WRC - MIA?
The 2011 World Rally Championship season has kicked off, and yet there's zero TV coverage of it so far.
So where I'd normally use this as an opportunity to recap the highlights, instead I'm going to use it as an opportunity to just talk about car stuff in general.
Until HD Theater gets off their thumbs, that is.
Currently, the rumor I've been eagerly following is the joint Toyota/Subaru TC-86 concept sports car. Toyota design, Subaru power train. Now that's what I'm talkin' 'bout.
Rumor has been that there will be a Toyota version (possibly the new Celica), and a slightly re-styled Subaru version with possibly a larger engine and all-wheel drive. Hopefully, that's very slightly re-styled.
Not that Subaru can't design good-looking cars (this one's mine)...
It's just that at the moment, they don't seem to be choosing to.
What happened? They had a really good looking car until they added an Edsel grill to it.
Then things just got worse.
Seriously... the current Impreza is one ugly looking car. It looks like any one of a dozen other generic Japanese or Korean compacts.
Then, they added all that ugly, plasticky, swoopy stuff to the STi version. It looks like someone beat it with an ugly stick!
Their new Impreza concept is a case of two steps forward, one step back. The back-end of it looks pretty sweet, but the front end looks like someone slammed it face-first into an ugly tree! The overall lines are good, but it's just got too much fiddly, useless detail stuff like the current STi.
I bet if they cleaned it up a bit, it'd look pretty good.
Anyway, Subaru's lack of aesthetics (and my now-tempered enthusiasm for the brand) is why I'm excited about the rumored TC-86. The concept renderings looked pretty cool. Of course, concept renderings always do, and they almost never make it into production.
And of course, the one-off auto-show concepts are even further removed from reality (although this is actually a concept for a hybrid Toyota/Subaru)...
And the "mules" they use to test the platform out aren't exactly inspiring...
But now, it looks like this bad-boy may become the actual car:
The rumors now, however, point to the Toyota version becoming a Scion. Specifically, the Scion FT-S.
Anyway, the Subaru version of whatever this is, is now slated to be revealed at the Geneva Motor Show in March. The Toyota/Scion version is slated for a New York Auto Show debut in April. Whether any of these will hit the showroom floors anytime soon is the big question, and as far as I'm concerned, there's no rush anyway. I'm not looking to replace my Subaru for the foreseeable future.
Unless, of course, something sexier comes along.
Speaking of cars, the new season of Top Gear started a couple of weeks ago on BBC America. I'd really like to see them take on the slackers from the U.S. travesty that is our version of "Top Gear" in a series of challenges (like they recently did for the Australian version), and completely humiliate them. Shouldn't be too hard. If the U.S. team tried to be funny or entertaining, that would be pretty humiliating right there.
But it would be good TV.
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