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Race Recap: 2014 Pikes Peak Hill Climb

The weather didn't interrupt the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb this year, the sun staying out to shine throughout a mildly cloudy day. The crowds didn't interrupt the race, either. Last year there were incidents like the woman who leaned so far into the road that her camera tore a hole in a speeding Shelby Cobra and she had to be sent to the hospital. This year the organizers shrank the number of spectator viewing areas and put others behind fences, such that long stretches of the route were uninhabited by anything other than varmints.
The only unexpected visitor was a dusty track and what some competitors said were slightly higher temperatures that changed the amount of grip and increased times. Yet the calm let a couple of teams, like that sun, break through the clouds of past misfortune and claim victories they'd been targeting for years.

2023 Mitsubishi Colt name reborn in a hatchback with a familiar design

Mitsubishi is dusting off the heritage-laced Colt nameplate to plant its stake in one of the biggest segments of the European market. The new hatchback is scheduled to make its debut in June, and a dark preview image confirms that it's closely related to the Renault Clio. The teaser keeps most of the Colt's design hidden, but we see enough to tell that it shares more than a passing resemblance with the Clio, which is one of the best-selling cars in Europe. From the shape of the rear lights to the crease in the hatch, the styling cues that characterize the Renault's back end are present on the Mitsubishi. We haven't seen the front end yet, but we're assuming it will be very Clio-esque with the obvious exception of a Mitsubishi logo on the grille. This is badge-engineering rather than leveraging economies of scale, Supra-style. We already have a decent idea of what the specifications sheet will look like. Mitsubishi announced the entry-level engine will be a 1.0-liter three-cylinder rated at about 66 horsepower and bolted to a five-speed manual transmission; European motorists still buy stick-shifts, especially at this price point. Next up is a turbocharged version of the triple rated at 90 horsepower and linked to a six-speed manual, while buyers who want a hybrid will be able to pay extra for a 141-horsepower gasoline-electric drivetrain that consists of a 1.6-liter four-cylinder engine, a pair of electric motors, and an automatic transmission. Like the Clio, the Colt will exclusively be available with front-wheel-drive. Built by Renault in Turkey, the new Mitsubishi Colt will make its debut on June 8. It doesn't sound like the hatchback will be sold in the United States. Renault hasn't homologated the Clio in our market, and the segment that the Colt would compete in is microscopic at best, at least in the U.S. When it lands, the Colt won't be the only Renault-designed Mitsubishi: the second-generation ASX launched recently is a re-badged Captur. Although badge-engineering brings with it a big bag of controversy, this is the only way Mitsubishi can justify a presence in Europe. Never spectacularly popular across the pond, the Japanese firm told its dealers in 2020 that it would exit the European and British markets. It hasn't returned to the United Kingdom, but the Renault-built Colt and ASX allowed it to keep selling cars in Europe while keeping costs in check.

Ghosn's legacy: one of the auto industry's most effective execs

"Bob Lutz ... estimated that carrying out the Nissan operation would be the equivalent, for Renault, of putting $5 billion in a container ship and sinking it in the middle of the ocean." So wrote Carlos Ghosn in "SHIFT: Inside Nissan's Historic Revival," which was published in the U.S. in late 2004. Two points about that observation: It is in keeping with Lutz's "Often wrong but never in doubt." It shows that Ghosn is a remarkable executive, given that he was able to take Nissan from the edge of financial oblivion to one of the foremost automotive companies (although with alliance partners Renault and, more recently, Mitsubishi). In 1999, Ghosn created what was named the "Nissan Revival Plan." It could have just as well been called the "Nissan Resuscitation Plan." Things were that bad. Now Ghosn is in the midst of legal trouble, accused of financial improprieties of some sort. There is no indication that this is at anything near the scale of what happened at Volkswagen Group. There's malfeasance. And then there's malfeasance. It is likely that this is going to be the end of Ghosn's career, but at age 64, and as a man who has spent nearly the past quarter-century essentially on airplanes, it is probably a good time to leave the stage. What his next act will be — to court or even prison — is an open question. But arguably, Ghosn's performance in the transformation of Nissan and Renault, which also needed some strong medicine to keep it from collapse in the early '00s (although one suspects that the French government would have done its damnedest to keep it propped up), makes him one of the all-time most-notable executives in the auto industry. Ghosn closed plants in both France and Japan and he worked to dismantle the Nissan keiretsu network of interlocked companies, things that were absolutely unthinkable. He established plans with stretch goals in their titles, like the "20 Billion Franc Cost-Reduction Plan," and worked with his people to achieve them, despite the pushback that seemed to come along with the announcement of the plan. As in, as he recalled in SHIFT, "Some people said, 'He's off the deep end. He's raving mad. Doesn't he know that at Renault you set the most conservative goals possible so you can be certain to reach them?' My answer to that sort of thinking was 'You're going to get what you ask for. If you set the bar too low, you'll be a low-level performance.