Schumacher back to F1 racing in 2010

F1 legend and 7 time world champion Michael Schumacher has signed with Mercedes GP (Formally Brawn and Honda) for a 3 year period. This means that Michael will once again be partnered with Ross Brawn who has been with him during his previous world championship years. Michael will be 41 years old when the season starts making him the oldest driver on the grid. 2010 is going to be a brilliant year in F1. Wonder if Ralph will get the same idea?

Kimi Raikkonen moves from F1 to WRC

Kimi Raikkonen previously a brilliant F1 driver at Ferrari (World Champion 2007), McLaren and Sauber will be moving away from Formula 1 and competing in the 2010 season of the WRC. Ferrari paid out his contract 1 year early to allow double World F1 Champion Fernando Alonso to take the seat opposite Massa for 10. Raikkonen will be racing under the Citroen Junior banner for the WRC championship team. Kimi will campaign in all but one of the 13 rounds next year, sitting out the New Zealand event which is a bit of a shame as I would have liked to see if Kimi can keep up with my old neighbor and NZ rally expert Patrick Malley.

2009 Cadillac CTS-V Hennessey V700 605 RWHP

This car has 605 Rear wheel Horse Power with it's modified supercharged V8 Corvette ZR-1 engine. It does 0-60 in McLaren F1 territory and can hit close to 200 Mph. It sounds fantastic. All cars should sound like this. Turn up the volume.

Rolls Royce Ghost 2010

The beautiful looking RR 4 officially got it's production name today. That would be the Rolls Royce Ghost. The vehicle will be powered by a 6.675 liter twin turbo V12 pumping out HP north of 500. This car will be smaller than it's big brother the Phantom and will probably be a lot more fun to drive. I'd expect that a few "drivers" may be delegated different jobs when the owner of the RR Ghost wants to drive it them self rather than being chauffeured.
Rolls Royce CEO Tom Purves announced the vehicles name at the Shanghai Motor Show. The new Ghost will be built at the Goodwood manufacturing facility on the south coast of England as a 2010 model towards the end of 2009.

2010 Jaguar XJ

The photo above ( Courtesy of Auto Express ) is that of the 2010 Jaguar XJ. The new XJ looks to have taken some styling cues from the handsome XF and is gunning for 7 Series and S Class business.
Rumor has it that the base engine will be 385 HP V8 with a 503 HP Supercharged V8 at the flagship model designed to give the S63 and the 760 a run for the money.
A diesel option is also likely.
I look forward to seeing the new model in the flesh and I wish Jaguar great success.

2010 BMW 760

BMW has outdone themselves with the new twin turbo V12 engine announced for the upcoming 760 series. BMW designed a new engine from the ground up to replace the previous normally aspirated 453 HP V12. The new twin turbo unit has considerably better fuel economy (about 4.5% better) has a lot more power ( 400kw / 544hp @ 5000 rpm ) and maximum torque is 750 Newton-Meters (553 lb-ft) at 1500 rpm.

This car has tire shredding power and can sprint from 0-62 mph in about 4.6 seconds. Best you keep your eyes peeled if you think you are fast in your M3. Also new to BMW is an 8 speed transmission a la M Benz.

It is entirely likely that the new engine will find its way into the Rolls Royce Phantom which is hovering around with the old engine, but time will tell.

It is nice to see BMW using turbo engines, getting fuel consumption and emissions down and bringing the power back.

The 2010 Zenvo ST1

Photo Pending

(Unfortunately my server disallows upload of photo)

Competition is riffe for Pagani, Ascari, Koenigsegg and Bugatti with a brand new supercar manufacturer coming onto the scene with a car that is fronted to win some design awards if it can make its production date early next year.

The car is staggering not only in its design, but its appeal too and if that doesn't float your boat then here are some statistics. A 7ltr Turbocharged and Supercharged V8 producing a power to weight ratio of 802bhp/ton or 1104bhp (that makes its power greater than a Bugatti Veyron). The speed has been electronically limited to 233mph and the big stat is that it does 0-100kph in 3.0 seconds (which isn't faster than a bugatti). Its design seems to filter certain aspects of other models such as the front sloping end and wheel arches like those of a Lambourgini but has much softer curves like those of Jessica Alba's buttocks. Because it is mid-engined that may speculate that it will courner spectacularly well if balanced correctly and the power controlled rather than it ripping up the tarmac and you spin off like a bad remake of a popular tv series (Knight Rider comes to mind).
While the ST1 wont be breaking any production land records for its speed its pure precense is mind boggling from its gapping front end to its wrap around spoiler. From head to toe you see similarities to Lotus, Lambourghini, the Nissan GT-R, Carerra GT but still comes completely original.
I look forward to the follow up on this car that can only be described as Biblical.