Tag: 2010

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Mercedes-Benz Motor Shows

AIMS 2010: Mercedes-Benz C63 AMG ‘Concept 358’

Mercedes-Benz C63 AMG

Mercedes-Benz provided a couple of world firsts at the Australian International Motor show yesterday. This fantastically bright orange C63 AMG was one of them. It was made specifically to Mercedes-Benz Australia’s specifications and in addition to the designo Pearl Orange paint it has been fitted with an AMG Performance Package Plus. These performance goodies, including forged pistons from the SLS AMG, add an extra 22kw to the already potent C63. Total power is now a very tasty 358kW, while peak torque is a smashing 600Nm.

Seeing as BMW won’t let Australia play with their orange beast, it’s nice of Benz to step up to the plate. The matte black details set off the car very nicely and while you’d be sure to take a bit of a depreciation hit with such a lairy colour on a three-pointed star, at least you would have a blast while doing so. It looks really, really good!

Unfortunately it looks like the Pearl Orange pint scheme on this show car will be a one-off creation as it is not currently available to order. However the performance bits can be ordered now and if they got your attention, you’ll need to start saving a few extra bucks, about 15 thousand of them we’ve been told.

More after the break, including a PDF download detailing all the goodies in the AMG Performance Package Plus.

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Holden Motorsports

Another look at Fabian Coulthard’s spectacular Bathurst crash

Here’s a couple of new YouTube clips of Fabian Coulthard’s violent crash from lap 1 of the recent Supercheap Auto 1000 at Bathurst. The two clips were recorded by fans from the inside of The Chase and give a good insight into the crowd reaction.

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Audi Motorsports

Raeder Motorsport Audi TT RS

Raeder Motorsport Audi TT RS

This is one of the most extreme Audi TT RS examples we have seen yet. And for very good reason. It has been prepared by German outfit Raeder Motorsport and will be competing in a couple of VLN rounds at the Nürburgring later this month, starting this weekend in fact.

There’s not a lot of technical info about for this car, apart from a few mentions of using bits and bobs from the R8 LMS. We know the car will be entered in the SP4T class at the Ring this weekend, so we can assume it uses a 2.5 litre petrol powered inline five turbo like the road car (although there are reports the engine is diesel powered, too). When more details come to hand we’ll bring them to you.

UPDATE 21 October: Hi-res pics can now be accessed at AUSringers.

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Audi Motor Shows

Audi A1 will be on show in Sydney

Audi A1

Audi Australia has just confirmed via its twitter account that its A1 premium hatch will be on show at AIMS, which starts on Friday. More details as they come to hand.

UPDATE 14 October: Audi Australia has confirmed with AUSmotive that the A1 will have its full Australian launch at AIMS tomorrow. Customer deliveries are expected in the new year. We’ll have full details after we return from the motor show.

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Ferrari Formula 1 Lotus McLaren Mercedes-Benz Red Bull Racing

2010 Japanese Grand Prix in pictures

2010 Japanese GP

Formula One action was all go on Sunday in Suzuka. Thanks to the rained out qualifying session the day before racegoers got to see a full qualifying session and a race all in the one day. What they saw was an unassailable Sebastian Vettel who topped all three quali sessions and led the race virtually from start to finish.

Our boy Mark Webber maintained his championship lead with a solid second place. The Red Bull duo still can’t shake of a persistent Ferrari challenge from Fernando Alonso, who also finished on the podium. McLaren’s Jenson Button was fourth, able to take advantage of more frustration for Lewis Hamilton; this time in the form of another dodgy gearbox.

However, aside from Sebastian and Mark, this race was all about fighting for the scraps. A couple of brain farts at the start ensured there were a few more scraps too, with Virgin Racing’s Lucas di Grassi reportedly crashing on the warm up lap. Vitaly Petrov made a mess of his Renault at the start—that’s him above, on the grass with half his car missing. And Felipe Massa continued to flounder by barely making it into the first corner. It’s a shame the latter two took some Force India and Williams collateral damage with them, too.

Local lad Kamui Kobayashi in his Sauber went on a late charge and provided plenty of entertainment and loads of heart-in-mouth overtaking moves. He made them all stick, though, and continues to show he has raw pace by the bucketful.

Relive the race for yourself by checking out our gallery below, with thanks to the F1 teams who offer great access to some fantastic photography.

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Ferrari Formula 1 Red Bull Racing

2010 Japanese GP – Post-race press conference

2010 Japanese Grand Prix

Red Bull Racing returned to the victory dais at Suzuka today with Sebastian Vettel claiming his third race win of the year. Constantly at the top of the time sheets, Vettel was the dominant man all weekend and started the race from pole position. Teammate Mark Webber completed the Red Bull Racing domination by securing an comfortable looking second place. Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso took the final podium position.

With three races to go the title race now looks set to be a race between Webber, Vettel and Alonso. A solid haul of points saw Webber slightly extend his championship lead this weekend. He is now on 220pts, with both Alonso and Vettel close behind on 206pts.

The full post-race press conference transcript is available below.

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Audi

Audi willing to make quattro concept a reality

Audi quattro concept

One of the undoubted stars of the 2010 Paris Motor Show is the spectacular Audi quattro concept. Word on the street is saying Audi is willing to turn the concept into a production reality. Oh yes!

Speaking to Autocar, Stefan Reil, head of development at Quattro GmbH said, “We are rethinking standard processes to make it possible. We know how to engineer it already.”

Reil went further, hinting the car would mostly likely be produced in limited numbers. Not being shy he also speculated at a possible price point for the quattro concept, “We need feedback to see if it is possible. Audi has no heritage in building 200–500 cars that are really exotic. But it won’t be over €100,000 [approx AU$141,500].”

The show car’s 1300kg weight would be achieved through extensive use of carbon fibre. While power from the TT RS sourced 2.5 litre inline five cylinder engine should be at least 350bhp (260kW) with thanks to a larger turbo.

[Source: Autocar]

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Ferrari Formula 1 Lotus McLaren Mercedes-Benz Red Bull Racing Renault

Japanese GP qualifying washed out

2010 Japanese Grand Prix

It would be out of the ordinary for AUSmotive to feature an image gallery on a Grand Prix weekend before the race had been run. It would be out of the ordinary for qualifying to be cancelled due to heavy and persistent rain. But these extraordinary events have happened today, and when you see the pictures, mostly taken during this morning’s Free Practice 3 session, you will see why.

Heavy rain started to fall this morning at the Suzuka circuit and barely abated all day. Despite several delays to allow conditions to improve qualifying was eventually called off and is now scheduled to be run tomorrow morning at 10am Japan time (midday AEDT). The race will go ahead as scheduled at 3pm (5pm AEDT). Weather conditions are expected to improve.

As well as the pics below you can also read the concise and somewhat humourous qualifying report from Lotus Racing.

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Holden Hyundai Kia Mazda Subaru Toyota VFACTS reports

New vehicle sales report – September 2010

FCAI banner

Official VFACTS data released by the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries (FCAI) showed that 85,054 passenger cars, SUVs and commercial vehicles were sold in September, up 8.9 per cent (or 6,923 vehicles) on the same month in 2009. It also represents a new record for the month of September, beating the old mark (2005) by 584 sales.

Toyota and Holden retain their place at the top of the charts, while perennial top-three challenger Mazda has once again knocked Ford back to fourth place.

Year-to-date sales now tally 780,720 and the full year prediction has been raised to over 1 million, up from the previous forecast of 980,000. It would be only the third time in Australia’s history that 1 million new cars have been sold in a calendar year.

Press releases from FCAI and various manufacturers are available after the break.

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Citroen WRC

Sebastien Loeb – World Rally Champion again in 2010!

Sebastien Loeb - 2010 WRC winner

A quick shout out to Sebastien Loeb and Daniel Elena who won their seventh consecutive World Rally Championship by claiming an outright win in the Rally of France on the weekend. It marks an amazing run of successes, which includes most titles, most successive titles, most wins, most wins in one season, most successive wins in one season, most consecutive wins on one event. That boy Loeb can drive!

For added emotion Loeb the event took in the town of Haguenau where Loeb was raised. Thousands of well-wishers surrounded the nearby liaison stages ensuring Loeb knew his success was being appreciated, “There were people everywhere on the road, and at the stage. It was rather moving,” he said.

There are still two rallies left on the 2010 calendar, but already the Citroën Racing team has given the all-conquering C4 WRC a fitting send off. Its replacement, the DS3 WRC, also made its public debut over the weekend at the latest world motor show, which is being held in Paris – where else!

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Audi Motor Shows

Paris 2010: Audi quattro concept “Rallye”

Audi quattro concept 'Rallye'

Tucked away on the Audi stand at the Paris Motor Show, almost out of sight, is this “Rallye” version of the Audi quattro concept. Firstly, it looks sensational and clearly harks back to the all conquering Quattro rally beasts of the 1980s.

Secondly, what does it mean? There’s is nothing apparent on the usual Audi press portals that explain anything about this car. In fact, this picture isn’t even an official Audi image.

Is it simply a homage and nothing else, or is this even more extroverted concept a hint of something new to come? WRC perhaps? Or is that simply too much wishful thinking?

If you see anything that offers more than this World Car Fans article, please post a link in the comments section below.

UPDATE 7 October: According to a response from a representative of Audi AG this car is nothing more than a scale model produced to illustrate what a Group B rally car might look like today if the category was still alive. I still want one!

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Audi Motor Shows

Paris 2010: Audi highlights

Audi highlights - Paris 2010

Audi has released a brief clip showcasing their highlights from the Paris Motor Show. Of course, that means the e-tron Spyder and the quattro concept. In addition individual promo videos on both cars can also be seen.

Rupert Stadler, Chairman Audi AG, reckons the “e-tron” name will end up holding a similar significance for Audi as the term “quattro”. Will be interesting to see if that comes to fruition in the coming years.

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