March 12th, 2010

Shelley to Drive Pikes Peak, Minus a Driver

You see Shelley is an Audi TTS. Researchers at the Center for Automotive Research at Stanford built Shelley to drive autonomously. She has a built in GPS that allows her to navigate without a driver and she has reached speeds of 130 mph.

Shelley will attempt the famous Pikes Peak course in September, the official Pikes Peak Hill Climb is in June of this year. They named the car Shelley in honor of Michele Mouton, one of the best rally drivers ever and the first female driver to win Pikes Peak.

The Stanford researchers have built two autonomous cars before, Stanley and Junior, but only used radar and cameras to navigate whereas Shelley will use GPS. Pikes Peak began in Colorado 1916 and is a climb up 14,000 feet.

The Stanford Report writes, “The trick will be to stay on the road at race speeds while sliding around the corners.” Well, that’s pretty much the trick for human drivers as well. Good luck Shelley!

March 11th, 2010

Breaking News: Soave Just Named Head of Fiat N. America

Laura J. Soave, 37, was just named as the Head of the Fiat brand for North America. She will be responsible for reintroducing Fiat into North America starting with the Fiat 500.

Soave will be reporting directly to Sergio Marchionne, the CEO of Chrysler Group. According to Chrysler’s press release she “holds full profit and loss responsibility for the Fiat product portfolio in North America.”

Prior to this post, she served as General Manager of Experiential Marketing for Volkswagen.

We’d like to congratulate you on your new post! We always like seeing women in the drivers seat!

March 10th, 2010

Breaking News: Lagerfeld Tapped for 2011 Pirelli Calendar

Breaking news: It was just announced that Karl Lagerfeld will shoot the 2011 Pirelli calendar and we couldn’t be more excited!

We were rather disappointed with the porn fashion photos of Terry Richardson this year. We’re all for sexy shots but we thought this material belonged in another forum, one marked with bunny ears perhaps.

The Pirelli calendar was first produced in 1964 and it is gifted to a select few, it cannot be bought. The calendar has been shot by some of the world’s greatest photographers including: Richard Avedon, Herb Ritts, Mario Testino and Annie Leibovitz.

March 09th, 2010

Find Out Your Car Soulmate

It’s Tuesday, Friday seems far away so we thought today we’d provide you with an entertaining distraction.

Which car are you destined to be with? Take this fun quiz and find out your true car soulmate.

We had two soulmates, go figure, the Audi R8 and the BMW 6 Series.

March 08th, 2010

1 Woman, 1 Car, 46 Years, 559,000 Miles

91-year-old Rachel Veitch from Orlando, Florida bought her Mercury Comet Caliente in 1964. After 559,000 miles they are still driving together today.

She takes meticulous care of her car she calls “Chariot.” “When I buy gas, I write down the mileage, the date and how many miles per gallon I got,” Veitch told FOXNews.com. “I’ve never been a destructive person and I’ve just taken care of everything, except my husbands.”

Veitch hopes that one day her “Chariot” will end up in the Henry Ford Museum in Michigan.

March 06th, 2010

Why Women are Easier to Insure than Men

We love these ads from the South African insurance company 1st for Women.

March 05th, 2010

New York Times Series on Gender and Driving

The New York Times has been running a series on it’s Freakonomics blog (not sure why it’s not in the auto section) about gender and driving. The authors initial report was about how men tend to be behind the wheel more than women in a relationship. This set off a chain reaction from readers and more posts by the author. Here are some of the posts.

-Are Women at Risk for Being Taken for a Ride?

-In Relationships, Are men in the Driver’s Seat?

-Couples and Cars

-Do Women Take the Backseat to Men?

-Gender and Fender Benders?

The series was written by Eric Morris. Mr Morris is an interesting guy, a renaissance man of sorts. Morris graduated magna cum laude from Harvard, was an actor in musical theater, was a television writer (Xena, Star Trek: Voyager), has an extensive Grateful Dead bootleg collection, and is researcher at UCLA’s Institute of Transportation Studies. We love the provoking questions Mr. Morris, keep them coming!