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Petrolicious profiles the rare Italian Porschephile

If you're Italian, you love Ferrari. It's almost a national requirement. If not Ferrari, then Lamborghini, or if you're a bit contrarian, perhaps Alfa Romeo or Maserati. This common belief, though, flies in the face of Rosita Corato's devotion to a certain unique Porsche. Despite growing up around cars from Italy's most treasured automakers, Rosita's family of coachbuilders had a passion for Porsche. This love was fostered by her father, who made a living repairing Ferraris. Despite his work, he'd longed for a rear-engined German, finally picking up a 1959 356 Speedster that was in desperate need of restoration. Rosita describes it as "practically a heap of metal" before her masterful metalworking father got to work on it. While it was originally meant to be a racer, it could best be described today as a restomod, and Rosita still uses it regularly on rallies. The engine and brakes have been upgraded, while the ratios on the manual transmission have been tightened up for improved performance. To save weight – remember, Rosita's father wanted a racer – the doors and hood were replaced with aluminum units, while other aesthetic upgrades were made as well, such as moving the fuel access up onto the hood. Check out Rosita's gorgeous 356 Speedster in the very latest episode from the team at Petrolicious. Related Video:

2014 Porsche Panamera 4S Executive

If the idea of a Porsche sedan (or, long hatchback) is still off-putting to you, then you might want to look away now. For 2014, the polarizing Panamera has received a midcycle refresh bringing slightly different styling, as well as adding two new models to the lineup, the S E-Hybrid and the stretched-wheelbase Executive. Having focused most of my recent trip to Germany on a First Drive of the intriguing plug-in Panamera, I also got to spend some time with the roomier Executive model.
Offered in both 4S and Turbo guise, the Panamera Executive has been stretched by almost six inches for the sole purpose of improving rear passenger space. Although it's hard to imagine anyone would willingly buy a Porsche and opt to sit in the back seat, I'd have to say that if I'm going to be chauffeured around in a car, why not make it a Porsche? For the most part, though, I'm guessing that many Panamera Executive sedans will be owned by people who want to one-up their buddy driving a stretched BMW 7 Series or Mercedes-Benz S-Class.
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There's a Porsche Cayman under here somewhere

What we have here is the work of Dubai tuner Royal Customs that is controversial even beyond its styling. The Middle East aftermarket house says it spent fourteen months developing a bodykit for the Porsche Cayman, and the results seem to be aimed at those who wish their coupe were a 918 Spyder - the nose, strake-filled and widened rear fender, carbon fiber wing and massive diffuser all cribbing some from Stuttgart's new hybrid supercar.
Even without a buyer, the Alpha One Concept is already controversial. When WorldCarFans posted on the Royal Customs car recently, German tuner Alpha-N Performance wrote in alleging that the Dubai package copies their design from two years ago, which was also called the Alpha One, a design with which it's clear the Dubai Alpha One shares numerous cues. We asked Royal Customs about its relationship to the Alpha One car, we were told, "Yes, there is a lot we can say about the remarkable similarities all of which will be explained by our press release by Mr. Emil from Autogespot. Please wait for the official release and you will have the full exciting story. It's an 'actual success story' and not a 'replication' story."
The response is referring to an "extensive report" on the car coming out of Autogespot. Royal Customs doesn't have the Alpha One Concept on its site yet, so we're still missing quite a few details on it, such as whether the Porsche engine has been given a similarly 918-ish workover. We do know that the company says each car takes 30 days to build and it will only build three of them, which is a number that should satisfy any haters and, even more so, its buyers. You can decide which side of the fence you're on by having a close look at it in the gallery above.