Reviews: C8 Grand Sport and Lambo Temerario; Flock returns!

Summary

The Smoking Tire Podcast – Episode Summary Episode: Reviews: C8 Grand Sport and Lambo Temerario; Flock returns! Hosts: Matt Farah & Zack Klapman Date: July 28, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Matt and Zack deliver in-depth reviews of two high-profile sports cars: the 2027 Corvette C8 Grand Sport and the new Lamborghini Temerario. They open with a follow-up on recent Flock Safety license plate camera controversies, sharing updates, critical insights, and broader concerns about AI-driven surveillance systems. The episode then shifts into detailed, hands-on impressions of the new Corvette and Lamborghini, with thoughtful comparisons to their segments, some lively banter, and listener Q&A that spans car culture, the collector watch market, and quirky hypotheticals.

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Flock Camera Controversy & Surveillance Tech

00:00–20:25

Key Discussion Points

• Correction to Previous Episode: Matt issues an on-air correction regarding previous comments about an incident involving license plate reader company Flock and journalist Joel, clarifying Joel was detained but not handcuffed or held at gunpoint. (00:41)
• Flock System Flaws: Discussion centers on the system’s inability to accurately handle irregular or dealer plate formats, and the broader issue of tech companies rolling out surveillance with insufficient oversight.
  • "Nobody ever brought up that there should be maybe extra training or maybe a higher level of scrutiny within Flock to screen for potential accuracy before nationwide alerts..." — Matt (04:12)
• Responsibility Deflection: Flock’s communication repeatedly blamed human input errors for failures, but Zach and Matt emphasize the danger of trusting AI systems without robust checks.
  • “‘If the system is always flawed by the human input, then is it not going to be inherently flawed?’” — Zack (09:57)
  • Matt likens over-reliance on flawed AI to “outsourcing your entire fucking brain.”
• Implications: Both hosts raise alarms about surveillance proliferation without public consent, the risk of “mass swatting,” and how minor errors can cascade into dangerous police encounters.
  • “We have technology with no guardrails, so that like 12 people can be so rich...I’m so glad they’re so rich though, you know? But think about how it inspires me to maybe one day be that reckless to be that rich.” — Matt (19:47)

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2027 Corvette C8 Grand Sport – Review & Analysis

20:25–44:09

Main Impressions & Specs

• Engine & Chassis:

  • All-new 6.7L V8—largest displacement in production (409 cid), 535 hp, 520 lb ft torque, now the entry-level engine. “This engine’s a fucking hot boy motor. And you can get it in the base car, which is wild.” — Matt (23:20)
  • Z06 widebody chassis, updated suspension, optional center-exit exhaust, aggressive new color schemes (e.g., Boomer-y white/blue/red combo).

• Driving Experience:

  • Magnetic ride offers a huge range from soft to stiff, making it a “really user friendly car” for both road trips and aggressive canyon driving.
  • Convertible power top enables easy use and preserves trunk space.
  • “It's crazy that you can get this engine...in the base car.” (24:11)

• Comparison: Grand Sport vs. Z06

  • Grand Sport: 535 hp/520 lb ft @ 6200 rpm; Z06: 670 hp/460 lb ft, but peak torque at much higher revs. “As soon as the Grand Sport’s big block fucking motor gives up, that’s when the Z06 just gets going. There’s no overlap in power band.” — Matt (31:42)
  • Real-world performance: GS will feel quicker for most drivers not living at Z06 redline.

• Value & Pricing:

  • Virtually all Z06 features/options can be equipped on Grand Sport; $30K price delta means real-world buyer choice comes down to preferred engine/performance style.

Notable Quotes & Moments

• “If you get a C8 Corvette, under no circumstances should you get a light colored dash...it was like driving into a softbox.” — Matt (22:11)
• “Any price, any model line, whatever they're charging is...a fucking crazy amount of performance.” (37:14)

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Lamborghini Temerario – Review & Analysis

47:19–69:45

Main Impressions & Specs

• Powertrain & Performance:

  • Hybrid system with tri-motor setup and flat-plane V8 that revs to 10,000rpm; total output: 907 hp.
  • “Temerario is a fucking ballistic missile. It is so fast. I can’t believe...it’s like 50% more powerful than the [Huracán].” — Matt (48:20)
  • EV mode for stealth/urban use, but realistically: “This car launches like a Lucid...it’s a gas car that launches and goes like an electric car.” (53:00)

• Driving Dynamics & Ride:

  • Steering is very light, little feedback, but “you feel the road and what's happening through your ass.”
  • Exceptionally spacious interior for a mid-engine supercar. “Tall people, your mid-engine car is here.” (55:25)
  • Notable resurrection of the clever Porsche/BMW hidden cupholder.

• Design Observations:

  • The reviewed matte blue/black colorway “works beautifully”; visually less two-tone than bright versions.

• Criticisms & Quirks:

  • Driving Modes/Ergonomics: No “individual” drive mode; settings never quite right for mixed use. Modes are “never quite right” (62:25). Constant fiddling required between EV/Strada/Sport/Corsa.
  • Sound: At low rpm, the V8 “sounds pretty agricultural...not a great sound” compared to former-Lambo V10.
  • Brakes & Tech: Brakes grabby at low speed. Some Bluetooth issues with the infotainment.

Notable Quotes & Moments

• “When someone has a crash in one of these [Temerario], it’s gonna be at like 160 miles an hour. Enormous crashes.” — Matt (50:00)
• “Only a true lunatic would want more power than this. ...the future of your job is ungovernmenting this fucking thing so that it just stays in the mode that the engineers probably intended.” — Matt on software restrictions (65:12)
• “Lamborghini continues to make cars with very extreme performance, but that are increasingly usable as everyday cars.” (72:28)

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Watch Out! (Unexpected Life Lesson)

73:10–76:51

Story Highlight

• Matt witnessed someone discover their newly bought “Hublot” watch was a fake with a Seiko movement, purchased for $5,500 off Facebook Marketplace from a guy "in a Porsche."
• Morals: Always buy watches in a trusted store and have them authenticated.
  • “If you’re gonna buy a watch in cash from a person, you gotta meet that person at a watch store that you trust and have them open the watch and tell you that shit is real.” — Matt (75:17)
• Notable humor: “He pulled up in a Porsche. ...That’s how you get a Porsche, selling fake watches!” (75:28)

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Listener Q&A Highlights

78:10–end

• Car Aesthetics: Are economy cars getting too “aggressive” looking? (78:10)
• First World Problems: Listener tries to condense Boxster GTS, 930 Turbo, and F12 down to two cars for practical reasons. Both hosts pine for a lifestyle that includes road tripping a 930–with some maintenance caveats. (81:09)
• Used Car Dealers: Still sleazy? “Plenty of people who say, 'I just bought this thing a month ago'...and there's metal in the oil.” — Zack (87:46)
• Affordable Restomods: Are there good options near $200-300K? Possibly with Revology, but real engineering and labor is expensive; “You can’t get the quality you really want for 'only' $200,000.” — Matt (95:54)
• Economy Cars with Exotic Design Cues: Does cribbing from Lambos “cheapen” them? “When you see a Revuelto on the street...there's so much information.” — Zack (98:16)
• Watch Tech: Discussion of new “smart disc” fitness trackers for mechanical watches—Matt would use a Whoop/OURA on the other wrist instead. (108:57)

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• “If AI is only as good as the information that it is given...then is it not going to be inherently flawed?” — Zack on Flock camera system (09:57)
• “You really can’t go any faster down the road...You are getting a crazy amount of performance.” — Matt on Grand Sport (39:00)
• “In traffic, every six-figure sports car is so capable today, it just becomes about how on the edge you’re willing to drive and how far your morals go into fucking madness.” — Matt (40:03)
• “This car launches like a Lucid... Stuff flew out of [my nephew’s] pocket and stuck to the back wall.” — Matt on Temerario acceleration (54:17)
• “You gotta meet that person at a watch store that you trust and have them open the watch and tell you that shit is real.” — Matt (75:17)

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Timestamps to Key Segments

• 00:41 Correction to previous Flock incident story
• 03:46 Flock PR & AI reliance
• 20:25 C8 Grand Sport: intro, specs, driving impressions
• 31:42 Grand Sport vs. Z06 power delivery
• 47:19 Lamborghini Temerario: intro & design
• 54:17 Temerario acceleration & real-world performance
• 62:25 Temerario quirks, modes, and daily driving
• 73:10 Fake Hublot life lesson
• 78:10 Listener Q&A (styling, ownership reduction, dealer ethics, restomods, etc.)
• 108:56 Smartwatch trackers for mechanical watches

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Final Thoughts

A dense, enthusiast-bait episode with sharp takes on surveillance tech, two major new sports cars dissected with the hosts' signature irreverence and expertise, and plenty of motoring culture tangents. For fans of real-world car insight, Matt and Zack’s commentary is both skeptical (of tech overreach) and appreciative (of performance engineering done right), and their life lessons—whether about buying watches or buying sports cars—connect gearhead obsessions across hobbies.

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Transcript

[A]

What's up, everybody? Welcome to the Smoking Tire podcast. Today's episode is, as always, brought to you by off the Record. Boy, am I going to need off the record, My beautiful bride, the lovely Hannah has gotten herself in a bit of a pickle, and I'm gonna need off the Record on the case immediately. I will keep you guys updated to how it goes, but if you get pulled over for any kind of a moving violation, big or small, don't plead guilty. Get off the Record. Off the Record is a service that will connect you with a qualified attorney in almost any jurisdiction in the United States. They will fight that ticket on your behalf and get those points off your record. If you have points on your record, it could threaten your job, it could threaten your insurance. It could make all kinds of problems where you. You don't need them, my friends. So go to offtherecord.com TST that's offtherecord.com Tst and get 10% off all legal services booked through off the Record one more time. That's offtherecord.com TST I use them and you should, too. All right. On this episode of the podcast, big day for sports cars. I've got a review of the new C8 Corvette Grand Sport as well as the new Lamborghini Temerario. In depth reviews of both of those cars. Plus, I have an amazing story with a life lesson. And we're going to start with more Flock. It's the Smoking Tire podcast. Let's go, guys. The Smoking Tire is giving away a 992.1 Turbo S in partnership with Dream Giveaways. We are giving away a $275,000 car with some slick choice mod. The proceeds benefit charity and you don't have to buy any merch. It's a straightforward entry process. So hit the link in the show notes and get entered. To win today, we have to start the program. Quick correction. I'd like to issue a quick correction from a previous program. Got something wrong? I believe in accountability, believe in admitting and correcting when you get something wrong. And I am about to admit, incorrect that I got something wrong when we talked about the Flock thing with Joel. And by the way, there's a slight update to that which we can segue into right quick. I said that he was pulled at gunpoint and handcuffed. Neither of those are accurate. He was surrounded by cop cars. He was got out of the car and he was detained, but the guns were not drunk. And so my bad. Got the facts wrong. Apologize. Want to make sure that people have the right information. So can't go back and change the episode retroactively. But for those regular listeners, that's how it goes around here. My bad. But Flock did have a follow up. You know, Joel ended up getting folks from Flock on the line, a couple different ones actually. And I read his follow up piece and you should too, on the drive. I think they're doing a thing over there. I think they keep changing the title of the same headline in order to make people think it's a news story, but it isn't, which is a thing that websites do. And I don't think Joel is doing that. It's not his problem.

[B]

They're using the same picture, they're using the same two different articles on the same site.

[A]

But they basically the representative from Flock pretty much said no, the system worked perfectly. It's that the cops inputted the data wrong. And also representatives were talking about how complicated it is, all these different license plate formats and all that. Nobody ever brought up that given the fact that there were so many different license plate formats, that there should be maybe extra training or maybe a higher level of scrutiny within Fleet to screen for potential accuracy against the police reports and whatever before nationwide alerts are sent out for plates. Sure. No sense of really self awareness there whatsoever. Shocking, I tell you, from a tech company.

[B]

Very, very surprising. Why not test while doing. I was trying to find the quotes from the PR and the CEO because they were different.

[A]

And by the way, another journalist was stopped driving a Range Rover. Driving a Range Rover. So the exact same thing that they said was gonna happen, happened. So it was actually really surprising in this article that the person who was talking, I forget if it was a police person or a Flock person, where the person is talking about the irregular license plate formats and what a challenge it is to read them. And it. And it's one thing for a regular person, you pick 100 people now walking down the street and start asking them about irregular license plate formats. And most of them are gonna have absolutely no idea or go, yeah, the dealer ones, they look a little different or whatever. But that's not their job to know. Of course that would be hard if you're a fucking cop. If you're a cop that is responsible for inputting license plates into a system that's in your job description.

[B]

Well, yeah, but I think so Flock's PR response. This is from. What was the guy's name? Josh Thomas. So he said, quote, the way the machine learning works, is it correctly read what it was Supposed to read. It was fed those characters 3, 4, DTM, and it spit out as a result with the characters 3, 4, DTM, it was asked, can you find this? And it did find that. It just didn't say, if there's more here, then don't do it. End quote. So they, you know, they didn't feed in the little letters in the middle or the characters in the middle. The system didn't think to ask about those. And then like, look, I'm not trying to like blindly defend police officers, but if they were handed a piece of paper in a meeting that says, look, for this car, the license plate is 3,4 DTM. And if flock didn't say this might be a dealer tag, and if they don't know it's a dealer tag, then no one has the information until they're literally looking at it. Now, the last line of defense would have been if they see this car in the flock camera in their area, and then the police pull up behind it and they go, wait, that says 3, 4, but there's some extra letters in the middle. Yeah, you know, now maybe they could have approached this investigation a little calmer instead of the four, four car swarm.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

But basically I'm saying if there's no photo evidence given to the officers, it was just text, which seems like it was also given to the flock camera, which is bad. Like there are numerous holes in the system where there need to be more places to input information.

[A]

Sure. Yes. And also more. It's the brain rot that comes with the rest of the use of AI. You just assume it's gonna work correctly and then go full hard at whatever it spits out. It's the same shit that happen when fucking dumb lawyers. You end up reading a legal brief that says claude said, you know what I mean? Or whatever the fuck in it. They're using AI because it's easy. It makes you not have to think. It does the hard work of decision making and thinking for you. And it's pitched as this sort of superhuman intelligence, when in reality it's a slick talking, kind of shitty search engine. Just like all the other fucking search engines are kind of shitty and full of the garbage inputs that are human garbage inputs, but it repackages them as this sort of super intelligence that is way too easy to outsource your entire fucking brain to. That sucks. I mean, if you're gonna put people in a potential life or death situation, which Joel was not in a life or death situation, but a cop suggested to him that if he was In a different city, he would have been in a life or death situation potentially, if you're gonna do. And we know that roadside stops are potentially life death situations, more so depending on what you might look like or how you might be presenting random luck that they picked a dude who looks like Joel driving a fucking Range Rover this time.

[B]

Yeah,

[A]

but like, dude, there's gotta be way more scrutiny, way more. And there's. I don't. I mean, I think the system appeared. Flock just sort of appeared. Well, I don't want to say that it wasn't like voted into, but it seems like these kind of like crazy surveillance apparatuses just are sort of appearing without being like discussed or voted on first.

[B]

Yeah. And then, I mean, this PR person continued. This is from the article, quote, a human entered this into the system and a human didn't put enough information into the system. The system made a read and the outcome was a problem. But the steps to get there were riddled with errors of human making mistakes, end quote. So that is a very clever way to blame humans.

[A]

Yeah, which.

[B]

Okay, fair. But what he's doing is not blaming the AI, not blaming the system, not blaming Flock. It's like, see, humans are the problem. Like, well, if, as we, as people have said for years now, if AI is only as good as the information that it is given, either given or scrubs, then it is not perfect. And then is it not superior to a human because it doesn't have eyeballs that are good enough to notice the difference in these plates? So then, therefore, if the system is always flawed by the human input, then is it not going to be inherently flawed?

[A]

It is. It is going to be majorly flawed. My trainer, who I love, has a little fucking chatbot on his phone and he runs a lot of his life through it. And the number of times I have heard this thing spit out straight garbage, it's like 50%, 50% of the time this dude tries to use his thing, it just spits out things that are not true and garbage. How often does this thing have to fuck up for you to decide that it's not a good idea?

[B]

Yeah, there's, there's ways to use the tool. And especially when you know this is a. Flock is a system that all it's supposed to do is have cameras that look at stuff and send information. You think it's not trying to write a screenplay? It's not also trying to compose music? Yeah. And if it can't, you know, take visual data from its cameras, look at a license plate which Is a very simple legible thing. You know, the ticket cameras use it like the in, you know.

[A]

Yes, they do.

[B]

You know what's a fast track? They use it. If these can't just look at that and go, oh, this has extra letters which could say FBI, they could say gov. They could say any of these other special plates that exist in this. And it can't do it. That's ridiculous.

[A]

As someone who's received a ticket in the city of Los Angeles With a dealer plate that is formatted just like this, Trust me, the camera can read it, right?

[B]

A good camera can read it.

[A]

A camera can read it. It doesn't need a human. Like, a camera can tell what that plate says. Like, the software should have been able to tell the difference between these plates.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And if not, a fucking human should have been able to look at the plate and go, guys, this format of license plate refers to up to 100 plates. Those numbers go from 01 to 99. You can get 100 plates that look just like this. Do you know how the plates go on different cars? That's the point of the plates. Like, do you realize the net you're casting of people to fucking pull over when you do that math out?

[B]

Yeah, it's crazy, you know, if we're gonna hand the responsibility to AI, so flock could say that the person who entered it, maybe their form has an area for these special characters and they didn't do it. This person entered was lazy and was like, I'm not sure you know what three, four means or whatever. I'll just enter this. The flock camera should have seen what kind of plate it was and then spit back like, wait, we need to get this extra information. It's very essential. It's so silly.

[A]

So, and then in the last paragraph that you can see on the screen here, they offload all responsibility for the outcome of this to the cops. Folks, we're taking a quick break from the action because delete me is supporting us today. Let me ask you a question over here. Have you ever considered I should really be doing something to protect myself from stalkers, scammers, hackers? But I really don't know where to begin or what to do. Here's what you do. Go to www.joindeleteme.com tire and enter code tire. Because you're going to get 20% off. Delete me. What is delete me? Well, they remove your personal information that's being sold online. In the age of a, we are especially vulnerable to scammers using your personal data. That's floating around on the Internet against you. You ever googled yourself and found something a little too personal? It's unsettling. But the good news is Delete Me can help. Delete Me was named the top pick for data removal services by Wirecutter. So it's never been more attractive or more affordable because our listeners can get 20% off at joindeleteme.com tire with Code Tire. Get an individual plan for a little over $8 a month and the discounts get even better. With a two year plan or when you enroll with a partner or family, DeleteMe does all the hard work to wipe your personal information off of data broker websites. It's very, very easy. I have used it myself and this is a crucial thing. It's not a one time deal. It's an ongoing process. They are looking out for you month after month, year after year, as long as you keep your subscription going. So take control of your data and keep your private life private. By signing up for Delete Me now at a special discount for our listeners. Get 20% off your delete me plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com Tire and use promo code Tire at checkout. That's the only way to get 20% off is to go to www.joindeleteme.com Tire. Enter code Tire at checkout one more time www.joindeleteme.com Tire code Tire. The quote says an alert from one of its cameras does not equal probable cause. It's like an alarm going off. Doesn't necessarily mean, doesn't mean that there's necessarily anything there. So they're trusting the cops to decide what to do when there's an alert on this, which is, I mean ultimately that's a piece of that probably partially right. But if that's. But they're also taking no responsibility for the idea that their system essentially, if you input a small amount of garbage, it effectively spreads mass disinformation to the police who are then put on a manhunt for this. Like that's the worst possible kind of disinformation. It's like mass swatting at random, but

[B]

it's sharing a headline without reading the article. I mean, the number of times you go to Reddit and it's like the responses are did anyone read the article? It is the opposite of what you think it is based on the headline.

[A]

That I don't need to go to Reddit because that's when I post that I've written something for road and track on instagram or something. And just the head. It's the headline of the article. People respond to the headline of the article without reading it. Very.

[B]

Ooh. So the police did respond. Police Chief Fadden said there are 8,000 different license plate formats across the country. A police officer can't be expected to be familiar with every single one.

[A]

See, so look, I agree. How about this? How about this? Fucking Chief Fadden, let's have them familiar with the top five or six formats that are used, okay. Outside of your normal six digit plate. How about that? You don't need to know all 8,000, but you see dealer, distributor and manufacturer plates all fucking over the place. Those are huge plate formats.

[B]

I think they might be huge in our world, but I don't know if they're huge. Dealer. Dealer, I bet is the most common.

[A]

The dealer format is just like this. You've seen dealer plates, you've seen manufacturer plates. They are the same. Just one says DLR on the bottom and one says mfr. But those aren't the mfr. Those are not part of it. It's the numbers. Dun, dun, vertical, vertical. They're the same. It's like that is like the second most common license plate format other than like regular for real. That's. That's commonly, commonly used. I don't buy that excuse. That I don't know. You can't know everyone. You could know the three or four biggest ones.

[B]

Again, I would have to Google what are the three or four biggest ones? Like, you know, because out here we've got. What are the Department of California, whatever. We're like. There's no registration on it because it's clearly a government vehicle. So it's like police, police cars have it like general. City workers have it. Like that's a format change. It's fewer numbers.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So I don't know. But what did they say?

[A]

They said something else, but I just don't buy that somebody who uses license plates in their work the way that cops use license plates. Think about how important license plate numbers are to a cop.

[B]

Yeah, they run your anytime, they're behind you.

[A]

That's such an important part of your job. License plates to cops. Imagine like, imagine you and I didn't know how to fucking put a GoPro into 4K. You know what I mean? Imagine we didn't know how to do some real basic ass shit that someone who does our job would have to do multiple times a day, every day. Come on, that's such a bullshit excuse. That's sad.

[B]

Well, I think they're Saying they don't need to know it offhand, which I would agree with. But they went on and said that if a police officer had entered 34 DTM without that extra number 10, they would have caused the same problem without flock. That's, I guess, probably true. But I imagine, and I would hope that a police officer would see that extra number because their eyes are better than the flock camera. Yeah. And they would go, oh, this is a crucial piece of information. And then it would come back with a specific car or something like that.

[A]

Yeah. But no, it's important. We have technology with no guardrails.

[B]

Right.

[A]

Very important. So that like 12 people can be so rich.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I'm so glad they're so rich though, you know? But think about how it inspires me to maybe one day be that reckless to be that rich.

[B]

Think about the future. Absence of traffic. Of traffic that won't happen because protests will be dissolved because they can track you everywhere you go.

[A]

Right.

[B]

So you won't be inconvenienced driving around on your way to buy things which

[A]

cost 25 times as much for no apparent reason. Right, Right. So anyway, that's that cars grand sport embargoes today.

[B]

You drove a couple of them.

[A]

I drove a couple. But the grand sport embargo is today. And I've been holding that in my pocket for a couple of weeks now because I went to Idaho to drive it Because I had a theory which I explore in my article for road and track, that you find good roads near dams. And so I went to explore a few dams in the 2027 Corvette Grand Sport. This has the new engine, 6.7 liters. It's got an extra 500 cc's. They don't like to say cc's because it's America.

[B]

Right.

[A]

It's a four. This is a 409 is what they want. That's what they want.

[B]

You talking about 409 cubes.

[A]

I shit you not. It says there's no replacement for displacement in the fucking marketing for this thing. It's a big beefy fucking V8. I'm pretty sure it is the largest displacement gasoline V8 on sale right now. I think.

[B]

I think 409 was a song. And I think it was about a Chevy engine that was in impalas, something like that.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

That's funny. Remember this song from 70 years ago? That's our marketing.

[A]

Well, I mean, this one was a very boomer color scheme with the white. With the blue interior and the black wheels and the red stripes. The interior Was extremely blue. Oh, wow. Extremely blue. But this photo illustrates really well why if you get a C8 Corvette, under no circumstances should you get a light colored dash. Because the windshield in this motherfucker is super reflecty. You can see even the blue is reflecting.

[B]

I can see the blue, and I can also see the source of your

[A]

HUD of the surround and everything. And if you get. We had one at one point. I forget which one it was, but it had a white interior and a white dashboard. And I was just truly shocked that nobody stopped them from selling this because the entire dashboard. It's like driving into a softbox. It was so fucking crazy.

[B]

This looks like Tommy Hilfiger specifically.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

It's like slightly too light on the blue, but white exterior. Very blue interior everywhere.

[A]

Wow. With a red stripe, everything blue. Blue floor, blue seats. Yeah. But. Okay, but the new interior, which is across all the C8s with a bunch of buttons for things like the climate control. And then the better widescreen touchscreen and doesn't have the wall of. The wall of chess wall. The wall of chassis. There's a guy who comes on no

[B]

turbos, no hand jobs.

[A]

There's a guy who comes on our road and track events. Ed Hazus has had a series of Corvettes and definitely wrote an angry letter to somebody about the impossibility of road head in this car and how that interfered in his life.

[B]

I feel like there's two people I can guess who would write that.

[A]

Oh, man. Okay. But so the story. The Grand Sport is a Z06 chassis. So it's a wide body chassis. It's got the better shocks. This one has the steel brakes, but it's the upgraded steel brakes that you would get with a Z06. You could also get ceramics if you want. But with this new engine, the 6.7, 535 horsepower. And that engine is now the base engine. So you can actually. It's crazy that you can get this engine. This engine's a fucking hot boy motor. And you can get it in the base car, which is wild. Also, if you show a rear view of the car, Zach, you can get a center exit exhaust. Now, it's optional, but it's like under 2,000 bucks. Wow. And I believe. And it's hard because I didn't have the same. I don't have the 6.7 with the dual and then with the center. So I don't have a direct comparison. But compared to that E. Ray recently, I really think that the center exhaust has a more like sort of Even and exotic tone given the same engine. Whereas the dual exhaust sounds a little more like trucky. But I don't have exactly the same engine. It could be the up. You know, there's other things it could be. But I did like the center exit.

[B]

I think it looks good. Cool.

[A]

Yeah. I also am a big fan now of these cars as convertibles with the power top. I just think you put it up and down a lot more. You use it a lot more when it's a power top. And it also doesn't. Your trunk is a little smaller, but your trunk doesn't get taken out. You don't lose the trunk space when you put the top down because the top would go in the trunk if it was the target top.

[B]

Oh, right, right, right, right.

[A]

You know what I mean?

[B]

We drove the Z06 with. Had the. Which was convertible. Right. And I was like, I'm not a convertible person. But if I can do hardtop convertible with tiny compromise and then I can just use it at my whim. Like I'm a fan, especially with mid engine supercars all day.

[A]

And it's also super nice to drive with the side windows down and the rear window goes down in the convertible, whereas it doesn't in the coupe. You just have the window into the engine bay. So I think the convertible is holy blue. Right. I think the convertible is a good option across the range. The engine, you know, the engine is. Los Angeles. TST LIVE is coming to you and we are doing it huge because we're bringing along Richard Porter and Johnny Smith. Smith and Sniff is joining TST for a live collab podcast at The Irvine Improv. August 18, 8pm It's a big room, so a bunch of you guys can come. Parking's free and tickets start at just 4, 40 bucks. You guys come on down. It's gonna be an Amazing Hang. TST with Smith and Sniff live in Irvine, August 18th. Tickets at the link in bio. While they last, folks, one more quick break for Avance. Love these guys. They've been supporting us for years now. Avance is a great company made of great people. We know them individually. It's not done through an agency. These are our homies. Avance helps enthusiasts save money and enjoy their passion more. It's actually very straightforward and the math does work because Avant's members get sweet discounts and a nice quarterly print magazine. I would pay for just the magazine itself. We've known Adam from Avance a long time and he put me on the COVID I think of one of their first Issues. And I've really enjoyed getting their magazine for a while. But also here, get this math. They help you save money on things that you're going to buy anyway, like tires. Right? An Avants member gets a 10% off discount at Discount Tire, plus an additional 10% if you buy Michelin or BFGoodrich. So if you were going to spend $1,500 on a set of pilot sports, you're going to save $300 just because you're an Avance member. And it's only $99 a year to join. So you're plus $200 if you get just the tires right at 1,500 bucks, which easily sports car tires could be more than that. And Avants will send you a $70 gift card to Griot's Garage when you sign up so you get the detailing. That way the membership literally pays for itself, plus the magazine, plus all kinds of cool regional events that Avance does around the country for their members. I've been to a bunch of them. Their Monterey Car Week party is a great time. So you can go to avants.com, a v a n-t s.com t s t and then use code TST for 10% off. That's another 10% off your membership. This thing is basically free. In fact, it could potentially be mucho money saving for you. Avance.comtst. use code TST for 10% off. Thank you to Avance for sponsoring the pod. The engine is great. It's what you're expecting, it's what you're thinking. It's more power and torque than before. It sounds angrier. It's a, a really, really good sounding package. And I drove this car right after I drove the new Ferrari 849 Testarossa Spider. And it really made me realize how much you're getting by buying a fast Corvette. The speed I was driving in these roads in Idaho, the speed I was driving on those roads in Tenerife for in two different mid engine cars, one of which has double the horsepower of the other one. And all this hybrid shit and all this extra crazy stuff. Same speed you're going the same speed down the road. And also the aluminum structure of the C8 Corvette and the aluminum structure, I think the C8 was a little more rigid than the Ferrari 849. Honestly, just by seat of pants jiggle or lack thereof, the magnetic ride in this car is fabulous. Huge amount of variable from soft to stiff. It had radar cruise control that works really nicely. I can't love the steering wheel. My kingdom. That dude who's the GM engineer who races that car, put the Cadillac black wing steering wheel in his. That's the game changer, is to have a round steering wheel. But outside of that, I think the Grand Sport's a great looking car. It's really, really fast. So it's really funny about this car. Listen to this. I have this written down. Hang on. So it's 535 horsepower, 520 torque. Okay, now the Z06 with the five and a half liter flat plane crank. 670 horsepower, 460 torque. So the Grand Sport makes 60 more torque than the Z06. And it does it at 3,000 RPM lower than the peak torque of the Z06. Right. But the peak horsepower five hundred and thirty five of the Grand Sport is 6,100 RPM. And the red line is 6,200 RPM. And the red line is six thousand five hundred revolutions per minute. So peak torque 6,200 RPM. Excuse me. Peak horsepower 6,200. Rim, the Z06. Peak torque 6,300 RPM. Wow. So as soon as the grand sports big block fucking motor gives up, that's when the Z06 just gets going. There's no overlap in power band.

[B]

That's amazing.

[A]

Isn't that crazy?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

The peak torque and peak horsepower of these two cars don't overlap.

[B]

That's pretty crazy.

[A]

That's a nutty thing to think about, isn't it?

[B]

The Z06 redline is 8,600 rpm. So you've got, you know, you've got 2,300 rpm of revs.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Which is fun. And I mean, that is a trick in itself and an enjoyable thing, I mean, because the, the big block engines are amazing, but the red line is kind of low.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But this huge torque spread. I would be very interested to see how they do in a little quarter mile race between the two of them.

[A]

Well, somebody just ran a. Someone just ran Aquarium Sport. It might have been savage geese, I think did a Grand sport in the quarter mile. It was like, like middle elevens, I think. It was not slow. But a Z06 is tens.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Yeah. A Z06 in the quarter mile is quicker.

[B]

It's amazing.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I mean, no horsepower is important, but like this has way more torque and it starts making everything earlier. Thought it might get going.

[A]

I mean, I don't know. Z6 maybe has better tires. Also this one there's a ton of. Because I was talking to Alex at GM to get pricing and stuff like that. The one I drove, which is a convertible, super interior, super carbon, super wing. I mean, this is almost as loaded as you could get one of these. You'd have to do some crazy paint to sample, factory tour, fucking check the stupid boxes to get one of these more expensive. And this is 144,000. It's almost maxed out. It's a convertible. I mean, it's got everything. So you really would have to work to make one of these more expensive. The price Delta is 30k between this and a identically spec'd Z06. So you can load one of these up and be 10 or $15,000 higher than the entry point of a Z06. Right. But if you load up a Z06, you can end up 20 or 30,000 higher than one of these. So there's like plenty of room in the middle for you to make a choice of. Like, if your budget is around 110, 120,000 bucks, you're legitimately making a choice of which engine do I want? Because I've got the same chassis, the same, effectively everything else, and even the same rear bumper, the same look, you know, I don't have I present as, you know. So you've got quite a lot of choices in the middle. And so it's sort of like 911s where the temptation is GT3 because, because, because, because. But in the real world, a turbocharged 911 will actually be a quicker car. And my suspicion is, in the real world, up on the mountain, for most people that are not comfortable zinging their car to redline constantly, the grand sport is going to feel like a much quicker car than the Z06 most of the time.

[B]

I think that's true. Yeah. And you also can play the game when you're pricing it of, you know, do you want the higher end model stripped out or do you want more features on the cheaper model? That's an important game to play too.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. I mean, but if it's me and my money, I think they've done such a good job with the Z06 engine. I'd want that. That makes the Corvette really feel like an exotic car.

[B]

Yeah. It separates it acoustically from Camaro, previous Corvettes, all basically trucks. Yeah. It just sounds special because it is, it's rare.

[A]

This does a great job. If you did, if you did want a Corvette that sounded like Murica, which is like cool. If you wanted the muscle Car thing. This with the center exhaust sounds more exotic than most Corvettes. It gets you this new engine with this exhaust. It does get you halfway there. Maybe it sounds a little more refined, a little more. Maybe a little more like not an AMG but like a 6.2AMG. A little more like that. Which is cool.

[B]

They can play so much with the exhaust pulsing with these muffler designs and stuff.

[A]

The valves do a lot of different stuff. It makes a whole bunch of different sounds at different throttle loads and different RPM and stuff like that. They've done a great job with the gearbox. It's really beautifully responsive and it does exactly what it's told. If you're like. Especially because I drove this right after the Ferrari. This is such a user friendly car. The phone just boom. Carplay right there. Like everything, Everything to drive it is in like the most obvious place possible. Like everything about it is just the most obvious way that it would happen. Let me think. Was there anything like not great about it? I wish there was a little more lumbar support. The Corvette isn't really the greatest car for tall people anymore. It used to be a really good car. I wish the seat was a little lower than it is. It's not quite as low as I wanted. And it has just a hint less room than I want. Wrong car. But it is a very nice. I mean for the amount of money they're charging for these at any price, any model line, whatever they're charging is, you're getting a fucking crazy amount of performance.

[B]

You are.

[A]

This car is so fast. The front end is really good.

[B]

Very talkative. I mean I drove at Spring mountain. It was Z51 package, but like, you know, normal engine. And I came out of that going, this is such a great track car, performance car. Also really comfortable on the highway with the mag ride and everything. Like absolutely fantastic performance value.

[A]

Yeah. And in the corners it had a ton of grip. It, it really. If you used race one traction control, you could just get just a tiny bit, a little bit of wheel spin coming out of some corners. If you found yourself wanting to have a little fun. When the camber in the road changed, it responded to that really nicely. This spec, I think it rides just a hint softer than the Z06, which came kind of in handy for road trips. The design of the rear wing with this particular. I didn't even have to use the digital rear view mirror. I used the regular rear view mirror, the glass mirror. And I could see out the back, which I thought was nice. Just a very User friendly car in general. And then you click all the stuff over to the right and you're ripping. I mean, this is a very fast car that it still has a. A beautiful wide torque band, but a naturally aspirated engine profile, especially coming down. And I don't want to crap on Ferrari more than I have to because the A4.9 is an amazing thing to drive. But it just makes you wonder how necessary any of that stuff is for a road car. I mean, this is a regular. It's a naturally aspirated V8. Not that it's a low tech engine, but it's regular engine and rear drive and it's got so much power already that it just. You really can't go any faster down the road.

[B]

Yeah, I mean, Ferrari stuff has never been necessary, I guess. You know, there's always been stuff that's almost as quick. And the only time you'll notice these hypercars is like from corner to corner. If you floored it, that's when all the systems would wake and you'd get to the next corner 0.05 faster than you would in the Corvette.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But if you're just, you know, most of us, like there's a cadence to canyon driving. There's an RPM you tend to stay in with. There's only a certain amount of room between corners. And I think torquey stuff is more beneficial for that. And that's the cadence you get is really up to tire grip. So. Yeah.

[A]

And like sanity.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, of course. Like.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. Every six figure sports car is so capable today that it just becomes about how on the edge you're willing to drive and how far your morals are into fucking madness when it comes to this kind of stuff. And hopefully they're not too far because that's where shit gets sketchy. We don't want people dying out there. But it's just such a huge amount of performance for what is. Yes, it's over $100,000, but although it starts under $100,000, it starts at that. A coupe, a grand sport coupe is like high 80s. So you can get into one of these for what I think is reasonable money, given what you're getting.

[B]

Was the ride different than Z51s you've driven? Because I think previous grand sports, amazing handling and everything, but they were always like a tiny bit stiffer because that was part of the objective.

[A]

It's been a long time since I drove a base Corvette. Like a really long time. That rental car you had that I drove for five minutes, It Was the

[B]

last one of them four years ago.

[A]

Yeah, it was a long time. And since then it's been Z06s and ZR1s and stuff. So I couldn't. If I even attempted, I'd be lying or making it up.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

I don't know. What I can tell you is over. I landed in Spokane after, you know, two hour flight, no big deal. Hopped in it immediately drove four hours to the starting point of my event. And it was a lovely drive, comfortable, stereo was good. Just cruising. And then did 325 miles of pure canyons as much as I could. And it was a great day. Put the top down and kept it there pretty much all day. Just a beautiful thing. And then I went out the next morning early at sunrise and ripped the roads again before anybody was out. And when you really start to put. These cars are great when the road's not perfect. Imperfect tarmac. A Corvette is a really good tool to have. You set the springs in soft, set the dampers in soft and you can just take a really, really, really good pace over bumpy roads really nicely. Car's pretty wide. It is what it is. So you're not great in these really narrow roads like you might be in a Boxster or a smaller sp. But compared to the even wider stuff like the Lambo or the. Well, the Ferrari had very wide mirrors. It wasn't that wide of a car. But the mirrors did stick out quite a way. So that. And also in Tenerife the roads are really small, but it's just a well rounded thing. Really nice thing continues to be. Yeah. And I think it's neat that there's a lot of, you know, there used to. It was for C7. It was in C6. Really. It became sort of the sweet spot. Right. Particularly C7 because the Z06s were overheating and the ZR1s were psychotic. And it was almost like the Miata of Corvettes. It was like beautiful handling and balance of power here because the chassis is capable of double the horsepower and then some. The sweet spot quote is actually that area where it overlaps with the Z06. Like that meat of it. And where it's like, here's a great chassis. Choose your engine power profile. Both are well within the limits of what the chassis could do. No problem. So like it's a double sweet spot now. Which is cool.

[B]

Yeah, very cool.

[A]

Yeah. So. And all the, you know, all the options you can get on a Z06. Really carbon wheels and whatever you can get on a Grand sport too. So you could sort of Burger King, have it your way kind of thing. You know what I mean? So there will be a story written in road and track print that's coming out next month. I think the story came out very nice.

[B]

Good.

[A]

You want to. Should we do Temerario as well? You wanna go right into. Right into that or do you want. You wanna something else?

[B]

Whatever you want. You sent me two sets of pictures, so that's why.

[A]

Yeah, I know.

[B]

But if you have other stuff, we can.

[A]

No. All right, all right. I have something very funny. But let's do Temerario first.

[B]

Let' so just quickly plug our live show Aug. 18 at the Irvine Improv with Richard Porter and Johnny Smith of Smith Podcast. We made it at 8pm so you can fight through traffic. There'll be less traffic to get to it. And tickets start at 40 bucks.

[A]

Yeah. The downside of coming to Irvine is you have to go to Irvine. The upside is almost everything else.

[B]

Free parking.

[A]

Yeah, free parking.

[B]

Go there, have dinner, nearby restaurants all over the place and then come to our show.

[A]

And also our blazers that we collabed with the Grotto I'm wearing right now. I love my fucking blazer. Watch this. I'm going to take my hood out in real time without taking the jacket off, convert it to formal wear. Not formal wear, kind of semi formal wear. I really love these things. We're really proud of them. The materials, the construction are absolutely first rate. It's the kind of thing that you would honestly spend twice the price on. It's like a garment for life. It's not fast, fashiony bullshit. It's not a throwaway thing. And Zach and I are very proud of it. And Nick from the Grotto is really, really good at making suits. This guy's been making suits for me for seven years now. And he really impressed Roger Farah, who my dad, who ran Ralph Lauren for 15 years with the quality and construction of his suits. And we've been working with him ever since. He's not let us down. And look at that. 60 seconds. Hood goes out. And now I've got an evening wear.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

Right.

[B]

This is good. You had a wardrobe change before Lamborghini, right?

[A]

Now, now I went from Corvette guy to Lamborghini. Right. You could do both with. With my blazer. So we're selling these until August 6th. The link is in our Instagram bio. Get one. And also August 20th is when our Porsche giveaway ends. The the 911 Turbo S modded by us Friday, I guess by the time this podcast goes up, we'll have up with the 911, where I demonstrate some of its capabilities. And that that is ending August 20th. It's just a fucking amazing car, and it comes with a whole bunch of money to offset some of those taxes that you're going to get if you win it. But it's a $275,000 car that's been modded by us. And also, we farted in it a couple times. Yeah, that's true value. We did not sign the dashboard or do anything that, like, loser. Ish. We should have signed under the hood. That may be what it is.

[B]

If the winner wants us to do that.

[A]

The winner wants us to do that. We'll fly to Florida to sign under the hood because that's where the car is right now at the Dream Giveaways headquarters. We didn't get to keep it. They didn't trust us for a full year. They were like, you put how many miles on it? We were like, not that many. And they're like, we'll take it back now. Thank you. Shall we talk Lamborghini?

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Temerario.

[B]

What a good color.

[A]

Looks great in this Matte. I think it's Mauritius matte. Blue is the color.

[B]

Really awesome.

[A]

This is the replacement for the Huracan. I drove it last year at Performance Car of the Year. And dude, comparison tests with a racetrack and a whole bunch of cars. Super important having one at home for five or six days to actually just use as a car. Also super important because I learned a whole lot more. This car is a fucking ripper. You know, I was talking about just a minute ago about the Grand Sport Corvette and how it goes as fast as one can go on the street. That is basically true. However, in the middle of the night, should you find somewhere safe enough and remote enough? Well, not necessarily the middle of the night, but should you find somewhere absolutely

[B]

safe enough you're not up in the middle of the night?

[A]

I wasn't once or twice. But should you find yourself somewhere safe enough. The Temerario is 907 horsepower and it revs to 10,000 rpms. This car is a fucking ballistic missile. It is so fast. I can't believe, even though it's a Lamborghini and no one is expecting a Lamborghini to not be very fast, it's like 50% more powerful than the car it's replacing, right? 40%. It's like 40% even more powerful than even the most powerful variant of the Hurricane. This car is so fucking fast. You like, imagine a McLaren 750, right, with full traction from zero.

[B]

Jeez. Yeah. So it's pulling less power.

[A]

Like, that's what I'm talking about. Like, McLaren 750s are great because for me, because they're psychotic. And, like, you can cruise around and they're very comfortable, but then you can ride a bull, right? Then you can. It's. Can you fucking tame this motherfucker? It'll do what you tell it. But also, you can spin the tires up to 100 miles an hour. So you best know what you're doing, because it will. This is that. But no wheel spin. Just forward and good. Wow. There's a lot of rpms in between. I'm going very fast now. And 10, like the point at which you are riding an Acme rocket is about six. And in fourth or fifth gear, six to 10 is like four or five seconds. And they are a long four or five seconds. And wherever the fuck you were, you ain't there anymore. You're way down there now. Now the world gets very small very quickly in this car. It's like the Gunther Turbo. It pulls over 100. It's like. Because even when we did performance car of the year, what do you call it? Thunderhill West, I don't even think you're getting to the top of fourth gear. In the Temerario, I saw the top of fifth and like, my God, it's real fast. Wait until you see the speed at which people crash these things. When someone has a crash in one of these, it's gonna be at like 160 miles an hour. They're gonna have enormous crashes in these cars. They are so fast. Okay, so that's that. You're gonna have to trust me on this. Like, I used to tell people that it was guaranteed that any McLaren you put somebody in would be the fastest car they've ever been in. This might actually beat some of them.

[B]

Sorry, I'm looking up, like, peak torque, peak power, all that stuff, but it's up there.

[A]

So you've got a tri motor hybrid. You've got a V8 flat plane, V8 that revs to 10,000 rpm. That's all very cool shit, right? And I don't think the V10 was a sacred cow. V10 was what Lamborghini was doing for the last 20 years. But before that, they did both V12s and V8s. What did you just make a face for?

[B]

The engine's peak torque of 538 pound feet. Happens from 4 to 7,000 RPM. Yeah, that's pretty. That's meaty. And then peak power, you know, I want to look that handoff.

[A]

Peak power is probably like nine, right?

[B]

So you have this crazy punch at four grand, and then as you hit, you know, probably six or seven, now you're getting that handoff heading towards peak power. So I think what's shocking if people haven't driven these, if you've ever driven anything with like 400 horsepower, the feeling you get in second and third gear of acceleration, where you go, whoa, this is a fast car. Imagine that happening in fourth and fifth gear. And therefore, you understand that the speed you're beginning at in fourth gear is probably quite high. And it accelerates the way you accelerate in second.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And that's when it's wild.

[A]

So he. My nephew Cole was in town, and I took him out in this thing last night. He wants to be a car photographer. Let's plug his Instagram. His Instagram is okay. His car Instagram is Moneyshot with three T's at the end of it. I don't. He just told me it this morning, so I probably don't follow it yet. I didn't even know until this morning. M O N E Y S H O T T T that ain't right. I don't think that's right.

[B]

Let's start here. Okay. M O N E Y S H

[A]

O T T T yeah, that's him all right. That's my cousin. He's 17, he's a minor. Be fucking nice, people. But if you want to see him take pictures of cars, give him a follow for your boy here. But I took him out to do a shoot with the Lambo last night. He had a good time, so I rip it on the highway like fourth gear. And he was like, that was crazy. But also, how are you in one gear for so long? And that's how I got to the conversation we just had. But then I was like, you don't understand fourth gear. This edge goes to Ted, and we went over behind the airport by our old house, and I was like, this car launches like a lucid. Like, it's that. It's a gas car that launches and goes like an electric car. And when I tell you things fucking flew out of his pocket and stuck to the back wall of the car. Like, this motherfucker launches like real. We haven't tried a ZR1X yet, but it launches like no gasoline car. I've been cool. It's really something special. I'd love to line one up in a drag race with a new Turbo S hybrid, this and a ZR1X. But this thing is. This is a fucking missile, this car.

[B]

You should get those cars. Let's borrow Willow Springs.

[A]

And then dynamically, the steering is very light. You have very little feeling through the steering, but you can feel the road and what's happening with weight transfer through your ass. And the ride is beautiful. It's got fucking high voltage shock controllers like the 911 Turbo S Hybrid does. So it's not hydraulic, It's a traditional thing. But it has much more computing power and processing power to make those adjustments. So the ride is fabulous. And then because it doesn't have a front prop shaft, it doesn't have a front mechanical differential, it's ev. You have a cabin that is extremely comfortable. Dude, the amount of space in this car, I can't believe it. Tall people, your mid engine car is here. If you're fucking six' six, this is your car.

[B]

And that was true with the R8V10. I mean, they had a pretty good packaging, but the new Temerario has more

[A]

room inside than the old R8. That's the amount of improvement that we've got. Check out the cup holder from my box store. Lamborghini has resurrected the Boxster cup holder.

[B]

Oh, with a little arrow in you.

[A]

Yeah, I love that.

[B]

I love this cup holder. It just pops out of a very small orifice, like right in the dash. It's just super compact, but I remember being very, very effective. And you can adjust it for like Red Bull cans, regular soda cans. One of the smartest dimensions.

[A]

Porsche got rid of it, Lamborghini brought it back. Yep, yep, Good. So. And then also, you know, your rear tires are mostly uncovered. I would have, you know, when we drove for Peacoti and we smashed all the windshields from cars driving behind it, I was like, they gotta put mud flaps or something on this. They're not just gonna sell that like that. But they are. And it looks crazy, huh? It looks much better in this more dark color. Because there's a lot of bits on this car that are either dry carbon or just black. And when the car's a bright color, it really becomes two tone. And the other color is just black. And so with this dark blue, I think the black, even though blue and black are typically clashy colors in fashion in this car, I actually think because it's a specific blue, it's muted in a specific way. The black is a certain type of black that's almost more Gray than it is black. I think it actually really works beautifully in this color combination.

[B]

Yeah, this looks awesome.

[A]

All right, so can I tell you some bad things? There's a few bad things.

[B]

Can I just tell you real quick about the California laws for mud flaps?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Standard passenger cars and pickup trucks are typically exempt, provided the vehicle body or standard factory fenders adequately cover the tire tread and minimize road spray, which these do not. I wonder if the dealership gives you some little flaps that. Like this tab right here that seems like that's a place you could put something. Unless it's a parking sensor.

[A]

I think it's a parking sensor, so

[B]

I don't know if they give you a little.

[A]

It would be funny if they just come in the trunk.

[B]

Yeah. And they go. If you get pulled over, put these on.

[A]

Yeah, that's funny. Okay, so some bad things about this car. Okay. One, the engine at low rpm, doesn't sound very good. It sounds pretty agricultural to the. Maybe even, like, not quite diesel y, but just. Just not just very meh until you're up in the RPMs.

[B]

When you. When you're in the cabin or behind the car.

[A]

I've never really been behind the car, but certainly in the cabin, you're probably

[B]

hearing a lot of the direct injection and shit.

[A]

Yeah. You hear mechanical stuff. You don't hear a lot of exhaust. And it's not a great sound. The V10 was a very sonorous engine. And this at low RPM is not at higher RPM, it does sound a little more like a McLaren at low RPM, a McLaren sounds much more interesting and throaty than this sound. This is like a McLaren that's just, like, had all the exhaust sound taken out of it. Okay. So it doesn't sound that great. Also, there's no individual drive mode where you can just set your preferred chassis gearbox settings in one place. And the settings that there are are never quite right. Like at performance car of the year. The first time I ever drove this car was on a truck track. So it was like, get in it Corsa mode. And at that activity in corsa mode, it was fine. No notes. Better than fine. It was awesome. It was awesome. Traction control off doing slides, also awesome. Great. Then I drove it in a sporting manner where I just put it into sport mode and shifted manually. And I found it to be pretty delightful. I put it in sport mode and strada mode, Found it to be delightful. But I was doing canyon driving, pure canyon driving. Now I was using it as a car. Last four days, I've used it as My car, I did a bunch of highway miles, I hit the canyons, I got stuck in a bunch of traffic, I ran errands with it. It was my everything car for this week. I drove it almost 400 miles in three days, believe it or not. So driving it just around like, there's the EV mode. Now, in EV mode, you can go about four miles. I could commute from my house to here and back in full electric. And in fact, the one time I did that, it was better than starting the engine cold and just turning it right away off. So there's that. But EV mode is front wheel drive and EV mode is not much power. And so to drive a car that looks like this and feels like this in EV mode, with the acceleration of the pow with dog shit acceleration is just so silly. And because it's not that loud, there's no. It's like, you know the Corvette E. Ray, I understand. Because you start that fucking LS6,

[B]

you

[A]

know what I mean? Like, that shit wastes the neighborhood. My neighbor Seema Dave, shout out to Sema Dave and his C8Z. I'm three houses up from him. I know when he leaves, I know when he comes home, shout out to him. But this leave the neighborhood quietly is for them. This car is too quiet to have a leave the neighborhood quietly. The EV mode is dumb, but every time you start the car, it's in EV mode. In fact, the next mode, which is Street Strada, is full hybrid with a fairly aggressive start stop program that cannot be defeated. Okay, But Strada also has the smooth gearbox program, so it will shift beautifully smoothly. And in fact, most of the time you really do want to be the mode I really wanted. That doesn't exist is Strada. But where the engine just stays on, it doesn't exist. You are stuck with Stra. If you want the smooth gear changes, you're stuck with an engine that'll shut off off as soon as you come to a stop.

[B]

And you can't go into the thing like in BMWs and whatnot.

[A]

The way to get out of that is to go into sport mode. In sport mode, the engine will stay on all the time, okay? And then you can manually put the shocks into soft. So you can have the sport problem mostly solved, right? Except Sport has Lamborghini's most aggressive clutch kick program. So every shift, automatic or manual, is wow.

[B]

Despite having comfortable shocks.

[A]

In fact, if you then go to Corsa, it smooths it out again, but it turns off your esc. It makes the throttle mapping the most Aggressive. And then you have to go back, and you can only dial the shocks back to sport instead of the soft. So you actually cannot get to the mode I want, which is smooth shifts, you know, ga engine on soft shocks. And I found myself fiddling with the modes all the time and never really being satisfied. So in the canyons, most of the time, I actually found myself using Strada. Because the engine stays on as long as you're moving. It only turns off when you come off. It's not like a Prius. If you're moving, it's pretty much on, but. But when you're stopped, it cuts off. When you go to move again, it's EV until the middle of second gear. So the engine's been on, you've been driving, you have a certain response, blah, blah, blah. Now, pulling away from the light, it's, You know, like they do pulling out of the pits in le Mans.

[B]

Right, right, right.

[A]

But if you try to pull out of the light quickly with a bunch of gas when it fires the engine, otherwise you use normal gas, and it's like. And then you have wait till the middle of second gear. So there isn't. And so now it's like you got to put it into sport just so the engine doesn't die at the light so you can pull away normally, kick, kick, all right, back to street. And so I'm flipping the fucking thing just constantly. And so I have a theory, and I may write about this from my. I Talked to Mitch McKee at M Engineering, of course, hypothetically speaking, I said, given that every one of these new cars has these regulations that force it into these dumb modes, but they're so fucking insanely fast that only a true lunatic would want more power than. This is the future of your job, like, ungovernmenting this fucking thing so that it just stays in the mode that the engine engineers probably intended for it to be in in the first place. And just drives like a normal fucking car. Yeah, because, like, when it drives like a quote hybrid, it sucks with engine on, engine off, engine like, it sucks. But when it drives just with the engine being on and the motors assisting and filling in the gaps. That exists with a 10,000 rpm motor helping to fill in that torque, helping to improve the handling, then it's like, dude, this is the absolute titties, this car. It's amazing. But you just, like, I just could never get it into the right mode for the right thing unless the thing was going really, really fast.

[B]

It's kind of surprising they don't do that these days because even like you get a charger, I mean there's so many cars that offer you the control of what do you want your powertrain to be at your transmission and your suspension. And obviously this has all that control anyway. But they just, it gives you like

[A]

a hint of it. Like. So for instance, there's like City, which is ev, Strada, Sport, Corsa and then full off. Right. That's on one side. And then also you can. It offers you hybrid recharge or performance. Right. Hybrid is the default recharge is if you deplete the battery, you click to recharge. It fires the engine, it refi. But performance is only available if you're in sport or Corsa. It's not available from Strada. So they're just. It's missing that mode. That's drive normal but keep the engine on, please.

[B]

So they'll do OTA update or something.

[A]

Yeah, it would be like, given that like both Porsche and Audi and I think even Volkswagen and certainly Bentley, every other VAG product offers an individual drive mode setting. Right. In their performance cars. All the other ones do. This one doesn't. That's weird. And I spent a long time looking for it. That's weird. But like, dude, when you're going, this car is a fucking screamer. It's crazy how fast. Yeah. 907 horsepower. It's crazy. The grapes. The grapes. The brakes are a little grabby going into hairpins. The brakes are designed to haul you down from 160. When you step on a hard at 40, your glasses fly off and hit the windshield. They're a little grabby and they got a little squeaky when they got dusty. Also, my phone did not want to connect to Bluetooth properly, although it worked fine over CarPlay with the USB cable. And the press car guy said, oh yeah, we've been having issues with that. It's like a software hiccup. So. Okay. But in general, a very nice thing to use considering the extreme left level of performance you're talking about, which is truly, truly extreme. It is easy as pie to use as a fucking wild as a daily driver car.

[B]

Yeah. I mean, nothing. The only car that made this power, what, 20 years ago was like Veyron and that had, I guess that was also fairly easy to use. But outside of that it was going to be a custom built twin turbocharged 4 GT or some other kind of, you know, Frankenmonster until all the technology caught up with it.

[A]

Yeah, I mean, you know, just, you know, think of what it, it used to take to have a nine second car. That, that was not, it was like

[B]

Hennessy venom stuff, you know. And that was not something that was easy to drive around. I mean it was intuitive to operate because it was simple, but it was intense. Yeah, yeah.

[A]

No, this, you can, all the features, you can putter, you can easily putter. Yeah. But I really do wish that there was a mode that I could use most of the time that just was like normal car mode because that would make, that would take it from an 8.6 to a 9.6 if I had that. But I mean I think they've really figured out how to make a hybrid car go fucking insanely fast.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And this is entry level car in terms of the numbers and the layout. And it's very close to like a 918 actually. Like.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, that makes sense.

[A]

Yeah. Which is a, which is a wide. You know, 10 years ago that would have been deep into hypercar. So it's fucking crazy. Really, really crazy car. And this, you know, there's obviously going to be the Performante and the whatever the fuck they go with from here. My God. Imagine a stirrado of this. A stirrado of this would be just bananas, you know, I hope the hybrid system doesn't turn out to be a pain in the dick. I hope it, you know. You know. Yeah, exactly. We don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

[B]

But I hope it all works really well and that these, you know, become great value on the used market and eventually, you know, you know, entry level car for 200 grand is 900 horsepower.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But thanks to Lambo for letting me have a go. There is not a video because. Because today. Well, honestly there was going to be a video, but then my whole week got fucked up. I was going to film it on Tuesday. My whole week got fucked up because we got stranded in New York and that's why there's no video. And I had a whole lot more important things to do business wise this week. But I figured I would would give you guys a thorough talking to about it and that would be good. And I might write about this for Road and Track as well because it's all these cars, all these cars you're paying all this money for this amazing experience. And a well intentioned government is putting these limitations on how these cars have to operate for reasons that make such a small difference in the real world. I see an aftermarket opportunity for someone who can go look for whatever $2,000. I want this car to start in this mode and just be in this mode.

[B]

But it's still surprising that Lambo doesn't have the individual mode because so many other cars have that. So you can at least set it the way you want. Maybe you have to put it in that mode every time you start the car, or which is something someone like Mitch could program out. But it's interesting that there are cars that have too much adjustability. Hyundai, their N division. Sometimes it gets a little busy, or BMW's M. But when it's absent, we do miss it, especially as there's more systems interacting that can change how the car operates from a stoplight.

[A]

And what's so interesting is go back to the photo of the interior of the car. When you pull up, the gauge is there. So when you pull up, if you just zoom in a little bit on the middle screen, when you go to the different drive modes. See, it says vehicle there. When you go to the different drive modes, it switches between. From vehicle, it shows you sport, Corsa, whatever, right? And the car changes color and blah, blah, blah. And then there's a little menu thing with three lines, and you can click on the that, and it pulls up a whole list of attributes of that drive program. Chassis, gearbox, this, that, that, blah, blah, blah. One would think that you then click on it and it says, Gearbox 2, chassis 4, blah, blah, blah. And you think you could click on that and it would open up a menu that you could then change those things within there. But they don't.

[B]

No, it's just showing you.

[A]

It's just showing you that in race mode, it's there, and in drive mode, it's. But then you can't change them. They should be able to change them. So, yeah, so that's that. But, you know, Lamborghini continues to make cars with very extreme performance, but that are increasingly usable as everyday cars.

[B]

I think it looks cool, too.

[A]

Does this one looks better than the one we had at P. Cody? The one at P. Cody we had was like a bright green and with all the black on it, to me, it didn't look as good. And I was like, all right, I need to see some different colors. This one totally works. I'm in. Fully in. So let me tell you a funny story. Just the thing I saw. I went over to Marina Bay Watch Company, shout out to them Mike and the boys. Mike owns the store. His nephew started working there about two years ago. His name is Mike. Also Mike and Mike, okay, they hire a fucking new guy. I met him yesterday. What's your name? Mike. There's three, Mike's over there now. I go, all right, well this is gonna be easy. Tell my audience, come in here, you ask for Mike.

[B]

Mike Sr. Is just hiring his own legacy.

[A]

Yeah, he's just trying to make it easy. So Mike, Mike and Mike over there. And I go in there and I had just picked up a watch that they were servicing for me because I'm gonna sell it. I. I'm gonna do an Instagram watch dump stuff I haven't worn for six months, four or five pieces, along with a big lot of straps and stuff that I have just gotta clear out cause I'm not gonna use. And so you'll be able to buy some of my watches on Instagram and one with a fresh service from Marina Bay Watch company. But as I'm there bullshitting with Mike Hannah's there, two, a guy comes in and he has a hublot and he asks Mike to authenticate it for him. And Mike looks at it kind of side eyed and sort of glances his eyes at me and they take the back off it and there's a fucking Seiko man in the back. And he tells the guy like, look man, I'm sorry, but like, this is not genuine. And this guy's like, fuck, man, I just bought this thing. And he's like, well, you need to go back. And, and he bought it off of Facebook Marketplace. A guy on the street, he met the guy on the street, he goes, he pulled up at a Porsche. I go, well, what did you pay him for this watch? He goes, 5,500. I go, well, you scammed four or five people. That's how you get a Porsche fucking selling. So I just watched this guy learn that he lit my. I mean, and I saw this watch, bro, this guy, this guy was a fool. Even on the outside it looked sus, dude. And so just, I need to tell everybody out there, if you're gonna buy a watch in cash from a person, you gotta meet that person at a watch store that you trust and have them open the watch and tell you that that shit is real.

[B]

And if the seller won't do that, don't buy it from them and let someone else. Maybe you miss out on the deal of the century. Probably not.

[A]

There's no such thing as the deal of the century. The deal of the century is you're buying some fake because you tried to save a dollar. Yeah, like that's this. And this guy, this poor fucking bastard is like, do I file a police report? I go, you think you're gonna find that person? Now get the fuck out of here. Dude, that person's gone.

[B]

I mean, I don't think the police will do anything, right?

[A]

No, I'm not sure there's any legal

[B]

recourse to selling someone or something like that.

[A]

Dude, there's laws on that. If you're a dealer, if you're a human, buy or be rare. Yeah, you can sell someone. Bullshit on cars all the time. There's no resource for. But he told me it fucking didn't have a.

[B]

The only way you find that person is the next time they put up a watch for sale. You go, oh, man, I love this hublot. Yeah, I want to get this one too.

[A]

That's what Mike. That's what Mikey said. Mikey said, wait for this guy to list something else and pretend to buy it and fucking roll up on him.

[B]

Right? I was like, all right, not advocating crime or.

[A]

That's what's up.

[B]

Sorry.

[A]

Mikey's strapped, so he's doing that.

[B]

I mean, that's not how lawyers. So I'm just saying that's how you could find the person.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Now what you do to return that watch, that's between you and the proprietor.

[A]

Yeah, what you do then. But, yeah, so that was funny. Should we go to the people? Yeah, they got a lot to say this week. People, of course, represented by patreon.com the Smokingtirepodcast. It's where you get the live stream. It's where you ask us questions for the show. It's where you get extra show each month. It's where you get the show without ads at a certain tier. It's where you get access to exclusive early access. Excuse me. And sometimes totally exclusive access to collabs that we do with high grade manufactured products. By the way, remember I told you about the little size snafu on the thing? Four more weeks to get the correct size. So we're doing another collab with tactile turn pens. I've been carrying this smaller, slimmer pen for like a year. They sent it to me as a sample like a year ago. And I found it in a drawer and I was like, holy shit, I actually love this. It's brass. It's got a really nice patina on it. And we're going to do a smug and tire edition of it that we're going to be selling to you. Early access for patrons. I love this pen. I've been using it so much. It's great. Let's talk to the people. Edward Shifterhand says, I've noticed economy cars looking more sporty and aggressive and I don't like, like it. What do you think? Do sharp lines help or hurt economy cars? See the new Nissan Sentra as an example. I'm not surprised that making a car look aggressive and sporty is a marketing tactic. I think they've always done that. It's just that our definition of what aggressive and sporty is has sort of changed. But please see the 1992 Plymouth Laser. That's true. Or the Plymouth Acclaim Sport or whatever. Yeah. I mean, I don't think the new Sentra looks great. I don't love the Nissan Mouth that they're doing. They sort of joke the John Wayne Gacy clown mouth.

[B]

Yeah, very true. They saw what Lexus has been doing and they're like, we can expand on that. Literally.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

I also don't like the. I don't know, I don't like the black roof that terminates all the way at the trunk. But whatever. It's a Sentra.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. Not exactly. For me I don't love it. But you know, if they go too friendly the other way, it can be weird. Hyundai Soft Ionic 6. That's a little too guppy.

[B]

Yeah. Proportions are weird too.

[A]

Yeah. Although too friendly. Like the Honda, the little Honda E, the Jimny. Jimny's boxy but friendly, I think.

[B]

But I think it's like if it looks mid mod, you know.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Then it gets away with it because it looks so friendly. Or that new. What's it called, like the Tipolino or thing like that's so friendly that it looks like it reminds people of small dogs to extreme. If you go soft and round eqs, that looks weak, I guess. And I do think that's how our brains work. And a lot of cars have gone edgy. Like Toyota was doing it for a long time with the trucks and now that design language is trickling down to. To the most entry level Econo boxes there are.

[A]

There was. Germany had a period of handsomeness, I think the early 90s. In Germany kind of handsomeness ruled early to mid 90s. But yeah, when an economy car is too aggressive it can be weird. Unless it's like Integra Type R or something. Unless it's backed up by performance.

[B]

Yes, very true. Right, yeah.

[A]

Shout out to Cletus ultimate scr.

[B]

Right. Get the cheater car out there.

[A]

Right? Yeah, yeah. He's like, you know what's funny is like he's like, he really has mastered the redneck, you know, the rich Guy redneck one upmanship, you know what I mean? Like he's doing grimy shit, but he can afford the ser.

[B]

Well, yeah. Cause you can't swap in a good diff to a stock Altima.

[A]

He knows what's going to happen. He knows what the car. And he's buying the good one anyway.

[B]

That's a good point.

[A]

That's what I mean.

[B]

And he still got crashed out. I don't know how. Yeah, yeah.

[A]

Oh, the car didn't make it.

[B]

No.

[A]

First world problem Brit. My current fun cars are a Boxster GTS 40 PDK. A low mileage 1989. Oh, an 89 930. That's the, that's a G50 car. A 930 with a G50 is glorious. Especially if you have like a little bit like a hot fucking turbo. A little bit, a little bit of exhaust.

[B]

Modern tires.

[A]

Modern tires and an intercooler. And that motherfucker will shoot fire like this and it will be so fast. And a Ferrari F12. This person's considering early retirement. But if I do, I need to reduce my costs a bit. I love all these cars, but if I could continue condense the experience of these three cars into two cars, I'd save quite a bit in maintenance. I live in the UK and mostly use the cars for road trips in France, Spain and Italy. God damn. Are you awesome.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

This dude rules, man.

[B]

This is a tough fuck merry kill. It really is.

[A]

Here's the thing. Okay. Fuck. This is a really hard 1. Turn 3 into 2. Like there's no replacement for any of these cars. Yeah, I can't believe I'm saying this. I'd probably get rid of the Boxster and just keep the other two. An 89930 is really special. And it's not that it's. It's not cheap to run, but low mileage though, it's. I mean I would, I would just put miles on those, dude. I would put miles on the 930

[B]

and the F12 for me. The F12 obviously sounds amazing and it's a great long legged GT car. I mean that, that is just like a classic. I think they're gorgeous, they're fun, they're fast. Better looking than the 812 in my opinion. And you know, if you have to keep a Porsche, I guess keep the one where it kind of all began. Go with the 89 and then just live without the boxer. Even though it's like it's a nice car and it's a modern car. But the F12 gives you some. It gives you some flappy paddle.

[A]

Selling the Boxster would. You could pay for maintenance for the other two cars for like 20 years with. By selling the Boxster. Especially if like if that 930 doesn't need a top end rebuild or doesn't need one of those big ticket items really soon then you're probably like good man. It's tough because miles are gonna feel expensive on that 930. But if you're living, if you're, if you're fucking living, put miles on it. Couple weeks a year road trip around Spain on 9:30. God damn. Is that awesome.

[B]

Yeah. Unless the F12 is costing you money and causing too many problems. And then, then I would get rid of that and keep. Man, that's hard. Dude. I can't get rid of the F12. What am I saying?

[A]

Owning a 12 cylinder Ferrari is a very good thing. Yeah man, tough question. Adas in a Subaru and got an STI. I'm looking at a first gen M roadster versus a 2008 Vantage roadster with an auto LA area. I work remotely and this is a one car solution. Less than 10k miles a year consisting of of trips between Woodland Hills and Malibu. Local errands. Okay, so you're not going to be sitting in that much traffic is what you're saying. What are your thoughts? And is the sport shift transmission in the Vantage really that terrible? It's pretty terrible. Bless you. It's pretty terrible.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

It's not like worse than what other exotic car manufacturers were doing at that time. Time. Like it's the same as like the single clutch in a Ferrari or the single clutch in a Lambo which is like pretty shitty.

[B]

But if, I mean but are they going to get m roaster with a manual?

[A]

I'd rather they only come with a manual.

[B]

I'd rather have that. I've only driven one of them. I would rather have that because I just think the Vanish rose, the Roaster will sound amazing or Sorry, the. The Aston will and then it's gonna be like. And just. It just ruins so much of the. For a car to me that look, it looks agile, fast, exciting. It has. It looks like all the pieces and it sounds like all the pieces and then to drive it and have it just slowly shift this with this complicated system. I'd be over it so quick. Yeah, it's like buying an automatic Mustang of the time.

[A]

Honestly it's just not. It's so not your dream car at that point. Yeah, I just, I would if you really can't spend the extra money for the manual. I would look at a Jaguar F Type with a manual Instead, like a 2017 F type coupe. Manual is like a great one, is like a 35 or $40,000 car and that's way better than an 08 Vantage auto.

[B]

Yeah, and they look fantastic and they look dope.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. Murray, long lasting name ahoy from a ship off Catalina. What up, buddy? If you were to build a soft rotor, what would you start with? My great grandma isn't allowed to drive anymore, so her 2008 RAV4 and 99 RX300 are up for grabs in the family.

[B]

Well, the RAV4, you know, this is not the cool Papadakis RAV4.

[A]

No, it's the one after.

[B]

After it.

[A]

Yeah, the Blobbish. That one's not great. I mean there's nothing wrong with it, but it's not exciting. So a first gen RX300, which is a 99 at least does have some character. And that was from the period where Lexus really was still on it. Lexus quality really peaked in about.05 and went downhill from there. So if it was an 03 RX 300, that would be even better. But a 99 is pretty good and that's pretty indestructible. And I would definitely say take that RX300.

[B]

Definitely. I think they look pretty good.

[A]

I would want to start with the 03 RX 300 which my mom had and it was the best one that she had. Grind my gears said, do you think small used. Do you think used car salespeople in 2026 still deserve the reputation of being shady and untrustworthy? I believe used car dealers in the past fairly earned that reputation. But have they cleaned up their act as of. I don't think so at all.

[B]

If you follow mechanic advice on Reddit, there are plenty of people who say, I just bought this thing a month ago and there's metal in the oil. And they're like, I bought it from a used lot. So look, it's not a blanket statement like there's going to be good car dealers, there's going to be bad ones. And a lot of the bad ones now will roll people into loans they shouldn't. There's a lot of the predatory lending we've talked about. Yeah, there's bad people everywhere.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. It became, you know, I think it used to, to be easier to hide problems in a car's history before carfax and those type of services that Used to be harder to. So there's still scams. They're just like evolved scams now. It's these crazy upside down financing deals or they've got trackers in your fucking car and you miss a payment and they just repo the thing the next day or all kinds of stuff. I mean they just had to, they just had to make this new law, the consumer protection laws here in California with the cooling off period to prevent. Exactly. Dealers from scamming people.

[B]

Right. Customers have a certain number of days where they could return the car, Right?

[A]

Yes. Yeah. Uli Kunkel's Autobahn. Is there a road trip you did as a kid or a young person with your parents that really stands out in your memories? If so, what was it and what kind of car did you do it in? Do you have one?

[B]

Well, I've told this story before, so the quick version is my friend Jeremy and I, sophomore year of college, we're going to drive for Christmas break back to California. We're driving his what, second gen RX7 with like mods on it and stuff. He's the only other car guy in the whole. Well, two car guys in the fraternity. Why we did this in the winter, I don't know. We happened to choose a time where the roads were clear even though it was cold. We were ripping like setting record time as you know, 20 year old to do. Then we ran out of gas in Utah a quarter mile from an exit. We got flat towed by a very nice person who was like, man, you guys passed me a while ago. And he was just so stoked on it. He flat toed us the gas station and then we popped the engine just outside St. George, Utah. We abandoned the car, got on a bus. Bus driver was like, what's up with that car? We're like, it's ours, we promise. It blew up. It was not stolen. And then we had to fly home from Salt. Salt Lake and we got home three days later than planned. But yeah, that was quite a thing.

[A]

My parents, we weren't road trippy people per se. I was very fortunate in that when I was growing up. When I was born, my parents were early in their careers and my dad got quite successful as I got older. You know, we did get to do quite a bit of travel. I got to go places.

[B]

But typically what was the moon like?

[A]

Yeah, right. Yeah, I did get to do some fairly baller shit as a kid in terms of travel. I flew on the Concorde once. That was really cool. You know, we did get to go to like other countries which you don't appreciate when you're 10. The way I appreciate it now, if it was my kids I probably wouldn't waste those experiences on a fucking 10 year old. I would probably wait it. But whatever it was as soon as I got my driver's license and it was freedom, freedom to choose your own adventure all the time that the idea of road trips became much more important to me. It never seemed that important to my parents, although my dad would fondly remember going across Europe with his brothers and then driving across the. They went to Europe, bought a Volkswagen in Germany, road tripped it around Germany, flew home, shipped it home and then drove it across California.

[B]

And I think stuff like that was probably more exciting one when you're a teenager because it's freedom and you're out with your friends and you'll make mistakes and you'll have adventures and you'll sleep on. But also the cars weren't as reliable so there was probably like more opportunity for funny things and breakdowns. And nowadays it's like me and my friends drove 3,000 miles across the country. It's like. And the car was fine. Yeah.

[A]

Adas in a Subaru and got an STI says Polestar was forced out of the US for using Chinese tech. But Waymo can use Zeekr vehicles. How and why?

[B]

I don't know. Someone replied to them and said that the Zeekr is using Google tech and the Polestar stuff was using. Using Chinese tech.

[A]

Yeah, it's more about the software than the manufacturer of the metal and whatever. And there may also be something to do with the fact that it's something that's being owned by Google as a fleet versus being sold to the public. There could be an entire exemption for that. Who knows? Google bought Trump a fucking Big Mac and he signed a piece of paper that he had no idea what it said. And it turns out that they're allowed to have an entire fleet of China.

[B]

He signed their wrapper and it's like now we don't have to, you know.

[A]

Here's your gold brick, sir. You know, and here's this young woman to change your diaper and then fellate you.

[B]

It's a paperweight. It's not a gold bar, it's not a bribe.

[A]

PCAR photos is going to Road America for the IMSA six hour. Any must know tips for a first timer at Road America? Best photo spots, track tips or anything else. I shouldn't miss the sausage. You shouldn't miss the sausage.

[B]

Sausage sandwich is really good.

[A]

I mean it's not that hard to figure out where to go because you can essentially follow the track the whole way around. There's like trails. If you have a mountain bike or a dirt bike or a moto, a small pit bike, boy are you in business. Because it's a big place and you can ride all the way around, but there's a great path that runs all down the curvy back straight to Canada corner and you can get there by bicycle or by foot. By. You can park at one end with your car. Now I was there for wrl so with imsa they may have some areas that are blocked off, but because of the elevation there's like tons of great photo spots. Yeah. And then eat a sausage.

[B]

Definitely.

[A]

That's a thing.

[B]

They have a great merch store too. Like really huge variety of stuff. I was very excited.

[A]

They do have good merch there. Yeah, yeah. Panic stop at the disc brakes. That's fucking good. That goes two ways. I like, like it. Would you rather drive, Whoa, wait, a manual car where the pedals are completely reversed around the middle is the gas, the left is the brake and the right is the clutch? Or where the steering wheel is mounted to the roof and point downward above

[B]

your head like you're trying to escape a submarine?

[A]

I would much rather drive a car where the steering wheel was in a weird place than where the pedals were not confused conventional.

[B]

If I had to drive it all the time, I'd rather drive the car with the pedal because I can, I can memorize the pedals but this is gonna be unnatural and uncomfortable and the leverage is weird. So like over time that would get bothersome. But as a one off article, sure.

[A]

I thought about it as once, not forever, but yeah, I'm with you on that. I've tried to drive, I drove. I've driven old cars like, like the alpha 8C from like the 3032 where the gas is the middle and the brake is on the right. And that shit is fucking. I'll bug you out, dude. Quadrifoglio face says the restomod momentum in the industry is fascinating and we're all very excited about the phenomenally expensive singers, Gunthers, et cetera. Are there decent options nearer to the 2 or $300,000 mark? Doesn't have to be Porsche. I mean Revology, Revology cars are around three and they're bad ass.

[B]

I think if you want a brand newish car for that money, it's probably going to be based on a domestic versus something exotic. But with that much money, you could get a used 355, get it serviced perfectly, maybe do a couple of mods and it'll be the best version of that ever.

[A]

Yeah, I mean just the cost of labor, the cost of parts, the cost of everything that goes into re engineering a car and the volume of cars that are really realistic and assessing sell. There's not, you know, you can't get the quality you really want for quote only $200,000. It just takes a lot of labor to get there. 200,000 is like what it would cost to like immaculately restore to OEM one of these cars at this point. It just costs more than that to get that high level of quality.

[B]

Well, you're also getting, getting, you're getting a re engineered car. You're getting all new body panels, a whole new interior that is also designed like the door cards on the Singer. Cars don't just look like standard doors that are re leathered. So you're getting all these different pieces of new engine. So it's kind of like that old, you know, reliable, fast, cheap. Pick two. This is like do you want the interior done, the exterior done, the engine or the suspension re engineered like pick two?

[A]

Levi Sinclair says when an economy car shares design characteristics with a luxury exotic car, does it raise up the cheaper car or bring down the more expensive? One example, the 2024 Kia Sportage. Is it cooler because it has Lamborghini headlights or is the Lamborghini less cool because it has Kia headlights? I don't think anyone is really confusing the two. I don't think it brings down the more expensive car except like I will say not appliance cars because I just don't think anyone's really confusing them. But a guy I know who is right around the corner from here at the shop has a McLaren 720 or 750 and, and when the C8Z06 came out, a couple people went up to him and asked him if his car was like the new Z06 and he was kind of shitty about it. But I don't think applying those features to economy cars and or appliance cars takes away from the supercar so much.

[B]

I mean I also like I'm pulling, I have pictures of each of these cars up. The Kia and the Revolver Revuelto similar but not the same. And also there's so much else going on. When you see a Revelto on the street, I saw a red one here two weeks ago. You notice the lights for half a second and the rest of your brain is like whoa, Just Lamborghini. There's so much information. So this is not a one to one comparison.

[A]

Yeah, I mean I think Levi noticed it because another company cribbed that little bit from it. And he went, oh, I recognize this design aesthetic, it's from this. But in the context of a whole car next to another whole car, there's a lot more going on there than just that light thing.

[B]

Yeah. And I think what I meant is there are cars where we have seen the exact headlight is on this car and the other car. Whereas we've spoken about the whole Maserati window switch thing taken from Dodges, they go, well, Maserati customers have never been in a Dodge, but this is a likeness. But I don't think it's close enough where most people would connect two dots.

[A]

Yeah. Pull this link up for listen and sometimes watch a 36,000 mile 06 mini Cooper JCW just sold for $33,000 on bat. Is this a sign of renewed interest? Well, first off, this looks like a fucking fabulously presented example. I mean look at this title photo. This title photo is beautifully lit. It's pro grade. Let's go, let's learn about this car. It's got the JCW package cockpit chrono, cold weather convenience. So it's fully fucking loaded. It's got the 17 inch wheels rather than the 18 inch wheels, which is a better choice. It's offered by a local partner. It's low miles. I mean, dude, I sold my car after having it for two years with 49,000 miles. This is now 20 years later and it's got less miles than that. Let's see the interior. How's it look? Oh, so this has the real leather. I didn't like the real leather because of how it wrinkled there at the bottom. I had the synthetic leather, but that is the real leather. And dude, these cars were awesome. I cannot tell you how fucking fun this car was to drive. It made the coolest sounds. It absolutely ripped. It felt like it was built like a BMW, not like a Subaru or an ev. It felt like a luxury car. It had a ton of space in it.

[B]

What a dashboard. Yeah, especially these days. Like just the chrome bezels and then the toggles down here. It's so good.

[A]

Yeah, it was so nice. And this one looks really, really clean.

[B]

Geez. The underside is spotless.

[A]

I don't see these come up a lot. You don't see 06s, you don't see JCW. These cars didn't really work very well when you Put a lot of miles on them and people didn't do all the maintenance was really expensive on them too. And so people didn't do it. They went to shit and they got crashed and they got whatever. So they were not always available really. But I'm not surprised that someone was willing to pay a good amount of money for this car. They're great considering what it would cost you in time and energy to find a better one than that. Assuming there's no shady shit going on. These weren't bought to collect, they were bought to be used as everyday cars. It's not like there's a bunch of 2000 mile ones sitting around. That's not really a thing with those.

[B]

Yeah. I think the enthusiasm people have for M3s, for example, granted they have some racing pedigree, but if you take that same kind of enthusiasm, enthusiasm, it should be applied to the Mini Cooper because they are fantastic cars. They're unique, they look good, they're fast, they're exciting, they're everything we like as car enthusiasts. So I think it's totally justified that they're expensive.

[A]

Yeah. JanSport Transport Perspirament Club Allegedly. As an avid Utah hiker, I do long highway miles at 80 miles an hour followed by long 40 mile an hour plus sections on gravel fire roads. How would a stock first gen Raptor and a Colorado ZR2 compared to a overlanding Cayenne or a gravel prepped E46 wagon? Like from my all cars. So should he get a truck or a ZR2 or an off road prepped Cayenne or maybe an actual rally car?

[B]

Right.

[A]

What, what to do with 80 mile an hour transits followed by 40 miles an hour on gravel?

[B]

Well, I, I think both of those trucks are amazing, but they're too much truck if all you're doing is gravel roads. They're fun. And if there's a jump in the middle of the road, sure that's a fun time. But like you are under using the capabilities of both of those trucks and then on the highway like you're gonna have, you're gonna get worse gas mileage, you have a higher profile, blah blah blah blah. I think rally cars exist for a reason and this is a perfect example of the reason you're going from tarmac to gravel. So I would want something that is lower than a truck and has a lower center of gravity and has good, you know, suspension that's just a little soft to absorb all the little rocks. So the suspension you put on the E46, fantastic. But also a bone stock Outback Wilderness or you know, plenty of other Subarus also. Fine.

[A]

That's your answer. You just said it. The answer here. It's not exciting, but it's Outback Wilderness. That car had such a good ride on gravel roads. And it's comfortable, it's fuel efficient, it's got all the modern tech in it. You can throw all your. You could sleep in the back of it if you want. And they're cheap. I think it was under $40,000 brand, brand new or like 40, 41 or $42,000. Dude, that's your car. Seriously. A forester wilderness or an Outback Wilderness. That's exactly what that car is meant for.

[B]

And we drove it on a kind of rutted gravel road. So this wasn't like a perfect road by any means. And the damping was wonderful.

[A]

Having said that, there is really something to be said for an Outback Wilderness is perfect if you want a car to do everything in your life, including this hiking thing. If you want a hiking beater, the E46 wagon with rally suspension, get the right tires and a couple of skid plates. I cannot endorse this highly enough. Honestly. A rear wheel drive rally beater for stage roads, you might end up with a whole lot of joy in your life that you didn't know you didn't have before. Yeah, like you might go, you could get sendy in a car. If you're driving your regular car down the road, you're not going to treat it the same as if you're driving your rally beater down the road.

[B]

Very true. And with the suspension you had and some taller tires, you can get about 4 inches of ground clearance added to an E46 before you have to start like fabricating stuff so you can get a pretty good amount of clearance and that's kind of what you're going to need.

[A]

Yeah, okay. The Boy who Cried Coyote I'm getting into watches. Got my first automatic watch and Orient Bambino Orient is another brand that Seiko owns. In learning more about watches, it seems like some people are really fixated on some specs such as having over 200 meters of water resistance or crazy high gauss ratings. That's the magnetic rating resistance. Is this similar to a guy who pays more for the Rubicon Jeep but will never actually use the locking diffs? Sort of, yeah, sort of. Water resistance ratings are a very funny thing because they're not actually directly related to how much water the watch can take. So if a watch has like a 10 meter water resistance rating that's like 33ft, give or take. Right. You should not go swimming with that watch. And I know that that is stupid. I know how stupid that sounds. I'm talking about the generally acceptable practices given water resistance rating. 10 meters water resistance generally means you could wash your hands with this or maybe get it splashed or like a shower if you're careful. But like, and do the dishes but

[B]

like, why do they call it.

[A]

Don't know.

[B]

Okay, don't know.

[A]

Don't know.

[B]

Bulletproof doesn't mean bulletproof.

[A]

You know, I wouldn't really go actual swimming of any kind. Pool, hot tub, anything with less than 100 meters water resistance. I wouldn't personally. Like, my cutoff is usually a screw down crown which the notice canyon has. But some watches don't. Our Weiss watches, for instance. I, I love Cameron. I wouldn't go swimming in that watch. My Speedmaster with the hand wound crown technically has I think a 50 meter, maybe not going in the water in that watch. I'll do dishes.

[B]

And I guess it should be said that they say water resistant too, not waterproof too. Right, right.

[A]

And so a 200 meter watch is a watch where I start to go, I could jump in the water with this. I can shower with this. I can go in a hot tub with this. I can go into cold water with this. It could handle air if I. If like a pressure washer almost. Not that I would take a direct shot from a pressure washer, but like.

[B]

Would you scuba dive with it? Yes. Okay.

[A]

I would. 200 meters. I would do basic recreational scuba diving with. Yes, totally. That's where it's like a serious water watch. But 100 meters is. I'll go in the pool. I know that's stupid. I know that's that. But. But this is. If you go and watch forums and show this is the generally accepted practice, I'm a little more liberal both politically and with my watches. So like I might jump in the pool with a 50 meter but not with a 10, you know what I mean? So anyway, Last one, another watch question. Elle McPherson strutting around. Elle McPherson Strutting around. How do you feel about the new smart watch attachments for regular watches like case back buttons or. Or smart bracelets. Have you seen these yet?

[B]

No.

[A]

It's an interesting idea and one I like. In general, there's two approaches to having your analog watch act as a pseudo smartwatch. One of them is a little disc that looks almost like a quarter that sticks to the back of your watch and it becomes the health tracker that then just connects to your phone.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

It turns the back of your watch into like a whoop. Right? That's this one, I believe. This is the disc. It's called Genanse. So on the one hand, like, this is actually pretty cool. It allows you to wear your regular watch and it does the health tracking thing. What I see about it that I don't like is it looks to add 2 to 3 millimeters to the thickness of your watch. So it's going to make your watch sit up off your wrist, kind of like a top hat.

[B]

You can see in this picture there's a shadow underneath the watch because that's how much it's lifted it from the person's wrist.

[A]

So that doesn't necessarily mean it's a bad thing. And it may in fact be better for you than wearing a separate fitness tracker, if that's what you want to do. So the other one I saw, it replaces my deployant clasp on my wrist side with an actual Apple watch. So I'm wearing my watch here. My mechanical flip side wrist side is an Apple watch. So. Interesting.

[B]

Interesting.

[A]

Interesting for sure.

[B]

I'd rather have the deployment clasp replaced with some sort of smart thing like the disc.

[A]

So my thought would be to have to have the disc on the underside. Yeah, yeah, that's how I would want it. Someone will get there. But even look at the one he's showing it, holding it in this palm here. I mean, look at the stack that's happening there. So if you ask me as a watch enthusiast, if I wanted fitness tracking, I would wear a whoop on my other hand, or I'd wear an OURA ring. I would not personally fuck with my watch.

[B]

I wouldn't comprehend compromise the existing watch. Compromise meaning, like, it changes the fit, the look, it changes so many things about the watch. Interesting idea though.

[A]

I like the thought. I like where their head is at. And if they applied this technology to a deployant clasp, that was also a whoop. Because a whoop kind of looks like a deployant clasp. Imagine a whoop that was a deployant clasp. Like, that would be awesome. Like, I would be really interested in a product like that, even though I'm probably the wrong buyer because I change my watch every day and I. I wouldn't be changing this around every day. Same reason I don't fuck with a dash cam. Same reason I don't want to run the Valentine Dado. People are always like, what dash cam do you use? I'm like, I'm in a different car every eight minutes. I can't be using that stuff. All right, what do you say? Is that our show, Zach?

[B]

That's our show.

[A]

That's our motherfucking show. August 18, Irvine Improv. TST Smith and Sniff come down and see the boys hanging out. Hang out. It's in Irvine, but parking is free. And of course, get our blazers while you can. Zach's design, my design are up. The link is in our Instagram. And this is a really beautiful garment that I'm really proud of and we worked really hard on lasts you the rest of your life. And that's available until August 6th. And of course, the car giveaway ends on August 20th, so hit the link in our bio. Get the intro, Jesus. Get your entries in while you can. It's extremely straightforward. And one of y' alls is going home with a $275,000 911 turbo. S. Not exactly a lightweight. That's a nine second car, kids. That's an instant nine second car craziness.

[B]

Nuts.

[A]

Yeah. Thanks, everybody. Thank you. Especially to our patrons, keeping the ship floating down the ocean. And I'll see you next time. Bye.