Cars & Coffee: Symbolic Edition

Here are some visuals from this weekend's Cars & Coffee event from Symbolic. Symbolic is a Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini and Rolls-Royce dealership in La Jolla. Symbolic brought over a few examples from each of their brands and together with cars from private owners there was a good selection of cool cars to check out. The highlight of the show was definitely the Bugatti EB110 in its signature light blue paint. It's not very often that you get to see a Bugatti, even more so one that's not a Veyron. The event was also the first time that I saw a Rolls-Royce Wraith in real life and I was pleasantly surprised about its design after absolutely hating its roofline in all the photos I have seen. Likewise I liked the design of the brand new M3, the M specific design elements looked pretty good in black. You can tell that it has the M treatment but they are not overdone.

A Trend That (Thankfully) Never Fully Materialized

Clear headlights are one of those things that make you scratch your head and wonder what took so long. Immediately a huge style improvement even with standard halogen bulbs, the advent of projector and now LED lighting elements have given us headlights as critical styling elements. While clear lenses have done wonders upfront they have made only a minor impact at the back. However there was a time when clear and chrome tail lights were all the rage and it seemed like they would spread to every make and model following the like of the Lexus RX, Nissan Altima and the Toyota Prius. Thankfully, the shock value soon wore off and only a few other manufacturers joined the clear and chrome party and the latest iterations of the RX, Altima and the Prius have toned down their designs and we are all better off.

Audi Wins Wild 2014 24 Hour of Le Mans

The #2 Audi R18 of Marcel Fassler, Andre Lotterer, and Benoit Treluyer are your winners of the 2014 24 Hours of Le Mans, the 82nd running of the famous endurance race. This win gives Audi its 13th overall 24 Hours of Le Mans victory and fifth in a row. The #1 Audi placed second with the # 8 Toyota TS 040 rounding out the podium of a wild race that saw each of the three manufacturers take the lead at one point or another. Brand new rules for 2014 saw Porsche enter as the third major manufacturer, each one with their own take on a hybrid powertrain. None of the top teams were able to run a clean race with multiple mechanical and electrical gremlins along the way. In the end, Audi once again proved to be the best combination of speed, reliability, fixability and teamwork to add another trophy to its collection.

Toyota started with the lead and pulled ahead clearly showing more pace than the Audi and Porsche. Only a few hours into the race heavy rain created chaos on the track with a multi car accident forcing the #3 Audi out of the race and causing heavy damage to the #8 Toyota. Eventually the track dried and saw the #7 Toyota build up a nearly 3 minute lead over the #1 Audi thanks to quick running and a couple of safety cars. The #7 would go on to dominate the race until the 15 hour mark when it stopped on track during the nighttime darkness giving the lead to the rebuilt from scratch #1 Audi and a potential 10th career win at Le Mans for Tom Kristensen. However, that would not be the case as Tom found his #1 Audi stopped on track a few hours later. The #1 crawled back into the pits in need of a turbocharger change much like the #2 Audi needed a little earlier. This latest mechanical breakdown gave the #20 Porsche 919 the lead of almost two minutes with four hours to go but Andre Lotterer was flying taking huge chunks of time from the Porsche lead. A little more than an hour later had Andre taking over the lead as the #20 was showing a serious lack of pace even compared to its sister car. The slow laps continued for Mark Webber until the #20 slowed to a crawl on the track and crawled into the pits giving the rebuilt #8 Toyota the final podium spot. Only a few moments later the #14 Porsche came into the pits for a lengthy stop as well. The Zytek Nissan Jota Sport team took the win in P2 while the AF Course Ferrari 458 Italia took the GT Pro honors. Aston Martin took the win in the GT AM category.

First Impressions With Cars

Everybody knows how vital first impressions are with people, but it is interesting to consider what they mean with vehicles. More than anything the context and location of where you first see a car for the first time can have an impact on how your perceive its design. Did you first see it against a beautiful backdrop, a crowded highway or a shopping center. Did you catch a quick glimpse as you were driving and preoccupied with traffic or did you get a good look as it rolled by slowly as you walked downtown. Did you see a fully loaded model with the sports package and a deep loud color or the cheap entry level option? With this in mind, I saw the brand new Porsche Macan last week stopped at a light not looking at much in particular and not paying much attention to the vehicles around. A Cayenne was making a left that looked slightly strange and not until I saw the tail lights did I realize that indeed the Cayenne was actually the Macan. I had decently high expectations for the Macan as it promised to bring the sportiest proportions to the luxury CUV category. However, my lack of attention might have not given the Macan a fair chance to present its design. Before I even get a good look at it I already feel like I have made up my mind that it's only a slightly updated and shrunk Cayenne. Here is to hoping that the Macan is able to convince me otherwise. In related news, the Macan is EPA rated a slightly unimpressive 17/23 with either the 3.0 or the 3.6 twin turbo V6.