SPOILER! Motor Trend Car/Truck/SUV of the Year!

MOTOR TREND "___OF THE YEAR" ISSUE

Motor Trend magazine annually picks their Car of The Year, SUV of The Year,  and Truck of The Year. This latest copy of the periodical rolls all three into one gigantic issue as seen in the photo above. I encourage you to go out and buy the latest issue, or even subscribe, or just attend one of their car shows soon and get a free one year subscription like I do! Either way, the Motor Trend folks pretty much cover all things automotive.

In describing their Car of the Year process, they state that they limit the competition to new or newly updated 2016 cars, and put a price cap of $150,000 on cars under consideration. I'm in no position to really nit-pick a bunch of professional journalists, but one of the cars they evaluated was a Mercedes AMG that with options priced at $152,000 and change. Believe it or not it got a great review and was chock full of awesome performance! At the price of more than 4 average cars ( average retail of new vehicles in the US is now about $31,000 or so) I should hope it's a nice ride!

Anyway, from reading so many magazines, one thing that I appreciate is when the reviewer finds a new or funny way to describe a car. There are already too many articles that state a car was fast, quick, handled like butter, or just lists the top speed, 0-60 times, and can quote the gas mileage, so a unique turn of a phrase always catches my eye. In this issue of MT, one of the reviewers describes an automatic transmission in a car with this great phrase, that the transmission is always changing gears, and "hunts more than Ted Nugent"! That's funny right there!

SPOILER ALERT!!!SPOILER ALERT!!!SPOILER ALERT!!! SPOILER ALERT!!!

Just to get to the bottom line, their Car of The Year is the 2016 Camaro, the Truck of The Year is the Chevy Colorado, and the SUV of The Year is the Volvo XC90. In honor of our NMS 1999 Miata, I must also let you know that Motor Trend states that the new Miata was just one point shy of taking their Car of the Year title, so we'll take that as a resounding "Miatas still rock"! They also considered the new FIAT 500X in the SUV category, so way to go FIAT!

HEMMINGS SPORTS AND EXOCTIC CAR......FORZA

If mainstream American car mags aren't your thing, branch out a bit and try these two that are a bit more specialized for particular automotive interests, Hemming's Sports and Exotic Car, and Forza. While the former typically focuses on foreign sports cars like the Jaguar XK140 on the cover, this issue also includes an article on the Honda Insight, a more recent and less sporty/exotic car than the Jag. On the other side of the coin is the all Ferrari FORZA!

TOP GEAR................................CAR

Speaking of British imports (like the Jaguar), if you've got a few more dollars to spend on your search for automobile education and reading enjoyment, try these British imports; Top Gear and Car. The Top Gear caught my eye for the awesome looking orange McLaren on the cover (another British import on my list-to-buy-when-I-win-the-lottery), while Car features the red Alfa Romeo Giullia. One of each would look great under my Christmas tree, I thank you very much! My wife even liked the look of the McLaren, so if you can only buy one super car this year for me, make it that one!

Feel free to check out the Motor Trend winners, or go pick your own winner.

Sign up Now: Model T Driving School!

Overly excited author with original Cobra at the Gilmore Car Museum

Last summer I got to spend a day at the Gilmore Car Museum near Kalamazoo Michigan, so let me update that report  NMS Gilmore Blog with this little bit of exciting news! You can now sign up for a Model T Driving School at the Gilmore and get to experience some seat time behind the wheel of a real Ford Model T! While I've never driven a model T, the website indicates that it has three foot pedals, and none of those is the gas! That explains why you need to learn how to drive one of these cars!

 Model A Ford in an entire building dedicated to the Model A

Over many years the Ford folks built something like 15 million Model Ts, so our ancestors surely would laugh at anyone today that would pay to just experience driving one of these classics, but as I've read somewhere it's good to spend your money on EXPERIENCES and not just STUFF that will collect dust and soon be forgotten!

Here's the link for more info: 2016 Model T Driving School LINK

Dates and times for the Model T Driving School are below:

If you are near Kalamazoo and can't wait for the driving school to start in May, check out their schedule of auto related lectures, pretty much every Sunday afternoon starting in January at this link:
Gilmore Lecture Series

Why You Should Worry About Going Bald!

12 Tires fit in a Ford Ranger

Going bald or tired of shaving your head? That's none of my concern, but on the other hand I AM worried about your bald tires!

Ford Mustang Wheel, Brembo Brakes

One of our main concerns at Nixon Motor Sports is safety, and considering how dangerous a 3,000 pound car can be at highway speeds we think that having safe tires is very important. I was just glancing over some information from the Rubber Manufacturer's Association, and besides learning about the latest transportation bill in the US, recent developments on the debate of having a spare tire or not in new cars and other interesting auto related topics, the subject of bald tires caught my attention.

Magic levitating Abarth tires by Dunlop

A recent survey of several thousand cars out on the street found that nearly 12% of them had bald tires Rubber News Link. I'll assume that the survey is accurate, so holy smokes people, what are you thinking? More than one in ten drivers could easily have a very bad hair day the next time they hit some wet pavement, ice or snow, or just try to stop quickly to avoid a road hazard (like me)!

Wheel on a BMW i3

Sure, I'll grant you that most people probably do not enjoy tire shopping, and I myself really don't like that super over powering aroma at the local tire store (Eau de Rubber), so it could be that part of the issue is that people just don't have much incentive to spend money when their car is driving just fine. Also, tires are not the cheapest thing in the world, and with gas prices falling it makes spending any other money on the car stick out a little more, as in "hey, I just filled my tank for less than 20 bucks and they want me to pay $600 for four lousy tires"!

Ferrari wheel, huge rotor

Where am I going with all this gibber jabber about tires? Well, let's stick with safety, and the fact that having tires that keep you safe are cheap compared to the cost of NOT having safe tires. Shoot, I can feel an entire series of blog posts coming on about all the different things to know about tires, such as size, wear ratings, speed ratings, the DOT code that tells you how old a tire is, the different sizes of tires, the difference between summer and high performance tires, where to buy tires, how to shop for tires, what's the best autocross tires, etc. Oh yeah, here comes a whole bunch of tire info.

New Dunlops for the FIAT Abarth

For now, check your tires and replace them if they are worn. You can even ask Santa to make it a Christmas present!