2011 Rolls Royce Phantom. Spirit Of Ecstasy Centenary. on 2040-cars

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Rolls-Royce celebrates Goodwood with Chicane edition Phantom Coupe

Of all the automakers out there, perhaps none scream "race track" as quietly as Rolls-Royce. But the British luxury automaker has its home near the Goodwood Motor Circuit, and has honored that proximity with its latest special edition.
Called the Chicane, it's based on the Phantom Coupe and is upgraded with a series of tastefully motorsport-inspired details. It's painted in gunmetal grey with a matte black hood and windshield frame, with matching gunmetal wheels - a modern Rolls-Royce first - and a red interior decked out with carbon-fiber trim and a checkered flag motif that's repeated on the exterior coachline.
The special one-off was commissioned by the dealership in Dubai and was created by the Rolls-Royce Bespoke division. Feel free to read more in the press release below.

Top Gear caught filming Best of British near Buckingham Palace

YouTuber and car-fan extraordinaire Shmee probably had very little trouble tracking down the Top Gear film crew recently, as the group was putting together an episode that could accurately be described as "excessive." With its flag-waving (literally) Best of British theme, the TG guys gathered a jaw-dropping array of British cars, and parked them all right in front of Buckingham Palace to make extra sure that the point was driven home.
Top Gear hosts Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May were outfitted with a trio of Jaguar F-Types festooned with gigantic Union Jacks, with which to survey the landscape of British motoring glory. In the video below, you'll see that this includes any number of Mini, Aston Martin, Lotus, McLaren, Land Rover, Bentley and Rolls-Royce models (just to name a few), as well as a healthy dose of weird stuff that most people would never guess at being built in the UK. The lawnmowers and military vehicles are especially cool.

Car companies used to cook up sales with recipe books

The evolution of automotive marketing has undergone a number of strange phases. Few, though, match the strangeness of the 1930s to 1950s, when automotive marketers turned to cookbooks as a means of promoting their vehicles. Yes, cookbooks. We can't make this stuff up, folks.
This bizarre trend led to General Motors distributing cookbooks under the guise of its then-subsidiary Frigidaire. Ford, meanwhile, offered a compilation of recipes from Ford Credit Employees (shown above). The cookbook-craze wasn't limited to domestic manufacturers, though. As The Detroit News discovered, both Rolls-Royce and Volkswagen got in on the trend, although not until the 1970s.
The News has the full story on this strange bit of marketing. Head over and take a look.