| QUOTE OF THE WEEK “Ferrari has this magical appeal, which is as powerful as it is difficult to describe. We all at Ferrari are very conscious of the huge responsibilities that lie on our shoulders, and we clearly are very focused on the ultimate goal, which is victory, and we believe we have the talent and determination to make our ambitions become real. I can assure you that we are more demanding of ourselves than anyone else could ever be.”
--Ferrari CEO Louis Camilleri launching the automaker’s 2020 Formula 1 racer, the SF1000. This year Ferrari will run its 1,000 Grand Prix; 2020 is its 70th season.
GOT THE BLUES?
February in Michigan is usually depressingly gray, overcast and snowy, which might or might not be why we picked the Blues for our Autoweek Talks features this week. We cover the five best blues you can buy, reminisce about the coolest blue racing liveries and even dispel the Blue Train Bentley myth. Did it really beat a steam train from Cannes to northern France?
MORE ELECTRIC PICKUP, ER, BUZZ
Startup Nikola previously announced it is partnering with semi-truck maker Iveco on a 2021 semi. Now the company says it’s going to build a pickup called the Badger, the latest electric pickup truck in a long line announced lately, including an electric F-150, Rivian R1T, Bollinger B2, GMC/Hummer, plus a few we forgot about. The Badger is an electric vehicle with a twist, though: Nikola says it is going to be both a hydrogen fuel-cell electric vehicle and a battery-electric vehicle. Nikola also says it’s building the Badger in “conjunction with another OEM utilizing their certified parts and manufacturing facilities.” Stay tuned—the pickup truck market gets crazier every day.
RACING LINES
You had to see this coming: Thanks to the coronavirus (recently renamed COVID-19), the Chinese Grand Prix, originally scheduled for April 19, has been postponed with no makeup date announced. Formula 1’s pooh-bahs said all parties “will take the appropriate amount of time to study the viability of potential alternative dates for the Grand Prix later in the year should the situation improve.” Word is there have already been attempts to find a new date, with no success. Frankly, it looks grim for a Chinese GP this year.
No surprise here, either: Freed from his NASCAR shackles after this year, seven-time champ Jimmie Johnson says his phone has been blowing up from interested non-NASCAR team owners, as well as other sanctioning bodies. Johnson could be eyeballing doing some IndyCar races and/or WEC, though he says nothing is imminent. Johnson, a former off-road racer, also said he’d like to go back for more of that. “We’ll see what develops over the year,” he said. If sports car racing ever gets its global prototype class together, how cool would it be to see Johnson, Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt Jr. in some sort of Corvette prototype at Le Mans? Just sayin’.
Rain delayed last night’s Duels about an hour, but now the 2020 Daytona 500 field is set. Joey Logano won the first race with William Byron taking the second race. The always-impressive Hendrick Motorsports team has three cars starting in the top six, and though the mighty Joe Gibbs Racing cars are a bit further down the order, we’d never count them out. The weatherman says Daytona’s weather looks about perfect Sunday—knock on wood!
CAR NEWS AND NOTES
Aston Martin dropping the top on its Vantage could be exactly the shot in the arm the company needs. Deliveries begin in a couple months with prices starting at $165,000, around $8,000 more than the coupe. One thing the convertible has going for it: what Aston says is the “fastest fully automatic soft-top hood in the business.” So there’s that.
A tough week for Jaguar Land Rover: I-Pace production is shutting down for a week starting Monday the 17th. The Magna Steyr factory in Graz, Austria, builds the electric crossover for Jag and is running low on batteries. LG Chem in Poland builds the lithium-ion batteries for several automakers, including Mercedes, Jaguar and Audi, and periodic delays have been reported several times over the last few years. In a double whammy, Jag is also stopping production during select days at its Castle Bromwich and Solihull plants due to slowing demand. The last few years have been challenging for JLR, and it experienced a 2.3% sales drop in the last three months of 2019.
WHAT WE'RE DRIVING
Jake Lingeman jumped into the hot new Infiniti Q50 Red Sport and reported he liked three things about it: the looks, the 400-hp twin-turbo V6 and the chassis. He said the Infiniti hung in there compared to the Mercedes-Benz C-Class and BMW 3-Series, the class dominators.
Robin Warner hopped in Mini’s latest John Cooper Works Clubman All4, and next thing we knew he had the audacity to compare it to the impressive Subaru STI. Then he really stuck his neck in the guillotine and mentioned the mighty Golf R in the same story. To find out if Warner’s completely lost it, go here.
SOME ODDS, MOSTLY ENDS
We were still ogling the new Escalade when a different sort of Cadillac (an even longer one!) came to our attention: Al Capone’s 1928 Cadillac Series 341A Town Sedan, bulletproof, of course. The 341A was the first Cadillac design legend Harley Earl touched and features a V8, three-speed manual, beam front axle, floating rear axle with leaf springs and drum brakes. The 1-inch-thick bulletproof glass has holes for shooting out of the car without opening oneself up to return fire. Handy. Since Capone (most likely) owned it the car’s life reads like a good mystery novel, and has somehow ended up at Celebrity Cars in Las Vegas where it’s now on sale for $1,000,000. A bargain!
LISTEN UP
The “Autoweek Podcast” Ep. 96 begins with Natalie Neff, Graham Kozak, Jake Lingeman, Wesley Wren and Wes Raynal talking about the blues. Kozak leads a fascinating discussion about the Blue Train Bentley myth, Raynal talks about his bone-headedness with diesel exhaust fluid and the gang all weighs in on the 2020 Chicago Auto Show.
Later in the show, Al Pearce talks with Mike Pryson and Wren about the Daytona 500 and his history with the major race. Closing the show, Kozak, Raynal and Wren join digital magician Andrew Stoy to talk about driving time in a GMC Sierra 2500 HD Diesel and a Mini Clubman John Cooper Works. Check out Ep. 96 and all the other Autoweek Podcasts here.
WHAT’S AHEAD
We’ll be around all weekend, and it’s one of the year’s busiest ones: Check in often for all the racing happenings down in Daytona, not to mention IndyCar, F1, IMSA and more. And, of course, we’ll see you next week with more car news, reviews and car culture stories.
--Wes Raynal, Editor
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