First Drive Reviews
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Like a pilot preparing for takeoff, I flick a few switches before heading out. I reach down to the base of the center stack and push up on the transmission, damper, and stability control switches to set them to Race mode. It’s time to see what Godzilla can do on the 11-turn, 2.14-mile Gingerman Raceway road course in western Michigan. Every GT-R is a bona fide performance monster, but the range has a hierarchy. If the GT-R Nismo is Godzilla at his deadliest, the Track Edition is one step down, the monster with only a slightly better attitude. It combines elements of the Nismo and the...
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2018 Mercedes-AMG E63 S Wagon first drive review: The finest bagel hauler
In this SUV-crazy era, we don't see enough bankers’ hot rods anymore, but the mad scientists at AMG have a machine to feed the few who desire one. The 603-horsepower 2018 Mercedes-Benz E63 S sedan is bonkers in the best possible way, but it has a sibling that is even stranger while being more...
Joel Feder -
2019 BMW X4 M40i first drive review: the evolving SUV coupe
Greenville, South Carolina’s Swamp Rabbit Trail shadows the Reedy River along 22 miles of a former rail line. It includes a section named for American Tour de France hero George Hincapie, who resides nearby and leads bike rides for dedicated cycling tourists. It is partially lined by...
Motor Authority -
2019 McLaren Senna first drive review: Ultimate street-legal performer
In the age of YouTube, an exotic carmaker needs exciting overhead tracking video of its latest automotive thunderbolt to thrill online fans. McLaren Automotive ran into unexpected difficulty getting that shot. The McLaren Senna’s extravagant wings, spoilers, splitters, vents, and ducts so...
Motor Authority -
2019 Audi Q8 first drive review: The Q flagship
If a Hollywood studio wanted to fake a Mars landing, I’d strongly suggest sending a film crew to the Atacama Desert in northern Chile. The vast, empty stretches of reddish sand peppered with loose rocks form a convincing backdrop in which to embed UFO-related props. I’m not in an...
Motor Authority -
2018 Lexus LC 500h first drive review: A glimpse into grand touring's future
It’s clear that the path forward in the auto industry involves electrification. No market segment will be immune from it, though some will take longer to hop on the electrification train. Toyota is the current king of hybrids, with its Prius and Camry models. The Japanese automaker’s...
Joel Feder -
A web of country roads casts a romantic net between the alpha world cities of Paris and Frankfurt. Where maps pare down to two-lane roads, the Moselle Valley unfurls vast expanses of lush green carpet, sun-spotted by a yellow haze of wildflowers, lidded by a cobalt-blue sky. Lucky steers and heifers bask against the Windows XP backdrop. They might wonder what the rush of Mercedes sedans all means, if the local cud wasn't so obviously tasty. We snake through in a bullwhip of C300 and AMG C43 sedans, coupes and cabriolets, through towns where hopping preserves the last bits of local culture...
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2018 Porsche 911 GT3 first drive review: Country roads and chicken livers
There’s one place where you can get great fried chicken livers on a Sunday morning in Georgia, before church is out. It’s a low-ceiling kind of place, tacked on to a gas station, the hallmark of fine low-priced dining across the south. Over the first glorious spring weekend this year, I...
Martin Padgett -
2019 Volvo V60 first drive review: A matter of inches
As I sit in the 2019 Volvo V60’s supremely comfortable seats and drive through a flash flood in Tarragona, Spain outside of Barcelona, I ponder just how much three inches really matters. You see, the V60 is a wagon—the kind of car that Americans don’t like to buy—but it...
Kirk Bell -
2019 Aston Martin DB11 AMR first drive review: continuous improvement rings true
I awaken at the Dorint Hotel on a cool, dewy May morning. The surface of the famed Nürburgring-Nordschleife rests just a few feet outside my window, and it, as well as the plentiful surrounding greenery, is shrouded in a pea soup fog. Mid-May shouldn’t be this cold. The temperature...
Kirk Bell -
2018 McLaren 720S first drive review
It launches to 60 mph quicker and weighs less than a Ferrari 488 GTB. It slays the quarter mile faster than a Bugatti Veyron. It'll take on all comers on a road course. And it’s from an automaker that got its start in earnest in 2010. We took the 2018 McLaren 720S to California’s Ortega...
Kirk Bell -
2018 Porsche 718 Cayman GTS first drive review: fighting for attention
Born into a prizewinning family, the 2018 Porsche 718 GTS may never be the champion of anything—not in the Porsche lineup at least. That doesn’t mean it’s not a winner. The 2018 Porsche 718 GTS adds 15 horsepower and 8 pounds-feet of torque above the Cayman S or Boxster S, cuts...
Aaron Cole -
The scene in the rearview mirror of the 2018 Porsche 911 Carrera T is remarkably clear. It’s all high-definition vineyards and crystal-clear coastline, for as long as I dare look back. Why it’s so clear: Engineers fitted thinner rear and side windows that are not only 6 pounds lighter, but also skip a defroster and the unforgivable clutter of those thin hot wires. The road winds through Napa Valley, and it’s one of its good days (Editor's note: Are there bad days in Napa?), when the trees and rows of chardonnay grapes individually glint, fresh from a morning mist. The ribbon...
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2018 Volkswagen California first drive review: forbidden fruit you can live in
Our ideal garage is full of weird French hatchbacks, Japanese kei cars, German wagons, and Volkswagen vans. But as North Americans, we’re stuck admiring these wondrous oddities from afar. Aside from the tragic Volkswagen Routan, the U.S. hasn't seen a new VW van since the Eurovan disappeared...
Brandon Turkus -
2018 Ford Mustang GT Performance Package Level 2 first drive: making it a real sports car
The Ford Mustang was born a pony car, but it’s worked tirelessly for most of the last decade to move past its roots. To become a true sports car. The reintroduction of the Boss 302 in 2012 came close, but only in 2015 did Ford finally ditch the Mustang's solid rear axle for modern technology...
Joel Feder -
2019 Bentley Continental GT first drive review: The stuff of dreams
The day begins in a Sequin Blue 2019 Bentley Continental GT at the exclusive Kitzbuhel Country Club in the Tyrolean region of Austria. Set against verdant rolling hills and tooling through storybook villages, it would be easy to think one is lost in a fairy tale. This car’s cabin is outfitted...
Kirk Bell -
2019 Porsche Cayenne E-Hybrid first drive review: Porsche’s case for electrification
An air of practicality sweeps over Porsche these days. It’s not unlike the strong winds coming off the Mediterranean Sea on the warm spring day when I find myself behind the wheel of a 2019 Porsche Cayenne E-Hybrid pushing toward the French coast from hilly Provence. This warm, humid breeze...
Andrew Ganz -
2018 Aston Martin DB11 Volante video road test
The 2018 Aston DB11 Volante just may be the grandest of today’s grand touring cars. A 2+2 convertible with a sensuous shape and 503 German horses under its clamshell bonnet, it’s a beautiful means of getting you wherever you want to go. We drove the DB11 Volante on the California coast...
Kirk Bell -
We’re far off charted roads, somewhere in France’s L’Occitanie region, on some family estate where wine and off-roading are baronial hobbies, when I first take a peek in the rearview mirror. As I crash a 2019 Mercedes-AMG G63 through trashcan-sized holes and muddy slip-n-slides for a good 10 minutes at AMG-appropriate speeds, I see something trapped in a spiderweb of belts and handles. Behind me, my co-driver has each limb hooked on a headrest or braced against a panel. He tries to stabilize himself as we careen—at our AMG driving instructor’s request—over...
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Doing grown-up things with the do-it-all 2018 VW Golf GTI
No one car can do it all, but the 2018 Volkswagen Golf GTI comes pretty close. VW’s hot hatch is almost as happy snaking through twisty canyon roads as it is doing adult stuff like hauling home lumber for a weekend project from the corner big box hardware store. Slap a roof rack on top and...
Andrew Ganz -
Living with the 2018 Kia Stinger GT: the good and the bad
It took years for Americans to embrace Japanese performance cars and the different philosophy behind them. If the 2018 Kia Stinger GT is any indication, it won't take South Korea nearly as long to gain a foothold with American performance shoppers. That's because there's something intrinsically...
Brandon Turkus -
2018 Volkswagen Golf R first drive review: no juvenile delinquent
Automaker family portraits are like most of ours. See that mohawk in the back? That’s the Honda Civic Type R. The blue-face scoundrel flipping the bird? Hello, Ford Focus RS. Every family has someone bound for the pokey—even short stretches, but the 2018 Volkswagen Golf R skips hard...
Brandon Turkus -
2018 Porsche Panamera first drive review: baser instincts
What’s the biggest sacrifice you’ve ever had to make? Drip coffee at home instead of a drive-thru latte? The middle seat in back, in coach? Okay, breathe. The base 2018 Porsche Panamera won’t trigger any gasps like those commonplace horrors. We’ve driven all kinds of...
Martin Padgett -
2019 Aston Martin Vantage first drive review: Tilting at windmills
The giant blades on the lazy-looking wind turbines that dot southern Portugal produce the sound of a passing jet, only it never goes away. I know this because the irresistibly photogenic windmills got me out of the 2019 Aston Martin Vantage’s driver’s seat. Not much else would. The...
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