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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.

The Ferrari GTC4Lusso T ditches the V12 and AWD for a turbo V8 and rear drive

Ferrari continues to turbocharge its lineup with the latest addition – the GTC4Lusso T. This car has the same body as the four-seat GTC4Lusso, but features a turbocharged V8 and sends power only to the rear wheels, a recipe that might just make the gorgeous, elongated hatchback even better to drive. Aside from the addition of the T badge, the majority of the updates were made under the car's body. Gone is the beastly naturally aspirated 6.3-liter V12, and in its place is a twin-turbocharged 3.9-liter V8. The new engine is similar to the one found in the California T, but it has been revised to make a little more power: The 3.9-liter in the GTC4Lusso T puts out 602 horsepower and 560 pound-feet of torque. That's a 78-hp decrease from the GTC4Lusso's V12 motor, but 46 lb-ft more. View 17 Photos While some will see the decrease in power as a downgrade, which it kind of is, the GTC4Lusso T is rear-wheel-drive only and, according to Ferrari, lighter. Much of that weight savings comes from removing the trick all-wheel-drive gearbox that sits in front of the V12 GTC4Lusso's engine, and its absence also shifts the vehicle's weight bias towards the rear, with a 46:54 split. This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings. Ferrari claims the GTC4Lusso T's turbocharged V8 has been engineered for everyday driving with modular torque delivery and a muted exhaust note at low speeds. The vehicle's dynamic systems have also been updated with the 4WS (rear-wheel steering) and Side Slip Control (SSC3) now more responsive to steering wheel inputs. No performance figures for the turbocharged V8 model have been released, but the GTC4Lusso T should manage to get close to the GTC4Lusso's 0-to-62 mph time of 3.4 seconds, but have a lower top speed than the V12 model, which tops out at 208 mph. Already missing the naturally aspirated V12 and all-wheel drive? Don't fret, as a Ferrari spokesperson confirmed that the automaker will continue to sell the GTC4Lusso alongside the GTC4Lusso T. The new model will make its world debut at next week's Paris Motor Show. Related Video: Related Gallery 2017 Ferrari GTC4Lusso T News Source: FerrariImage Credit: Live photos copyright 2016 Drew Phillips / Autoblog Paris Motor Show Ferrari Coupe Hatchback Wagon Performance Supercars 2016 paris motor show

The 2016 Spanish Grand Prix flipped all the scripts

The Monaco Formula 1 Grand Prix circuit and the Hungaroring fly the flag for processional races, yet Spain's Circuit de Catalunya is arguably as bad. Before this weekend, the pole-sitter won the race 19 times out of the last 25 years. The front row of the grid produced 23 winners in the past 25 years. The racing gods edited that script this year, when a first-lap crash and two mid-race strategy changes kept things open until the end of the 66-lap race. It started when Mercedes-AMG Petronas teammates Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton took each other out on Lap 1. After Rosberg passed pole-sitter Hamilton into Turn 1, Rosberg's car slowed through Turn 3, somehow in the wrong mode. Hamilton closed in on Rosberg so quickly that once the Brit ducked inside for the pass, he couldn't back out. Rosberg, however, closed the door so suddenly that Hamilton had no choice but to drive onto the grass. When Hamilton spun, he collected Rosberg and both Mercedes' ended up in the gravel trap. The stewards deemed it a racing incident. The crash put Red Bull teammates Daniel Ricciardo and Max Verstappen in the lead, followed by Toro Rosso driver Carlos Sainz and the Ferrari duo of Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen. Both Ferraris cleared Sainz by Lap 10, leaving 56 laps for them to haul in the Red Bulls. Ferrari loosely followed Red Bull's pit strategies. Ricciardo pitted on Laps 11 and 28, Vettel pitted on Laps 15 and 37. Verstappen pitted on Laps 12 and 35, Raikkonen pitted on Laps 13 and 36. Pirelli predicted a three-stop race as the fastest and that the medium tire could only go about 23 laps. Verstappen and Raikkonen didn't get those memos. So while Ricciardo and Vettel came in for third stops the Dutchman and the Finn stayed out, with Verstappen ahead of Raikkonen at the front of the race as of Lap 43. That's when Verstappen – 18 years and 227 days old – proved how good a driver he is, lapping perfectly as second-place Raikkonen closed the gap to a little more than half a second. The Finn still couldn't get past the Dutchman down the pit straight even with the help of DRS, nor under braking at the only real passing opportunity into Turn 1. At the end of Lap 66 Verstappen crossed the line ahead of Raikkonen, a victorious end to Verstappen's first race weekend after being promoted to Red Bull. Further back, Vettel and Ricciardo fought for scraps, the German staying ahead to finish third.