2015 Koenigsegg One:1

Everything is going fine until we reach 150 mph. And then, very suddenly, it’s not.

Just sitting in the passenger seat of the Koenigsegg One:1 (we explain the silly name later) as it attacks a wet runway is, in terms of spiked adrenaline, somewhere between a solo sky dive and being chased by a bull while running in red pants. But as the man from the factory demonstrates, even in the sodden conditions we’ve found waiting for us in Sweden, the world’s fastest car can still be easily controlled. Or so it seemed.

It’s been raining all day, and the One:1 is struggling to put its monstrous power onto the slick surface of the former airbase that serves as Koenigsegg’s test track. The engine is bellowing and the car squirming and sliding as the twin-turbocharged V-8 comes on boost. Even with the stability control switched on and working overtime, it’s struggling to find grip. Running on regular pump gasoline means around 1161 horsepower; 1341 horses and 1011 pound-feet come when it’s fueled with E85. But either way, that’s vastly more twist than the rear Michelins can deliver to the soaked tarmac. Glancing across at the instrument display, I can see that the wheels only stop trying to spin as we pass 125 mph, when serious aerodynamic downforce starts to push the car into the track.


For a couple of heartbeats, we experience the full, brutal acceleration of a car that makes a steam catapult look underpowered.

And then, with a jarring suddenness, the car snaps sideways, and, although the runway is still arriving at an undiminished rate, it’s now coming at the passenger window. A look across the cockpit confirms that this isn’t part of the show; our driver’s face makes it clear that we’re having an unscripted moment in a $2.8 million hypercar.

He briefly holds the slide, and then there’s the sensation of momentum shifting, the pendulum swinging back. There isn’t enough opposite lock in the world to catch this one, and sideways becomes backwards toward the edge of the runway.

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2015 Nissan GT-R NISMO

The 2015 model year marks the seventh for the GT-R, and nearly every turn of the calendar has come with incremental updates from Nissan, stretching the envelope of a car we initially called “big, heavy, and incredible.”

The portfolio grows this year to include a NISMO—Nissan Motorsports—model, and all three of our initial adjectives still ring true. NISMOizing the GT-R makes it a little bigger, stretching the car’s length by 0.5 inch with new bodywork. This includes an integrated splitter and a raised rear wing that, according to Nissan, increase downforce at 186 mph by 220 pounds without affecting the car’s 0.26 drag coefficient.

At 3883 pounds, the NISMO is still a heavy beast and only a scant two pounds lighter than a 2014 GT-R Track Edition. With engine modifications—including larger turbos lifted from Nissan’s FIA GT3 racers, remapped timing, and revised breathing—the 3.8-liter V-6 produces an additional 55 horsepower and 18 pound-feet of torque, for 600 and 481, respectively. Reportedly, Nissan could have cranked it up even further, but resisted the urge for the sake of transmission longevity, which is a touchy subject after early R35 models Cuisinarted their transaxles.

A quarter-mile run doesn’t reveal much difference from the ’14 Track model, with the NISMO breaking the tape in 11.2 seconds at 125 mph. That’s the same time and just one mph swifter than the ’14. In fact, the two track sheets look eerily similar. Both cars register 1.02 g’s on the skidpad, stop from 70 mph in 145 feet, and sprint to a mile-per-minute in 2.9 seconds. Maybe the tires and drivetrain are just about maxed out in the launch department.

The NISMO’s extra power is apparent mainly in its run to 130 mph, which is 0.3 second quicker than the Track model’s time.

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Ferrari LaFerrari

Meet the 500bhp Rezvani ‘Beast’

The kerbweight sits just shy of 750kg (up from the Atom’s 456kg), with 0-60mph quoted at 2.7 seconds. Top speed? 165mph.

The standard Ariel Atom, with its 2.0-litre Honda VTEC engine on board, 245bhp and lower weight, will go from 0-62mph in… 2.7 seconds. And top out at 140mph.

There are no driver aids, CEO Ferris Rezvani stating: “By limiting as much electronic interference as we could, we were able to allow the driver to feel every inch of the road at their fingertips.” You have been duly warned.

There are lightweight aluminium forged alloys. There are carbon fibre seats, a carbon fibre steering wheel and Apple’s CarPlay on board too.

The price? $165,000 (just over £100,000), and you’ll have to wait between two and three months for it to be built. This, or a good ol’ British Atom?

Ferrari FXXK

Five years ago, Ferrari wrested control of its visual creative back from Pininfarina, Maranello’s chosen couturier since a celebrated meeting between Enzo Ferrari and Battista Farina in 1951, and set up its own Centro Stile under Manzoni. Since then, he’s won the famous Compasso d’Oro for the F12 Berlinetta, and his team has genetically modified Ferrari’s hypercar bloodline to stunning effect with the LaFerrari. But even that somehow pales in comparison with the monster you see here, the FXXK, the car that Manzoni quietly regards as CS’s greatest achievement so far. This is sculpture and engineering on an unimaginable scale.

Let’s recap. The FXXK is the latest product of Ferrari’s Corse Clienti division, a limited-run track-only mobile laboratory for the super-rich strata of the company’s customer base that prefers to operate at the bleeding edge of high performance, rather than commission a one-off SP (special projects) car or run a decommissioned Formula One machine. When Ferrari announced the FXX programme a decade ago, some scoffed at the notion of a £1m-plus track car, stored by Ferrari and ferried to different circuits around the world, never mind the idea of using owners as guinea pigs for new technology. But if imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, Ferrari ought to be very flattered indeed by McLaren’s P1 GTR and Aston Martin’s Vulcan.

Typically, the FXXK has the jump on them. A power output of 1,035bhp provokes memories of insane Eighties turbo-era F1 cars, and if that figure falls short of the Veyron in sheer Top Trumps terms, remember that the Bugatti is lugging the equivalent of an Alfa 4C in excess baggage.

The FXXK has 101bhp more than the regular LaF, with 848bhp generated by the 6.3-litre V12 and the remaining 187bhp ponied up by the electric motor. The combustion engine has new camshafts, reworked intake manifolds and an exhaust system that junks the silencers.

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2016 Lamborghini Huracán LP580-2

Six years ago, Lamborghini put a stripe on a special-edition Gallardo and named it in honor of Valentino Balboni, the company’s longtime test driver. While toiling away over the sticker package, Lambo’s engineers also yanked the front differential and slightly detuned the car, creating the rear-wheel-drive Gallardo LP550-2. Here, finally, was a machine that put itself right up against Ferrari’s mid-engined, rear-wheel-drive V-8–powered cars, something Sant’Agata hadn’t done in decades.

It took six years of Gallardo sales before Lamborghini pulled the trigger on a rear-drive model. In the case of the Gallardo’s replacement, the Huracán, the company isn’t wasting any time, and just a year after the entry-level supercar’s release it is debuting the Huracán LP580-2.

The rear-drive Huracán follows the same recipe that directed the Balboni: The front diff and its attendant hardware is removed, as is 73 pounds of curb weight, and total output is reduced slightly, from 602 horsepower to 572. Peak torque falls to 398 lb-ft from 413. To compensate for the reduced weight on the front end, the nose has been redesigned with additional downforce, while the spring rates also have been fiddled and futzed with to best exploit the car’s newfound 40/60 weight distribution. (On our scales, the AWD Huracán carried 42 percent of its heft in the nose).

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2016 Ford Explorer Platinum

The Ford Explorer Platinum edition went on sale last month promising to solve multiple problems for Ford. Problem One: The strongest engine offered in the popular Explorer SUV, the 3.5-liter EcoBoost V-6, would sell in greater numbers if Ford made it more widely available.

 This is only a problem because it would seriously drag down the corporate fuel-economy figure, given the Explorer’s sales volume. The best way to restrict the max-power engine’s percentage of the mix is to make it expensive or limit it to a low-volume model. Offering the V-6 EcoBoost only in the Sport trim, as was the case with the 2011–2015 Explorer, did both. But that irritated some potential customers, those who walk into dealerships wanting it all. These folk don’t take kindly to being told they can only have the 365 horsepower mill if they give up their preference for a soft ride and a big shiny grille (the Sport’s is black) or can’t get all the optional features they could in a luxury-oriented Limited. The trick is to limit EcoBoost penetration without irritating the wealthiest potential customers. Competitors cater to such buyers with offerings like the GMC Acadia Denali.

Problem Two is that the obvious alternative, sending the luxury buyer to the Lincoln store, isn’t really viable despite that brand’s sales rebound. One symptom of Lincoln’s recent identity crisis is that Dearborn forgot to give its dealers a version of the Explorer. Where once they had the Aviator, the only Lincoln sharing the Explorer platform is the MKT, an oddly styled analog to the boxy Ford Flex, which itself is all but salesproof despite our repeatedly stated preference for its lower center of gravity and sensible packaging. With luxury crossover/SUV sales hot and profit margins high, Ford leaves money on the table every time a shopper looking for a leather-lined, feature-rich, three-row crossover opts for an Acura MDX or an Audi Q7. The obvious solution is now at hand: a more luxurious, more expensive Explorer.

 They’ve sold 7 million Explorers in 25 years, after all, establishing a huge and loyal customer base that includes many who are ready to spend whatever it takes to get all the comforts and luxury trimmings.

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2016 Toyota Fortuner

With the recent launch of the Chevrolet Trailblazer SUV in India and Ford set to follow suit with the new Endeavour, Toyota has prepared a worthy response in the form of a new-look Fortuner which has recently been launched in Australia. The new model features a long list of improvements over its extremely popular predecessor including drastic changes to its interior and exterior profiles. The all-new Toyota Fortuner is expected to be showcased at the 2016 Delhi Auto Expo before its official Indian launch in early-2017.

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2015 Kia K900: A RWD Flagship Takes Kia to New Heights

As Kia debuts the K900—its first-ever true luxury sedan—at the 2013 L.A. auto show, the automaker asks that you consider how far it has come since entering the U.S. market 20 years ago. Looking at the K900’s spec sheet, and then at its rich styling and rear-drive layout, and then its spec sheet again, it’s easy to drink Kia’s self-congratulatory Kool-Aid.

After all, this is a brand that started out building bicycles in Korea in the 1950s, and then launched itself stateside with the dreary Sephia sedan in 1994. Now, the K900 arrives in the U.S. with the mission of fortifying Kia’s luxury aspirations, its arrival paved by recent, incremental moves upmarket with the Optima Limited and Cadenza sedans.

More Than a Rolling Warranty with Leather

The K900, which is already on sale in Korea, leaves Kia’s womb a fraternal twin, paired architecturally as it is with Hyundai’s rear-drive Genesis sedan. Although there are traces of the Genesis in the K900’s general proportions, the look is pure Kia, and in a good way. Under the guidance of Peter Schreyer, Kia’s design department has been on a roll of late, and the K900 continues that trend. Overall, the sedan is clean and well-tailored, even if the headlights and taillights mimic those of BMW’s 5- and 7-series a bit too accurately.

Fine details abound, such as the pinched side-vent shape that mimics the grille and Kia’s attractive “soft LED” head- and taillight accents. To our eyes, the only heavy-handed styling element is the chunky chrome strip that runs above the rocker panels and is picked up on the outboard edges of the rear bumper.

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2015 Hyundai Genesis V-6 RWD

Michigan roads have never been so useful. You see, we recently sampled Hyundai’s new Genesis sedan in Arizona, and while we discovered it’s pretty damn good, the pavement on our drive route was merely cracked. (Oh, but to dream…) We’ve now driven the car near Detroit, and we can comment on how its Lotus-tuned suspension handles moonscapes such as those that serve as the Motor City’s highways and byways.

We also spent more time with the V-6 car, which is the expected volume model and focus of this report.

Subtract Two Cylinders and Some Weight, and Add Lotus

Lotus founder Colin Chapman once said, “I hate enormous luxury sedans. Please hand me the keys to a Seven and a rag to wipe the bug cheese from my face.” This was later pared to the famous “simplify and add lightness,” a credo to which the Genesis V-6 adheres reasonably well given that, well, it’s an enormous luxury sedan.

 

To wit: It’s 403 pounds lighter than the V-8 car, according to Hyundai’s scales. We haven’t yet weighed any Genesis, so we can’t verify the claim, but the V-6 version certainly feels much lighter from behind the wheel.

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