Hot Foot at Talladega: Record setting in the Saab 900
“For my next act, I will set myself on fire.” So said Craig Breedlove after one of his speed records went awry. That was what I did not want to do when Saab invited me – along with 119 other…
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1979 Maserati Merak SS: Less-expensive exotic kept company afloat during the lean years
Maserati, under the Orsi family, as it had been under Fratelli Maserati and later under Alejandro DeTomaso, was always financially marginal, despite a succession of seductive automobiles. So when in 1965 Citroen president Pierre Bercot suggested a Maserati engine for…
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Wanderer W25K Roadster: Wandering in from the cold
In the ‘30s, Auto Union was a German General Motors, Sloanian to the max, a car for every pocketbook. DKW –Das Kliene Wunder (the small wonder) – staked out the lower price range and the mighty Horch rivaled Mercedes-Benz, with…
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2001-2010 | Germany | I-5 | Volkswagen
2007 Volkswagen New Beetle Convertible Triple White
The guy in the well-used pickup truck in the next lane over was so not wishing he were me. The 2007 Volkswagen New Beetle Convertible Triple White I was driving isn’t, well, terribly manly. It’s sort of like Jerry Van…
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1954 Delaney Delta: An Example of eccentric English automotive enthusiasm
Perhaps England doesn’t produce more eccentrics than any other country. Maybe it’s only that in England eccentricity is cultivated to such a high degree. Adam Smith’s nation of shopkeepers is also the home of the tinkerer, the inventor and the…
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1958 Volvo TP21 Sugga: A piggish hybrid
Swedish soldiers called it “sugga,” or “the sow,” but you always hurt the one you love, they say. The official Volvo designation for the four-wheel-drive radio and command car was Volvo TP21, and the Volvo TP21 Sugga nickname came not…
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2010 Jaguar XKR Coupe: Better even than Love Letters
Reading sports car specifications and descriptions of features can be entertaining but compared to driving, it’s like love letters versus being there. Which is why we looked forward to getting behind the wheel of the 2010 Jaguar XKR Coupe. We…
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The Next, the Middle and the End: Panhard PL 17, Panhard 17 and Panhard 24
The Panhard story dated back to the dawn of the automobile age, the first Panhard built in 1890. It continued into the brass era and through the Great Depression in France with the upper class and technologically advanced Panhard Dynamic….
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Evolution and extinction: Dyna Panhard
World War II changed Europe. It was more than shattered buildings and bomb-cratered fields, though those mattered. It was more than lost time and misdirected lives, though those matters even more. It was more than row on row of chalk…
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2011 Audi A8L: Flagship
Merriam-Webster defines “flagship” as (1) “the ship that carries the commander of the fleet and carries the commander’s flag”, and (2) “the finest, largest, or most important one of a series…” That would be the 2011 Audi A8L all over….
