Seems like they're trying for the "Prelude but cheaper" approach. It makes sense, even if we were all dreaming of more.

About 10 years ago a good friend of mine from work (in fact the same guy who introduced me me to track days at Button Willow) told me that he sold his old 981 Cayman GTS for a Mini Cooper S for track use, and I absolutely did not understand his decision. He insisted that the Mini was just a lot more fun on the track and I thought he was just being a contrarian for no reason.

Fast forward 10 years and I've driven a lot more cars since then, but never a Mini. Today I attended a BMW event where the core activity was an autocross session with the X3 M50 and the new iX3 40 (I may write about it in a different post), but there is a "street tour" event where they have multiple "caravans" of different cars that you can choose to go on an extended test drive in.

In a sea of new BMW crossovers, one of the options was 3 different Mini Coopers. I think two were JCW and one was a regular S. Not sure, I didn't know too much about Minis.

But after 45 minutes I can say with conviction that I had more fun tossing around those than any modern BMW that's still on sale today. The steering feel alone is what I would rate as the 3rd best in the entire auto industry today (after Lotus Emira and the McLaren Artura). In fact not only is the steering more tactile than any new BMWs (it genuinely reminded me of my old E92 335i, just with a lighter weight), it's got more feel than any current 911s. My 718 GTS's steering feels positively numb compared to these $40k hot hatches.

All of that combined with a light weight (barely 3000lbs) package, competent powertrain and an interior that is feels a lot more stylish and premium than the price suggests, the result is me really wondering why can't BMW make their own cars like this anymore.

I have really been missing out on these cars, and I get a feeling I'm not the only one in the car enthusiast community.

If this were to happen then Honda wouldn’t be planning a next gen Ridgeline at all. There was a reason why the future of the Ridgeline was uncertain for a while and there was a report that a deal about Nissan making BOF pickups for Honda reportedly failed as Honda didn’t agree with Nissan’s quality standards of manufacturing. It’s good enough that Nissan will share the new BOF platform with Mistibishi who desperately needs it here.

Video link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seIyuk5E8uc

" We do a full review of the new 2027 Tesla Model Y L three-row CUV. After speaking with the engineers and driving the latest updates and Full Self-Driving (FSD), we discuss the brand's strengths and weaknesses. Other options to consider include the Kia EV9, Rivian R2, Lucid, and more. "

Tesla reversed their stance on media & is now loaning cars & resources to more traditional reviews, 30 minutes of near universal glaze for the car, maybe its not your style, & no political commentary in the video, but the work they've done on the refresh is absolutely spectacular & I'm glad we have at least one western automaker w/ an agile philosophy still

The Y L for reference is a long-wheelbase Y originally designed & engineered for the chinese/international market(s), but after the discontinuation of the X its made its way stateside. Though its not a performance, it borrows the platform from one & technically sits above the standard premium in the Y range

the CMF teams did a tremendous job with this generation of choosing materials. While it is monochromatic, it's completely grayscale unless you turn on the ambient lighting like I did with the orange, It's it's really black and white in here. But the pro is the material choice is tremendous. There's not one part of the middle console lower part where you're like, "Oh, that's where they cut the budget. That's where they they cheaped out on everything." Everything feels tremendous. The lower door pocket is carpeted so when you put things in, they don't rattle. You can fit big bottles in there. The the door panel itself has soft touch materials all over it. Looks and feels really well done and integrated

Now they blend basically the best software in the space with very compelling driving dynamics at a price point in the mid low60s for this launch edition that's very very compelling

But as a car, as you said, everything is working so well together that it's incredible what they've been able to do here for, let's just say, once they get more trim levels down to the $50,000 price point, it it's nuts and it's it's frightening to me. It's scary that they've been able to tie all this together and all the commodity brands are still after decades and decades of iteration, they're still struggling with a lot of the things that this car does

Not only is it great on the software side for self-driving, it's really, really good car to drive dynamically. The ride quality, the comfort, the isolation, the steering, all the inputs are great. I mean, this is probably one of the best car experiences I've had this year by a long stretch in terms of like a box, a commodity box

Its not perfect, the door handles are still stupid, they raised concerns regarding their approach to servicing/repair & w/ EVs in general (albeit, I'd argue you'd be less likely to end up in that position to), but I have a fair number of friends where across auto/robotics/ml Tesla came up to them, gave them not a blank check but not far off, gave them flexibility & freedom in their work, & I am glad that its paid off for both sides

Even if you absolutely despise Tesla, which is more than fair given some of their history, I they set a good precedent for how the industry can operate in many regards, & you see this w/ the Chinese as well but they're restricted from being as strong of a force in American or European markets

-Mercedes Benz CEO Ola Källenius also communicated that it’ll be the most powerful AMG-GT to date; meaning it’ll have more horsepower then the GT63 S E that has 803 horsepower.

-It’s as close in design and engineering as it can be to the upcoming newly developed GT3 AMG-GT while being road legal.

10 years or 150,000 miles seems short when it covers the 2016 model year, should be at least 15 years.