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Valtteri Bottas on pole for Formula One's 1,000th race

Valtteri Bottas will start Formula One's 1,000th world championship race from pole position after leading Mercedes team mate Lewis Hamilton in a front row lockout at the Chinese Grand Prix on Saturday. Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel qualified third, ahead of 21-year-old Monegasque team mate Charles Leclerc who was unable to repeat his Bahrain Grand Prix pole of two weeks ago. Bottas, who won the season opener in Australia and leads defending champion Hamilton by one point in the standings, was the third different driver to take pole this season in three races. "The lap was OK, not completely how I wanted. Luckily it was good enough for pole," smiled the Finn, who pipped Hamilton by 0.023 seconds after setting a best time of one minute 31.547. "Lewis also managed to improve a lot during the qualifying and it was super-close." The pole was a first for Bottas since Russia last September and the seventh of his career. It was also his first in China where Mercedes have won five of the last seven races. Hamilton sounded happy just to be on the front row, despite six previous poles in Shanghai, after looking out of sorts in practice. "I didn't give up, I kept pushing right to the end. Big congratulations to Valtteri, he's been stellar all weekend and I've been struggling and fighting the car," said the Briton. "To be as close as we are at the end is fantastic. An incredible result for the team. There was a little bit more time left on the table there but that's cool, I'll try and get it tomorrow," added Hamilton. UNHAPPY VERSTAPPEN Ferrari had arrived in China as favorites after showing their speed in Bahrain, particularly on the straights, with Leclerc on pole and leading until a loss of engine power in the closing laps. While unable to match the quick-cornering Mercedes cars for overall pace in Shanghai, Vettel hoped to be closer on Sunday thanks to the track's main straight being more than a kilometer long. "I think there was maybe a little bit more but overall not enough to beat these guys today," said the 31-year-old German, a four times world champion. "If we get close we could have an advantage in a straight line." The top 10 positions went two-by-two in team order, with Red Bull's Max Verstappen and Pierre Gasly fifth and sixth and ahead of the Renault pair of Daniel Ricciardo and Nico Hulkenberg – the Australian just 0.004 ahead of the German.

2018 Lincoln Navigator vs luxury SUV rivals: How it compares on paper

The all-new 2018 Lincoln Navigator is an impressive, luxury-lined beast. However, while its Black Label interior stood out most during our first drive of the new Navigator, it also seemed pretty clear that much of this full-size SUV was superior to the competition in a number of fundamental ways. Its Raptor-sourced 3.5-liter V6 had class-leading power for one, and its third-row seat seemed as spacious and comfortable as its rivals' are cramped and barely usable. To search for your next new vehicle, try Autoblog' s Car Finder. Yet, I wanted to take a closer look at how the Navigator fully compares on paper to its competitors - especially the Cadillac Escalade with which it most directly competes. The below spreadsheet should tell the whole story, but as you can see, there's an awful lot of class-leading green highlighter in the Navigator's column. The cargo volume and third-row legroom numbers are particularly telling, with the latter actually going up to 42.3 inches when you slide the second-row fully forward. Now, a few things to note about the above spreadsheet. The GLS-Class is also available as the GLS 550, which boasts a 4.7-liter V8 that just comes up short to the Navigator with 449 horsepower but has to deal with only 5,578 pounds. Its $94,950 price tag is comparable to the Navigator Black Label. Much of the LX 570's information is also applicable to the Toyota Land Cruiser, which, badge aside, could certainly be considered a member of this segment given its feature content and still-hefty price tag. It has better ground clearance and approach/departure angles than its Lexus sibling, along with an as-indicated lower price. Much of the Escalade's information also applies to the GMC Yukon Denali, while the Infiniti QX80 is applicable to the Nissan Armada. Related Video: Cadillac Infiniti Lexus Lincoln Mercedes-Benz SUV Luxury Off-Road Vehicles consumer lincoln navigator

2019 BMW M850i xDrive: How it compares on paper with other GT coupes

Although the hot new vehicles for the rich seem to mainly comprise SUVs and supercars, the neglected luxury GT coupe segment is starting to see some life again. The latest to add a spark to this set is the 2019 BMW M850i xDrive. It goes on sale later this year, and revives the 8 Series that's been dead since the 1990s. The first version available to Americans will be one with a twin-turbo 4.4-liter V8, with other versions likely following. Before it launches, we wanted to get a lay of the grand-touring land and see how the new BMW stacks up to the competition in performance, practicality and price. While some of these models have higher-performance or more-affordable iterations, we picked the versions that would be the closest match to this 8 Series model. They include the 2019 Lexus LC 500, 2018 Mercedes-Benz SL 550, 2018 Mercedes-Benz S 560 Coupe and the 2018 Maserati GranTurismo. We will also provide some short summaries on our experiences with these cars, but to get a full picture of each model, be sure to check out their full reviews. And if you want to compare any of these cars with models you don't see here, be sure to try out our car comparison tool. Engines, transmissions and performance On paper, the BMW M850i xDrive is clearly the performer of the group. It has the most power and torque at 523 horsepower and 553 pound-feet. Coupled with all-wheel-drive and an eight-speed automatic, the car is able to overcome its relatively portly 4,478-pound curb weight to hit 60 mph in a scant 3.6 seconds. That's more than half a second quicker than the lightest car in the group, the Mercedes-Benz SL550, which weighs 4,012 pounds. The other three vehicles are in the low- to mid-4-second range to 60 mph. Though the Maserati is the slowest to 60 mph, it does boast the highest top speed of 186 mph. The M850i and SL 550 are electronically limited to 155 mph, while the Lexus is limited to 168 mph. The Mercedes S 560 has the lowest top speed at an electronically limited 130 mph. View 52 Photos Of interest is that there's a 50/50 split among these cars between using a pair of turbos, and having none at all. The BMW and Mercedes resort to forced induction, whereas the Lexus and Maserati choose to stay naturally aspirated. This is likely why the Germans break 500 pound-feet of torque, while the others don't make it to 400. Also interesting is the spread of gear quantity. The Maserati has just six ratios to choose from, and the Lexus has a whopping 10.