Some Good, Bad, And Ugly

Plenty of us would admit to being guilty of spending far too much time perusing motoring sites on the web. However, before you're overcome with guilt and leave TyreRoar to pursue more tedious tasks, hang around, because I've compiled a quick round up my my favourite car-related posts from the past couple of days. Since Tuesday is often the most depressing day of the week (last weekend already a distant memory, ages until the next one) here's some reasons to be cheerful.

As a big fan of fast Fords, this first snippet makes me fizz with excitement. The current Fiesta MkVII has been on sale here in the UK for about two years, selling well, looking good, top of the class. Unfortunately, when revealed, Ford also said there would be no hot version for the petrolhead market, leaving the 1.6 Zetec S as the range-topper. This was a big pity given how good the base car was, and how tantalising the prospect of a Ford rival to the RenaultSport and John Cooper Works divisions would be.

Of course, the big mistake we made was to believe car makers when they promsie never to do something. Porsche promised it wouldn't make a diesel car. It now has oil-burning Cayennes and Panameras. BMW promised its M cars would always be normally aspirated. Once the current E92 M3 dies, all will be turbocharged. And, following suit, here are the best pictures yet of the 2012 Ford Fiesta ST, testing cooling systems at the Nurburgring.

Sporting the Zetec S bodykit with a more aggressive diffuser and tailpipe arrangement, the biggest visual clue is the implementation for the new 'ST nose' which originated on the Focus ST 'concept' (idential to the production car due in a few months.) I myself am not a fan of this new design cue; the gaping grille isn't broken up, Audi-style, by a badge, so the yawning mouth dominates the front of the car. The lower supplementary grilles are fussy too, just as they are on the new Focus, and on a smaller, more bulbous supermini, the effect isn't all that appealing.

Nevertheless, this is only a camouflaged, bodge version, so the production car will hopefully be a,little neater. More importantly, the performance should be right up with the best of the junior hot hatch crop. The engine capacity will remain at 1.6 litres, but gains Ford's EcoBoost technology, using a small but efficient turbo and direct injection to give excellent power-to capacity ratio, while preserving economy. Output will have to be around 200bhp to take on Mini, Citroen, RenaultSport and Vauxhall's equivalent, and that's well within the reach of the motor,. A predictable Mountune option kit will take that figure higher, and given how the Ford tuning scene was reinvigorated by the packages for the outgoing Focus RS, expect to see plenty of go-faster bits turning up right on time.

Really, really looking forward to reading the reviews of this car. It's got the modern looks inside and out, balanced performance and consumption targets, and all the fast Ford heritage in its back pocket. Should be a blinder.

Now for the bad. It's another small, light, fun to drive car, but this time it's one coming to an abrupt hault on the Nurburgring. Thinking of a track day pilgrimage this summer? Watch this, and then remember two things. Firstly, lift off oversteer is very, very difficult to recover from if you don't expect/induce it yourself. Secondly, it might be frowned upon at track days to film yourself, since it encourages bad behaviour for the cameras, but at least when things go less well than planned, you've got a souvenir. Or evidence. Incidentally, the driver of this unfortunate Lotus claims he hit a patch of oil unseen on the crest.



Can any Italian-speakers provide a translation in the comments below?

Finally, this may be constituting the 'ugly' part of my cars-on-the-internet piece, but you can't fault the ingenuity and ambition of this Chinese motorist, who turned his 1995 A31 Nissan Cefiro into his very own Lamborginhi Aventador, for the bargain sum of £8. 

Spot the difference: The front definitely carries more Reventon cues than the Aventador but the rear screen and proportions are defintely aimed at the new LP700-4 from Sant'Agata.

UK readers may remember the Peugeot advert from a few years back, when an envious Indian chap bent his banger into a thoroughly plausible representation of a 206, and then went round impressing the ladies in his new pride and joy. This proves there's always a real-life template...

Fair play to you, I say. China just can't help but show it's the new workshop of the world.
Here's hoping this'll turn up on YouTube in the near future, proving it's not just a Transformers-esque sculpture.

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