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Porsche trio seals endurance drivers' title

Fifth place. That's all it took for the Porsche team to seal the drivers' title in the 2015 FIA World Endurance Championship. And that's just what they did this weekend in the 6 Hours of Bahrain. The leading lineup of Timo Bernhard, Brendon Hartley, and Mark Webber drove the #17 Porsche 919 Hybrid to the drivers' title to cap a dominant season for the Weissach team. Porsche already won the pinnacle race at Le Mans this past summer, and drove home the manufacturers' title at the penultimate round in Shanghai. The championship-winning trio of Bernhard, Hartley, and Webber won four out of the total eight rounds this season – including the races at the Nurburgring, Circuit of the Americas, Fuji, and Shanghai. That gave them 166 points in the final standings, besting the 161 achieved by the Audi team of Andre Lotterer, Marcel Fassler, and Benoit Treluyer, who won at Silverstone and Spa. In beating Audi to the top honors in the championship and at Le Mans, Porsche has completely locked its corporate cousins (and chief rivals) out of the winner's circle for the first time in years. Last season saw Toyota win both titles in the WEC, but Audi still won at Le Mans. Audi won both titles in the first two seasons of the championship, and the French endurance race all but three times in the past 16 years. The last time Audi was completely shut out was in 2009, when Peugeot won at Le Mans and Aston Martin took both titles in the associated Le Mans Series with its Lola-based LMP1 prototype. This latest achievement only adds to Porsche's unsurpassed sports car racing trophy cabinet. The German outfit won 12 manufacturers' and teams' titles (and another six drivers' titles) in the 1970s and 80s under the previous World Sportscar Championship. It has won at Le Mans a record 17 times, and another 18 each at Sebring and Daytona. Porsche also took the checkered flag at the Targa Florio 11 times, won the Monte Carlo rally four times, the Dakar twice, and with TAG and McLaren, won three drivers' titles, two constructors' titles, and 25 grands prix in Formula One. Related Video: Porsche works drivers win the FIA World Endurance Championship drivers' title The new champions: Timo Bernhard, Brendon Hartley and Mark Webber Stuttgart.

Watch Jeff Zwart drive his Porsche GT3 Cup Turbo at Pikes Peak in 4K

There are always fantastic videos documenting the Pikes Peak International Hillclimb, but 2015 is giving us an embarrassment of riches. After seeing clips from some of the record-breaking runs this year, possibly the very best is here somewhat belatedly after the rally. Watching master Porsche pilot Jeff Zwart wind his fire-breathing 911 GT3 Cup Turbo up the mountain was definitely worth the wait. Already no stranger to success at Pikes Peak, this year Zwart won the Time Attack 1 Class with a run of 9:46.243. To make the feat more exciting, his Porsche was outfitted with cameras to perfectly capture his entire race up the course. The external shots truly convey a sense of speed and show how the mountain goes from tree-lined at the bottom to rocky with patches of snow at the top. The film's sublime production shouldn't be too big of a surprise, though, because Will Roegge was director, editor, and among the camera operators for the video. In 2014, he put together a great, short documentary about Zwart's preparation for the mountain and the run, as well. This year was yet another success. At a breezy 4.5 minutes, this clip is definitely a must-see, and the entire thing looks and sounds fantastic no matter how your experience it. However, if you have the capability, the video is also available in 4K. Switching over to the high resolution really makes it possible to pick out all of the gorgeous details. Related Video:

Weekly Recap: Porsche embarks on Mission E

Porsche's board of directors approved the company's first all-electric car Friday, signing off on production of the eye-catching Mission E concept that debuted in September at the Frankfurt Motor Show. It's set for launch by the end of the decade. The Frankfurt concept uses lithium-ion batteries to power two synchronous motors that create more than 600 horsepower and provide a range of 311 miles on the European cycle. It's capable of hitting 62 miles per hour in 3.5 seconds and can run the Nurburgring Nordschleife in less than eight minutes. In a statement, Porsche board chairman Oliver Blume called the Mission E the "beginning a new chapter in the history of the sports car." Porsche is backing that up with a roughly $1.1-billion investment that will create more than 1,000 jobs at its facilities in Zuffenhausen, Germany. The company will spend more than $760 million at its main site there to build a paint shop and a new assembly plant. It will also expand an engine factory to make electric motors. Porsche's renewed electric ambitions come as it grapples with fallout from parent company Volkswagen's diesel-emissions scandal. Porsche uses a VW diesel engine in the Cayenne SUV, which it stopped selling in November until a fix is found. Still, Mission E's scheduled landing could be as much as four years away – when Porsche and VW hope their diesel woes will be long over. The electric strategy is clearly a long play to provide its enthusiast owners with an efficient form of sport and luxury as fuel economy and emissions regulations tighten around the world. And if you still can't wrap your head around electric Porsches, the company also just announced plans to make the 911 Turbo and Turbo S even more powerful. Electric propulsion is part of Porsche's future, but for now at least, it isn't everything. OTHER NEWS VW sales crash 25 percent in November Finally, the other shoe dropped. Volkswagen sales plummeted 25 percent in November as fallout from the company's diesel-emissions scandal finally showed up on the sales charts. VW had managed to tread water with flat sales through September (the scandal broke more than halfway through the month) and October. The company stopped selling its 2.0-liter I4 and 3.0-liter V6 diesels as it works to make the engines complaint with emissions rules. VW admitted to rigging its diesel-powered cars so they could pass emissions tests in the United States and around the world.