Overdrive TV

This just happened! Some poor rich bloke was no doubt having a whale of time along one of Cape Town’s best driving roads, De Waal Drive. We have no details as yet but quite clearly things went wrong and the Lambo ended up on it’s roof! The car looks really flat, we’re really hoping it wasn’t a cabriolet, and we sincerely hope everyone is okay.

If you have any more details please get them through to us, contact details below right.

More pictures here!

Ciro De Siena

Here it is! The new new VW Beetle. Details are scarce at this stage but we think you’re looking at a Golf 6 chassis wearing a nostalgia-inducing dress. Expect engines from throughout the VW range, from a little 1.4 litre twincharged petrol, through some small diesels and all the way up to a 2.0 turbo.

The interior looks like pretty much any VW we’ve ever tested here at OverdriveTV, but that is no bad thing; standard VW interiors are generally well fitted, the GUI on the touch screen is brilliant and nifty options like the SatNav and HDD music player will be on the options list. Which is nice.

Some UK sites are putting their local arrival at early 2012, so expect the new Bug in SA sometime in mid-late 2012.

We’ll keep you posted.

Unfortunately there is no escaping the icon that is the Beetle. Whether your dad had one, or your grandad, or his grandad, or whether your kids just use them as an excuse to punch their mates, everybody has a Beetle story.

After a fairly weak effort at reviving the brand in the ’90s, VW has got stuck in and have come up with what it hopes will be a fitting modern tribute to the car that essentially helped mobilise an entire continent after WW2.

You know a company has spent a tonne of money when a) very few details whatsoever have leaked to the public, nevermind pictures of the thing and b) they’re launching a car simultaneously on three continents.

VW has partnered with MTV for the launch, and you can follow everything as well as stream the launch live right here: worldstage.mtv.tv. The launch is also trending on Twitter – follow #VWBeetle for the latest. It’s also hugely funny reading all the tweets cursing the Beetle.

In the meantime, here’s the awesome little Superbowl ad for the new bug.

The original Mini was a rather unlikely rally star, winning the Monte Carlo rally in 1964, 1965 and 1967, as well as a host of other rallies which suited its diminutive nature and ability to take corners without actually slowing down.

But in the interim, the world of international rally moved on a bit. The Germans dominated, with the Audi Quattro, which changed the sport forever. The Japanese then took the German’s idea and improved it, with Subaru and Mitsubishi becoming synonymous with the sport.

The sport gradually became frighteningly expensive, and it wasn’t uncommon for a top rally team to spend more than a top Formula One team through a season. This, coupled with The Great Recession, drove some of the stalwarts out of the sport, a situation which brought the head of Subaru to tears during a press conference.

World Rally announced plans almost immediately to cut cost, and this year the biggest change came into effect, the car’s are now smaller – much smaller. We’re talking Ford Fiesta’s here. Which suits Mini just fine.

The Original Ass-Kicker.

Unveiling their official contender yesterday, the Mini John Cooper Works WRC, the team will join the World Tour in Sardinia on the weekend 5-8th May, with two entries driven by Briton Kris Meeke and Spaniard Dani Sordo.

And Mini are certainly in with a shout. They’ve got Prodrive running the team, a world-renowned collection of geniuses who successfully ran Subaru’s rally outfit for years.

With Subaru still out of the sport, I reckon I might just get behind the Brits. Maybe.

Ciro De Siena

More pics of the new and old Mini rally car when you click here

The Red Bull tyre-burning bonanza has moved from Marine Drive, Blouberg, to the Killarney Race Track, which is just up the road really. They announced this about an hour ago. If you show up at Marine Drive on Sunday you will witness precisely nothing, except for the usual kite-skaters and some severely hungover bar managers, emerging into the light.

Anyway, the Red Bull team is in town and they’re putting on quite a show, for free, at the Killarney Racetrack. This will be the first time in 50 years that anything even remotely connected to Formula One races at Killarney, which staged the 1960 Cape Grand Prix.

Killarney Race Track. Old School, but still kicking it hard.

Having witnessed this incredible machine at Kyalami on the weekend, I highly, highly recommend heading through to see this car in action. And it’s not just any show car, this is Sebastien Vettel’s 2010 Championship winning racecar. The sound is unlike anything else on earth; it crawls under your skin, rattles your teeth and makes the hairs on the back of your neck stand to attention. It’s really that good.

My advice: try get a seat at Shell corner (ask a marshal for directions), the car should fly through here and start accelerating. Formula One cars are simply astounding through corners. Additionally try get onto a straight, either the main or back straight, to appreciate the quite ludicrous straight line acceleration. A modern F1 car reaches 100km/h in about 1.6 seconds, a bit faster than your turbo’d Corsa. Even with those mags wheels.

For a video of the F1 car at Kyalami, and my noisy interview with David Coulthard, click here.
For more information visit the event page.

Ciro De Siena

By Ciro De Siena

In reporting this story, we have to underline the obvious human toll of the disaster, as well as the horrendous destruction to property and the livelihoods of the Japanese people. While the international news networks continue their excellent work covering the story, as car journalists and huge fans of Japanese cars in general, we thought we should bring you this story.

Honda, Nissa, Toyota and Subaru, Isuzu and Hino Motors (a large truck manufacturer) have all halted production indefinitely in Japan, as the country takes stock of the destruction caused by last week’s earthquake and subsequent tsunami. At least one person died at Honda’s R&D facility, and two fires broke out at a Nissan plant.

Nissan has reported damage to 2300 new vehicles and minor damages to four of its factories. While the factories themselves have reported little damage, transport networks and of course the ports, via which all cars are exported to foreign markets, have been badly damaged and will take considerable time to repair.

Car makers are likely to keep assembly plants closed until they are certain the supply chain has recovered enough to meet the demands of regular production. At this point it is unclear whether the effects will be felt in overseas markets, although there is likely to be a disruption in new models and/or parts in the North American market.

The Japanese manufacturers are widely known for running “just-in-time” assembling methods. This means that the parts for a particular model arrive at the factory hours, even minutes before they are needed. This is all good and well when everything is running smoothly, but the tsunami has led to a massive disruption in this system. Some part suppliers are set up very close to the factories, but many are further afield, particularly in the north-western region of the country, most heavily affected by the tsunami.

New cars which were standing in ports waiting to be exported were smashed, burned and mostly drowned as the water rushed over breakwaters, leading to some astonishing images of thousands of cars being destroyed.

We’ll keep you posted as the situation progresses.

The beast currently staring at you is BTCC’s Toyota Avensis-based ‘Next Generation Touring Car’. After a bit of wind funnel testing it should be ready to race, much to the delight of Toyota fans everywhere. This a much appreciated departure from a brand constantly berated for pouring beige wall-paper paste over everything they create.

I was absolutely stunned when I opened the picture to reveal the fury of the timidly-named Avensis. I think it’s very existence has already led to at least 14 men in Lenasia having a stroke, and has single-handedly convinced everyone in Birmingham to stop adding pointless wings to their Vauxhalls.

What we want to know is, if Toyota can build something that mean and aggressive and anti-beige, why don’t they just do it all the time? Sure, nobody wants a Verso with an aerodynamic package but the Auris could certainly benefit. It looks like a fridge magnet at your Gran’s house. I’m not saying go balls to the wall, lads, but a bit of sportiness wouldn’t hurt.

Full size image here.

Ciro

That is all.

Ciro