Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa pose with their new Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT8s

Formula One drivers aren’t like you and I. They live in nicer houses, have bigger bank accounts and sometimes have garages filled with lustworthy cars. Jenson Button, for example, used to own a Bugatti Veyron, and the McLaren Mercedes driver recently sold his classic Ferrari 512 BB. It’s not uncommon for automakers partnered with F1 teams to give drivers their wares, since it’s clearly good advertising for the brand. Current world champion Sebastian Vettel drives an FX50 crossover from team sponsor Infiniti, and we’d be willing to bet he didn’t pay list price for it.

Ferrari recently issued new company cars to team drivers Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa. Instead of giving them Ferrari FFs (too long of a wait list for paying customers), or Ferrari 458 Italias (too impractical), the F1 stars each received a brand new Jeep Grand Cherokee. If you’re puzzled by the tie-in, remember the family tree that Jeep is now part of. The brand falls under Chrysler, which falls under Fiat, and so does Ferrari, Maserati, Alfa Romeo, Lancia and a host of other industry brands.

If you’re guessing that they didn’t receive off-the-shelf Jeeps, you’d be correct. For starters, the Jeeps were SRT8 models, packing 470 horsepower and 465 pound feet of torque. The trucks were dropped an inch and a half for better handling, before being fitted with custom 20-inch wheel. To honor Ferrari, each was sprayed in Rosso Corsa before being trimmed with a matte black roof and gloss black body stripe.

Inside, the seats, door panels, center armrest and instrument surround are finished in red leather, appropriated from Ferrari’s own inventory. Instrument faces are finished in yellow, which links them back to the dials of Ferrari’s GT cars.

Alonso and Massa now have the first two Jeep Grand Cherokees in Europe, while other buyers in the EU will have to wait until summer to get one of their own

Why yes, that is a big-block Corvette... Image: RNickeymouse

Southern California is the center of the collector / exotic car universe, and nowhere is that more evident than the canyons of Mulholland Highway, near Malibu, California. YouTube poster RNickeymouse makes a living by filming motorcycle riders in some of the better corners, then selling them the footage and stills. Occasionally, he captures a few cars worth noting, too, like the ones in the video below.

If you’ve got a keen eye, you’ll spot Jay Leno (twice, in fact), and the list of cars captured is pretty impressive. There’s a Ferrari 599 GTO, a McLaren MP4-12C, a prototype Audi eTron Spyder, a few Ariel Atoms, a Caterham 7, a Bugatti Type 57 SC and even what looks to be an original Shelby Cobra. If idiots crossing double-yellow lines mid-corner raise your blood pressure, there’s some sweet justice in the middle of the video, too.

Years ago I rode with a sportbike club, until one ill-fated weekend ride where the group suffered three crashes and a member received a ticked for 100 miles per hour OVER the speed limit. After spending two days running from a certain Western state’s highway patrol, I realized that having a license, and not being dead, were more important than the occasional high-speed hoon weekend. Bad things happen in high speed groups, whether you’re talking about motorcycles or cars.

Take the incident below, which was found on Jalopnik. It seems that an exotic car club was en route from Kyushu to Hiroshima when the driver of a Ferrari lost control while overtaking in a curve. His car hit the median, creating a chain-reaction accident that ultimately totaled 14 cars. Included among the carnage were eight Ferraris, three Mercedes-Benzes, a Lamborghini, a Nissan Skyline and a Toyota Prius (which, if we had to guess, probably wasn’t driven by a club member.

The good news is that no one was seriously injured in the accident, which shut down the stretch of road in Yamaguchi Prefecture for some six hours. Wet roads likely played a part in the accident as well, which is no up to the police and insurance companies to sort out.

A Ferrari Enzo on a London Street. Image: Ed Callow

The original Ferrari Enzo, built from 2002 until 2004, was a no-compromise hypercar that borrowed heavily from Ferrari’s Formula One experience. It used a carbon-fiber monocoque, a carbon-fiber body, an electrohydraulic shift transmission and carbon-ceramic brakes. Power came from a mid-rear mounted 6.0-liter V-12 engine, good for 651 horsepower, and the handling was refined by none other than Michael Schumacher.

In the day, you couldn’t even walk into a Ferrari dealer and buy one, regardless of your bank account. Purchase was by invitation only, and the right to buy the Enzo was extended to F40 and F50 owners first. Performance was the only concern of the Enzo, and such trivial matters as fuel consumption and carbon emissions never impacted the car’s design.

Those days are, apparently, over. A Ferrari Enzo successor has been discussed for quite some time, and Inside Line caught some inside info at the release of the Ferrari 458 Italia Spider. Per Ferrari CEO Amedeo Felisa, the Enzo replacement will also use a carbon-fiber monocoque and will still be powered by a V-12 engine, but Ferrari is testing hybrid prototypes for possible inclusion in its new supercar.

If Ferrari were going the route of a performance hybrid, this could make sense. After all, the characteristics of electric motors (peak torque at zero rpm) make them ideal to supplement internal combustion performance. Design a light enough hybrid system, and you’d have a car that out-performs a conventional, combustion engine equivalent.

Sadly, that’s not the path that Ferrari’s going down. Instead, Felisa advised that any future Ferrari hybrid system, “must focus on improving efficiency and not just be about performance.”

It’s a sad day when the world’s premier manufacturer of performance automobiles is concerned with the fuel economy of its upcoming halo car. Building the California, or even the 458 Italia, in a hybrid version is one thing, but building an Enzo replacement with anything other than performance in mind is a sin, and it doesn’t bode well for the future of performance cars and motorsports. Maybe Jeremy Clarkson was right after all.

Francesco Baracca, the WW1 ace behind Ferrari's logo.

The Ferrari logo is among the most recognizable in the automotive world, featuring a prancing horse on a yellow background, topped by the colors of the Italian flag. As with most logos, it’s steeped in history, dating back to an Italian fighter ace from World War 1 named Francesco Baracca. Baracca, who racked up some 34 kills before being killed in action himself, chose a black prancing horse as the symbol of his airplane, originally a Nieuport 17. The horse was a tribute to the time Baracca spent in the cavalry, and Baracca believed it brought him good luck.

The video below, found on Left Lane News, explains the rest of the story, which Enzo Ferrari told just once. We’re not sure that the black prancing horse brought much luck to Baracca, but it certainly has helped Ferrari win races and customers over the past six decades.

I am sure you would agree with me when I say that the new Ferrari 458 Italia and Audi R8 V10 are remarkable exotic vehicles out of the box. For those who want the ultimate in performance, and beyond, they take cars like the 458 and R8 to the guys at Underground Racing. If you have any doubt about what exactly you will get out of Underground Racing’s customized twin turbo modifications, then check out the videos below of the Twin Turbo (1000+ HP) R8 V10 and (700+ HP) 458 Italia tearing up some asphalt.

When I was a kid, I honestly believed that the sound from an exhaust of a Ferrari was nothing special until I heard one with my own ears. I will never forget it. It was a sunny afternoon in downtown Chicago right after a few of the Chicago Bears left the practice field. One of the players was so kind to fly past us in his red Ferrari Testarossa. It was all over, I was in love, not with what seemed to be a NFL football player but the car he was driving.

Today that passion gets stirred up in me every time I am in the presence of a Ferrari no matter the model as long as it is real. The Ferrari 599XX, a 720 horsepower hard-core re-worked track version of the 599GTB, is a prime example of a machine that is able to produce the branded Ferrari sound that so many car enthusiasts crave. To help you understand my heart-felt love, we are sharing an exclusive video of several Ferrari 599XX’s making their way around the Spa Francorchamps circuit during a recent Ferrari event. The sound is just intoxicating. Be sure to turn up your speakers and enjoy the video below!

[Sources: L4P via Youtube]

The guys at Motor Trend take 11 of the best “drivers cars” to an empty airstrip for the world’s greatest drag race. Why in the world would Motor Trend do this? Well, because they can as Angus MacKenzie explains. What are the world’s best “drivers cars” according to Motor Trend equaling an 82-cylinder, 5000 horsepower and $1.5 million drag race? Here is the full list of cars (in winning order) and drag video in its entirety below. Enjoy!

1. Nissan GT-R
2. Ferrari 458 Italia
3. Audi R8 GT
4. Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG
5. Lexus LFA
6. Chevrolet Corvette Z06
7. Porsche 911 GT3 RS
8. Ford Mustang Boss 302 Laguna Seca
9. Porsche Cayman R
10. BMW 1 Series M
11. Lotus Evora S

Source: Motor Trend