Car and Driver December 2012

By the time this issue hits newsstands, the presidential campaign will be over and we can begin the important work of healing friendships injured on the battlefields of Facebook. At least I hope this will happen—too many people I sort of know dared to challenge my assertion that the only American fit to be president is Roger Penske, and I await their apologies. It is also my hope that whoever has the misfortune of sitting in the Oval Office for the next four years likes to read car magazines on the john, because I have some advice: 1. Stop with the moving targets: Pick a safety standard and stick with it. Pick a fuel-economy standard and stick with it. Allow carmakers the time to reconcile the two. That whole "54.5 mpg…

Sic your dogs on us at:editors@CARandDRIVER.comor join the discussion at:backfires.caranddriver.com THE NEWEST IN NEW I was cruising along in the September issue, enjoying the sights, when all of a sudden I came to the start of the new-car list and saw the Acura ILX 2.4. Whoa!! Who had the drunken insight to put that big metal band at the top of the grille? It's tantamount to putting a bra on Angelina Jolie, for God's sake! No matter how many times I see it, that vomit-inducing band is like a tractor beam that pulls the eyes away from an otherwise great car. Too bad, Acura—you lost me with that travesty. JOHN ASPRELLISEYMOUR, CONNECTICUT Really? You'd turn down Angelina Jolie because she's wearing a bra?—Ed. In your new-car coverage, you didn't mention the most important news for…

WITNESS THE P1 CONCEPT, McLAREN'S SUCCESSOR TO THE LEGENDARY F1. When McLaren launched the F1 in 1992, it created an icon—and a supercar benchmark that stands to this day. At a time when the Lamborghini Diablo and the Ferrari F40 were wrestling with the 4.0-second 0-to-60-mph acceleration barrier and top speeds of around 200 mph, the F1 could hit 60 in 3.2 seconds. It also screamed all the way to 221 mph. After years of road-car silence, McLaren again leapfrogged the supercar establishment with its MP4-12C, which we crowned champion in a July 2011 comparison test against a Ferrari 458 Italia and a Porsche 911 GT2 RS. The MP4-12C—McLaren has unofficially changed its moniker to the 57-percent less-cumbersome 12C—outperforms the mighty F1 in almost all regards, except for top speed (it…

AS FAR AS WE'RE CONCERNED, the Mercedes-Benz 300SL was the first supercar. Why the 300SL? Funny doors, of course—plus a tricky mix of brawn and performance with intangibles such as outlandishness and rarity. It was a wobbly road from that 220-hp, 138-mph gullwing coupe to today's aluminum-and-carbon-fiber wedges, but we've mapped the progression of the defining exotic-car stats here with data from our test archives. THREE QUESTIONS FOR: LORIS BICOCCHI Loris Bicocchi, 54, worked his way up from mechanic's assistant to test driver at Lamborghini before leaving to help develop the Bugatti EB110. He went on to become a test pilot for cars such as the Pagani Zonda, the Koenigsegg CCR, and the KTM X-Bow. C/D: Is it scary to be in a prototype car from a small manufacturer? LB: When you sit down in…

THANKS, WORLDWIDE SUPER-RICH, for buying enough wildly impractical cars to support their continued manufacture. Below, we've mapped the global distribution of the 7673 Bugatti, Ferrari, Lamborghini, and McLaren cars sold in 2011 with help from the automotive-data specialists at Polk. VAPORWARE THE LONG SHOTS Successful small-timers such as Koenigsegg and Pagani are fueling an unprecedented explosion of never-gonna-happen automotive vaporware. Here we've corralled a selection of the most outlandish proposals, each with its country of origin, claimed engine and output, expected price, and—for our friends in the Vegas odds-making business—our ranking (from 0 to 5) of its likelihood of coming to fruition. Place your bets! Arrinera Hussarya, Poland 6.2-liter V-8, 650 hp, $160,000 Probability Rimac Concept_One, Croatia four electric motors, 1088 hp, $1,300,000 Probability…

FOUNDING A SPORTS-CAR company is a surefire way to squander one's fortune and reputation. Think of Bricklin, De Tomaso, and DeLorean. The risk might be monumental, but so is the appeal: Be the guy whose creation inspires the next generation of car fanatics. That's a nice headstone inscription. Perhaps not surprisingly, given the concentration of wealth in many such nations, the Second World is emerging as fertile ground for industrialists hoping to be the next Enzo or Ferruccio. While there is no shortage of vaporware being peddled to potential investors worldwide [see bottom of page], the following companies are notable for actually, you know, building cars. (Which isn't to say that they, too, won't go the way of Vector.) —jens meiners MARUSSIA MOTORS HOMELAND: Russia ANNUAL OUTPUT: "Several hundred" CHIEF OFFERING: B2 PRICE: $155,800 ENGINE: Turbocharged…