurprisingly, is thinking about the performance aspects and widening the suite of digital services it can offer to customers. A short video and a series of graphics showed how a potential WayRay system could enhance the driving experience, especially on track. The Porsche driver not only gets an image of the ideal driving line laid down ahead of him, he could get prompts for braking and turning, a "ghost" car acting as rabbit to show him where he gains and loses time, lap times, track position, and more. As much as this kind of feature makes sense for the Porsche brand and the new Cayman GT4 owner working to hook up his personal best at his local track, WayRay's possibilities seem like an even better boon for hypercar buyers.