WhichCar By Wheels

Ford has moved closer to selling off its Volvo arm by announcing that that the preferred bidder for the Swedish carmaker is a consortium led by China’s smallish but ambitious Zhejiang Geely Holding Group.

Geely is trying to put the finance in place to buy Volvo as part of its plans to make a mark globally.Though keen to restock its war chest with cash, a sell off to a Geely consortium won’t be plain sailing. Volvo products reflect a lot of Ford technology and the Detroit giant won’t be interested in allowing any of its technical secrets to go to China with the former PAG brand.Another potential impediment is the Swedish government and unions although Geely has been assuring them that it will retain the existing Volvo labour agreements and dealer networks.Ten years ago, Ford paid US$6 billion to buy Volvo.In today’s depressed car business, it can’t expect anything like that amount. Insiders suggest that Zhejiang Geely could pay US$2 billion for Volvo.What a sale to the Chinese would do for Volvo is anyone’s guess, but surely there will be some consumers sceptical that Geely could maintain the technological and design progress made under Ford.

At the time it was akin to sacrilege when BMW overturned the tradition of a straight-six engine powering its M3 in favour of a V8 – but one belting out all of 309kW/400Nm from 4.0 litres.

Not an old design blunderbuss V8 mind, is a growling high-revving design with variable camshaft control, low-pressure double-VANOS which weighs less than the old sixThe first eight-cylinder for the BMW M3 sports sedan, the engine produced that mountain of power and torque while reliability was maintained right up to the 8400rpm max thanks to a consistent and reliable oil supply with longitudinal and lateral acceleration up to 1.4 g ensured by two oil pumps and wet sump oil lubrication optimised to cope with extreme dynamic behaviour.The V8 had to exceed the benchmark set by BMW’s 3.2-litre straight-six, several times the “Engine of the Year” and developing a 252 kW in its last iteration.While purists tut-tutted when the V8 arrived, enthusiasts voted with their wallets.BMW has confirmed it will deliver the 1000th current V8-powered M3 in Australia in the coming weeks.By comparison, it took the previous E46 generation M3 seven years to reach a total of 1579 cars. Sales of the earlier E36 generation M3 tallied 890 units after eight years.In its time here, the new M3 has been embroiled in a mighty sales war with the rival 336kW/600Nm V8 Mercedes-Benz C 63 AMG four door.The majority of customers want some comfort and pampering in their performance car but for those who demand something more hard core, a t hand-built clubsport special, the M3 GTS may be heading their way. . BMW is currently investigating the possibility of bringing the car to Australia.

Speedway racing in Australia in the 1970s went through great change, with sedan racing coming to the fore and speedcars retreating. Then at the end of the decade a new force emerge – sprintcars.

It was also a time of gritty Australia versus England bike Test matches, mad three-wheeled sidecar racing, and a growing professionalism across the sport led by the entrepreneurial and imaginative Mike Raymond at Liverpool Raceway.Today, the 800-horsepower sprintcars still dominate. Bikes are battling locally, even though Aussie Jason Crump is the reigning (and three-times) world speedway grand prix champThis spectacular growth time in the sport has been captured by Tony Loxley in a new hard-cover book, Full Throttle, which Raymond has generously described as the best publication on local speedway ever published.Sub titled Images of Australian Speedway 1970-2009, the book extends to 272 pages of glossy A4 horizontal-sized paper. The memories of crazy characters and raw courage – and sometimes silliness – leap out of every spread.Though, with 600 photos included, the book purports to be largely pictorial, there are also some 118,000 accompanying words in the form of forewords from Ivan Mauger, Barry Graham and yours truly, plus in many cases lengthy captions that tell the story behind the pics.A mild criticism is that some of the beautiful images deserve to be run larger than allowed by the three-to-a-page format widely used. But Loxley says he wanted to get as many of the photos into the book as possible.In colour and black-and-white, Full Throttle is published by Renniks and is available from all good bookstores at a cover price of $74.95.Loxley, a superb photographer, is responsible for some of the more memorable images between the covers. But he is the first to give credit to the work of others led by David Cumming, who shot at Liverpool for many seasons.Loxley has taken up the challenge of preserving speedway’s rich and diverse history in a tangible way. He collects so much that needs to be retained in the sport, and Full Throttle represents much of what could easily carelessly disappear in a bin to the local tip. He’s not stopping here either.Loxley is already well advanced on his next historical tome, The Place of Pace – Liverpool City Raceway 1967-1989, another mainly pictorial collection highlighting the popular Sydney suburban oval track which attracted everyone from Gough Whitlam to AJ Foyt.Loxley is interested in colourful stories or memorabilia from competitors who rode and drove at LCR to enhance the upcoming 250 page book which covers the operating life of one of Australia’s most successful motor sporting venues. Contact the author at [email protected]

I had bad dreams before this drive, jump-cut scenes of amphetamine-crazed truckies running me off the road and dark images of breaking down on the lonely Nullarbor and being abducted by a sweating psychopath. Maybe I shouldn’t have watched Wolf Creek or Duel.

The Outback can be a hostile place for a ‘townie’ and I’m about to tackle the 4000km drive from Melbourne to Perth for the first time, accompanied by a photographer I haven’t met and a tote bag carefully packed with four days’ worth of T-shirts and Reg Grundies. I’m ill-prepared to fight off a well-armed psycho, but guess I can always out-run the bastard’s lumbering Landcruiser in our Porsche 911.A week earlier editor Bulmer had drawled, “How’d ya like to drive a Porsche across the Nullarbor, Nal Pal?” Naturally, I had the odd question. “Is this a Porsche-chaperoned trip or am I on my own?” I asked, imagining a Cayenne chase car packed with mechanics, spares, and gourmet hampers. “You’re on your own, mate,” Bulmer deadpanned. Not what I wanted to hear.But I needed little convincing. The Nullarbor exerts an almost mythical pull, like some sort of alien brainwashing beam. And the Porsche is a bonus because, well, it’s a 911.But with this assignment comes great pressure. Ours will be the first of four legs in a 17-day lap of the continent, and if snapper Chris Benny and I don’t deliver the Carrera to Peter Robinson in Perth on time and in one piece, the whole shooting match will be, well, shot. We will also be hot on the heels of Porsche’s official Panamera media launch with the plan being for Robbo to catch the tour in Darwin. It’s another reason why failure is not an option.A few days before departure, I collect the car from Porsche’s Melbourne HQ, where I’m briefed on mechanical and safety issues by a helpful mechanic. I’m shown how to inflate the scrawny space-saver spare that’s been included as a safety measure, given that 911s don’t come with a spare. Along with a five-litre bottle of oil, the ‘space-saver’ takes up most of the car’s boot space. “When most owners get a puncture they just get their cars towed to a dealer,” notes the mechanic, who unwittingly exudes a clear sense of pessimism about our chances.Exactly where we’re supposed to stow a deflated 19-inch tyre and wheel should we have a flat is never explained. The standard first-aid kit is replaced, ominously, by a much larger one and the rudimentary tool kit is explained. I feel a stab of anxiety when I realise there isn’t even a proper wheelbrace with which to clobber a psycho.I pick up Benny from downtown Melbourne bright and early on D-day and we make for the Westgate Bridge and the Princes Highway, bound for Geelong and all points west. The talented snapper is only 22 and we haven’t worked together before, so I’m hoping he’s no prima donna. When you’re stuffed inside a tin can for 16 hours a day it pays to get along. As it happens, we get along famously.According to the weighty road book prepared by dep ed and chief trip wrangler Jesse Taylor, Adelaide is only 896km away. Today will be the shortest leg; it’s mostly familiar territory, something of a ‘transport’ stage. We push on to Portland, on the coast, then turn inland towards Mount Gambier, rain slapping a gloomy filter on our first-day excitement.Question: How many corners does it take to fall in love with a 911? Answer: Not many. The Porsche is everything you’ve read about in these pages. Its brilliantly flexible 3.8-litre flat-six howls with that distinctive metallic rasp, the gearbox has a buttery change, the brakes are powerful and the steering is accurate and full of feel. But with the constant threat of radar we barely trouble the boxer donk’s 283kW, cruising just over posted speed limits. It’s such a waste, we might as well be in a Corolla.Outside Millicent, the rain eases and rays of sunlight stream earthwards to create a dramatic skyline. Lush paddocks are dotted with fat, contented sheep and lambs. But things are not so peaceful in the Porsche.Question: How many kilometres does it take to fall out of love with a 911? Answer: Not many. On coarse surfaces – which is most Aussie roads – the roar from the low-profile Michelins is deafening. The noise is akin to being in a cement mixer and turns conversations into shouting matches. I’d gladly exchange a slightly slower 0-100km/h time for some more sound deadening.With the computer showing 92km of range left in the tank, a warning chime sounds on the outskirts of Adelaide but we easily make it to the Mercure Hotel and hit the sack circa 11pm. With photography stops, an easy 10-hour drive has become a 14-hour slog, but day two will really test our stamina.After a bad night’s sleep, I almost nod off while warming the car up, a time-wasting ritual I’m advised by Porsche to conduct religiously every morning. Benny, who has slept like a log, is annoyingly chipper.In town we meet Stewart Kay, who owns the first 911 ever imported into Australia, a pretty Stone Grey/dark green leather 1965 model in brilliant condition. It was originally bought for £2000 by wealthy pastoralist Ron Angas, whose family settled the Barossa Valley and after whom the town of Angaston is named.A smitten Kay, who relishes flogging it at every green light, bought the car from its second owner in 1992 after pestering him for five years. “We know of only about six other RHD cars in the world in this early style [wooden steering wheel and dash],” he says proudly. “What I really like about the car is the adventures we’ve had in it and the places we’ve gone.” As Kay roars off into the rush hour, I wonder if we’ll be as lucky.It’s still overcast as we meander north on the A1, regularly monitored by radar jockeys that we pass at 115-118km/h (the limit is 110), which doesn’t seem to worry them. At Kipling’s Bakery on the highway near Port Wakefield we locate a frontrunner for that most important of all road-trip indicators, the Best Pie of the Trip, a spicy pepper number bought for $3.20.Outside Port Augusta, at the northern tip of the Spencer Gulf, we turn onto the 1671km-long Eyre Highway, named after Edward John Eyre, an English explorer who, with his aboriginal companion, Wylie, was the first European to cross the continent from Adelaide to Albany in 1840-’41, tracing the Great Australian Bight and braving the barren Nullarbor. For me, this is the real start of the adventure because everything from now on is new to me. Ceduna is 443km to the west, Perth two days away. Today’s destination, Nundroo, doesn’t even register on the sat-nav.The sign welcoming us to Iron Knob brags that it is the birthplace of the Australian steel industry. Flour merchant Ernst Siekman began mining here in the early 1880s, but in 1899, BHP took over and continued digging up high-quality ore for the next 100 years. The ‘knob’ that held so much ore is 150 metres lower than it was a century ago and the mine is now closed. And so, it appears, is the town. It’s virtually deserted except for some school kids playing in the main street and a couple of blokes kicking back on a veranda.At Wudinna we pull over to snap an old servo and are bailed up by a colourful chap who claims to have lived in the now-abandoned building for the past 30 years. A mechanic by trade, Graham Finearty elaborates on the virtues of two-stroke engines at some length, including an extraordinary 2.0-litre, two-stroke he’s developed that’s reportedly good for 600kW. I make a mental note to call him should my lawn mower ever need a hot-up.With the light fading, we begin scanning intently for roos. Under a ‘safety’ sub-heading, Taylor’s road book counsels against driving after dark and recommends dropping to 70km/h to minimise the chances of hitting rogue wildlife. So far, though, we’ve hardly seen any road kill, let alone live animals. And if we drive at 70 we’ll never get anywhere. I decide to live on the ragged edge and lock-it-in-Eddy at 120km/h.We make Ceduna, on the Bight, at 7:45pm, just in time to get a meal of excellent King George whiting at the smart new Foreshore Hotel. But with Nundroo still 160km to the west we don’t dally over dessert. Benny and I are both knackered and just want to start counting sheep but prod ourselves to stay focused on the live roo count, which still stands at zero. At 11pm, energy flagging and eyeballs bulging after 17 hours and almost 1000 clicks, I drive straight past the blacked-out Nundroo Hotel Motel. Opened in 1957, the year Holden released the FE station wagon, the motel looks and feels its vintage. I sleep like a dead man on the saggy mattress – until my alarm goes off at 5:30am. Groan.After the mandatory warm up, we’re on the road again by 7am, cruise set to 120km/h (a busy 3000rpm in sixth), gazes fixed in the direction of Norseman, some 1000km distant. Ninety minutes later we arrive at the eastern edge of the Nullarbor (or ‘tree-less’) Plain. In the sandy silence of this limitless landscape I feel like a pioneer. For some reason my thoughts switch to Neil Armstrong and the Eagle module on the surface of the moon. Curiously, our 2009 model Porsche probably has more computing power than the flimsy contraption that first carried man to the moon 40 years earlier.Of course there were no computers at all in 1941 when army engineers took six months to construct an unsealed road across the Nullarbor. That road cost £250,000 to build and was named the Forrest Highway, after WA pioneer John Forrest. It wasn’t until 1976 that sealing of the road was completed, at which time it was renamed the Eyre Highway.At the Nullarbor Roadhouse, we meet Brisbane-based truckie Mark Gonsalves, who’s been crossing the continent since the ’70s. I ask him about the lack of wildlife. “There was lots back then,” he shrugs. “In the ’70s, we saw wombats, camels and roos; now you just don’t see anything. I think they’ve all moved more inland.” Aware that truckies also usually know the best places to eat, I take the opportunity to ask about the best place for nosh on the Nullarbor. “No such thing,” deadpans Mark. We’ll later concur with this assessment.The Roadhouse used to have trouble with people filling up and doing the bolt, apparently, so these days you have to hand over your licence before the pumps are turned on. The manager Adam, a big bloke with a goatee and a fierce expression, reckons he’s seen his share of wackos out here.“There was a bloke here saying the radiation from Maralinga had come down and [that] he was really scared and thought he should wear tin foil under his clothes. I think he had a couple of screws loose.” Ya reckon? Nevertheless, pondering the proximity of the former nuclear test site, I opt to run with the windows up and the air on recirc for a while.Nearing the WA border, we haven’t passed or been passed by another car for hours and, with 2317km now under its wheels, the Porsche is still burning premium at a metronomic 10.8L/100km, just 0.2L more than its ADR81 figure. Impressive.The Border Village Roadhouse is spitting distance from the SA/WA state line and here we find truckies Tony ‘The Hat Man’ and his cousin Colin relaxing in the shade. They drive their road train two-up and cross the Nullarbor each and every week, sometimes covering 14,000kms in nine days.Tony has a theory about the incredible vanishing wildlife. “They’re all in the bush,” he explains. “They only come to the road when there’s no water; to drink the morning dew off the road.” We ponder this bush logic and decide it makes perfect sense, agreeing to keep a special watch for thirsty camels from here on.Crossing into WA just before midday we’re greeted by a quarantine officer who tells us the Panameras passed through a few days earlier. I wonder if this sudden influx of Porsches rates on his scale of unusual border incursions? “Strangest thing I’ve seen is an Indian tourist on a unicycle,” he laughs. “He was only a thin fella but he obviously knew what he was doing.”Near Cocklebiddy we finally spot one half of the coat of arms as three startled emus sprint off into the scrub. An indignant Benny, meanwhile, is thinking more about cows: “How come the women never wave?” he asks, his right index finger frozen in a forlorn mid-air salute to yet another campervan girl who has motored by, oblivious to his outback etiquette.By 4:30pm, we’re on the famed Ninety Mile Straight heading directly into the sun at 120km/h. This is perfect V-max territory, but it would be just our luck to hit the hopping half of the coat of arms, or be sprung by the only radar gun in hundreds of kilometres.By mid-evening, having been sans phone reception for most of the day and with vehicle sightings few and far between since the sun went down, it’s a relief to see the lights of Norseman emerge out of the darkness. All the pubs and restaurants are closed so we settle for a meal of radioactive-looking fish ‘n’ chips at a local servo before hitting the hay early.The next morning, a quick calculation on the back of a napkin prompts us to veer from Taylor’s script for our final run into Perth. We peel off Highway One and head inland on Highway 94 via Kalgoorlie and Coolgardie. It’s a shorter 858km run and we can’t afford to risk the wrath of Robinson by being late.Founded in 1893 on the back of gold and nickel mining, Kalgoorlie today is an impressive enough inland town of 29,000. It’s a shadow of its former self, though, as during the 1890s up to 200,000 people called it home. The town’s early affluence shows in the substantial period buildings and pubs on every corner. There’s still a quid to be dug out of the ground, too, as evidenced by the 3.6km long, 1.6km wide and half-a-kay deep ‘super pit’ open-cut gold mine that sustains the place.Our decision to take the shortcut to Perth is vindicated when high winds begin to buffet the Porsche near Coolgardie and rain clouds mass ominously. With 120km to go, torrential rain and high winds set in and, incredibly, after four days spent crossing one of the most arid landscapes on earth, I now begin to worry about aqua-planing into a swollen creek.The monotonous roar of the Michelins and four long days in the saddle have worn us down, and there’s a palpable sense of relief on my part at least when we finally see the lights of Perth in the distance. Benny has Robbo and the Perth-to-Darwin leg still ahead of him, but I’m done. I’ve added the mysterious, marvellous Nullarbor to my list of driving accomplishments and can say with some authority that it’s a road trip every Aussie should take at least once in their life.Over dinner Robbo asks whether I bonded with the car. I quickly forget about the tyre noise and bang on about how ‘intimate’ one becomes with the 911, how it seems to mould itself around you, and how connected you feel to it. He smiles knowingly. Over 4000km, I fell in and out of love with the Carrera many times but in the end, love prevailed.Take care of my car, Robbo.Tudor Tudor is the timing partner of Porsche Motorsport for the Mobil 1 Supercup series. Making Steve Nally’s arm even more functional and aesthetically pleasing (below) is the Grantour Chrono in triple black; bezel, dial and leather strap with large perforations. Waterproof to 150m, this version of the Grantour Chrono retails for $4570. More info and stockists at www.tudorwatch.com or phone (03) 9654 3988.Accor Hotels The Accor hotel group offers weary travellers 150 locations Australia-wide at which to put your feet up and your head down. The group includes the five-star Sofitel and Pullman brands, four-star Novotel and Mercure and three-star Ibis, which you’ll find in far-flung locations like Kununurra, Alice Springs, and Mount Isa. We rested at the Mercure in Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth.

Designers and design-savvy types were the only ones who liked the look of Land Rover’s Discovery 3’s exterior. But the honest minimalism of the big brick on wheels was an absolute turn-off for most people, apparently.

Disco 4’s exterior redesign is intended to make the big seven-seat wagon rather more cuddly. Don’t like it personally, but the changes to lift the appearance and user-friendliness of the interior are more successful.The Disco 4’s most important changes, though, lurk under the skin. Like the new Rangie Sport, the Disco benefits from new (for Land Rover) 180kW 3.0-litre V6 turbo-diesel and 276kW 5.0-litre V8 petrol engines.At the same time, Land Rover has sought to improve the Discovery’s on-road driveability. A bunch of new suspension hardware lifts the Disco’s handling score noticeably. It steers better, corners better. Modifications to the software in charge of the Disco’s computer-controlled off-roading bits bring incremental improvements on most surfaces.The 180kW turbo-diesel engine (detuned a little compared with Jaguar versions, the better to cope with towing) is the engine that feels most right in the Disco 4. Although the old 2.7-litre will continue in a lower-priced ($68,490) entry model, the 3.0-litre SE ($81,990) and HSE ($94,990) models have more power, consume less fuel and are more refined. The 5.0-litre petrol V8 ($126,460), smoother, quieter and much thirstier, seems purpose designed for those who don’t understand that real Land Rovers these days are not fitted with spark plugs.

The Falcon will live on, but not as we know it.Under FoMoCo’s ‘One Ford’ strategy – which is focussed on developing global platforms which are then tailored for different markets around the world – pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into developing a stand-alone Falcon for Australia “makes no sense”, according to Burela. Instead, it’s likely a single large-car platform will be developed and farmed out across the sprawling Blue Oval empire.Speaking to Wheels in a snow-blanketed and arctic-cold Detroit, Ford’s CEO Alan Mullaly echoed Burela’s words. “Would we [build a car just for Australia]? No, I don’t think so. [Car manufacturers] who make one vehicle – a different vehicle – for just one country, I think those days are gone, because you can’t compete with the global companies.”So the question is: what becomes of Falcon? Burela confirmed the next all-new Falcon will surface in 2015 and that the nameplate will live on in Australia. The next-gen Falcon will also retain the current car’s basic size and dimensions, but because the Falcon needs to integrate into the global Ford community, and potentially become just one variant built on a platform sold in several world markets, the DNA of the next Falcon is unclear. According to Ford, not even they know. But the glory days of rear-wheel drive are looking shaky.“We have several options,” said Burela. “The new car won’t arrive until 2015 and we don’t have to make a decision on Falcon until 2011. Do we go front-wheel drive, all-wheel drive or stick with rear drive? These are the questions we’re asking and we’re in the early stages of intensive market research into those questions. But let me say this: Ford Australia will have extensive input into whatever car is choosen and we will deliver the car that Australians want and need.”But RWD isn’t off the table just yet. Alan Mullaly also outlined the possibility of twinning development of the next Falcon with Ford’s rear drive muscle car: the Mustang. “You know, we’ve got some really good RWDs, too, like the Mustang. Can you imagine another new platform, just like the Falcon, that’s going to be RWD for Mustang? So you can imagine driving One Ford we’re going to have one of those, and there’s no reason why we can’t have it in Australia.”But uncertainty over Falcon’s future also casts a shadow over the future of Ford Australia continuing to build cars in this country. Ford has done much to strengthen its position since 2008, having streamlined local production and purchasing and taking into account the additional volume that will be created by the four-cylinder Falcon and diesel-powered Territory in 2011. But despite Falcon’s overall sales and market share actually growing during last year’s GFC-savaged roller-coaster ride, there can be no guarantee that the next Falcon will be built in Australia.It will require a huge investment from Ford HQ to re-tool Australian factories for the next-generation Falcon, and with a low-cost manufacturing base in Thailand available to FoMoCo, questions marks linger over Broadmeadows. Building around 55,000 cars last year, volumes for Ford Oz are low and Australia is a relatively high-cost manufacturing base. It must be proven that the Falcon can be built profitably and that Ford Australia itself can return to profitability. The company posted a $274 loss in 2008, although Burela is confident of returning to profitability within the next three years. Ultimately, however, the decision will be made in the boardrooms of Ford HQ in Detroit.Burela, on the other hand, was quick to hose down speculation: “You’re asking me to guarantee something that’s five years away. Frankly, that’s impossible, but the ‘One Ford’ strategy doesn’t include any immediate plans to stop building cars in Australia. We invested $230 million into our local operations last year and we have the Ecoboost Falcon and diesel Territory coming on-stream in 2011 – does that sound like the actions of a company that’s getting ready to turn off the lights?”

A FEW weeks ago, I got a shot at the future I thought we were all going to have. And you know what? It was every bit as good as I’d thought it was going to be. But isn’t.

Way back in 2001, when I was living in Paris, I got caught up in a low-level intrigue about a miraculous invention that was expected to revolutionise society and re-shape cities.

At the time, the thing was known only as ‘Ginger’. Nobody knew if it was a nose-picking attachment for a ballpoint pen, a matter transponder or a device that deep-fried a chicken while it walked to your table. But its American inventor, Dean Kamen, was entirely credible.Kamen holds more than 400 patents, most of them in the medical world, for life-saving stuff from intravascular stents to a wheelchair that climbs stairs. And I fully understand the potential of a machine to change the world, having made my career from one that did.Finally, in December 2001, Ginger was unveiled as a … well, a sort of scootery-looking, self-balancing, trolley-like platform transporter thing. Thank God it had a name – Segway – because there’s otherwise no way to save syllables in accurately describing it. I ‘got it’ immediately. Here we had a society with a dominant population of baby boomers, the older of whom were in their mid 50s. There was concern over finite fuels, global warming and social health. The motor car was being vilified.Into this whirred the Segway, a device that basically took the walking out of walking. More to the point, it took 1.8 tonnes and 300 grams of CO2 per kilometre out of walking. Maybe it was living in Paris without (like more than half of Parisians) owning a car, but by then I was already a bit uncool with the idea of driving 500 metres when there were so many other options.Sure, you look like a dick on most of them. I know I do on my kick-scooter or my pushbike. But I’ll excuse anything, except a unicycle. No, Tah’quinn, it does not make you look arty and interesting. And pull your bloody pants up. So I read everything I could about the Segway and gawked and pawed unashamedly when I first saw a Michelin person waltzing with one at a motor show. It balances itself by reacting to the fore-aft pressure of your feet, literally keeping itself underneath you. Steering on these first-gen models was via a simple twist-grip.In no time, though, I noticed that other people weren’t ‘getting’ the Segway at all. I started reading and hearing comments like, “Can you imagine the footpaths teeming with those things? Why, folks will be skittled willy-nilly to the billy-o.” Never mind that a Segway is narrower and much more directionally stable than your average elderly pedestrian. People fretted about falling off one; you are a towering 20 centimetres from the ground.Dumbshit transport authorities went into apoplexy, their 10-dot-per-inch brains unable to process anything outside the silhouette of a Camry. In 2004, Australia, needless to say, rejected applications to import them. Before I knew it, the Segway had turned into the BMW C1 scooter, the Concorde, the Sinclair C5.Anyway, a few weeks ago, I got to have a ride on one. It was the second-generation model, with steering via an even simpler, leaning handlebar column. It was totally great. I could have ridden it with my brain tied behind my back.Riding it restored my faith in cynicism. I recently read a sign on a train in Sydney that stated more than 100 people every year fall through the gap between a train and the platform. ‘It may seem silly…’ began the sticker.Yes, well, it is.

So you’ve had your eye on your dream car for some time but don’t have enough cash right now to drive it out the shop?

Or you’ve been waiting for the right one to come along when you drove past a car yard last weekend and saw ‘the one’, and she was calling out your name? Whatever your story, that car must be yours but if you don’t have enough funds to make it happen, here are some tips on how to own those wheels sooner.

Step 1: The ground work

First things first, you probably already know this after kicking a few tyres, but find out the asking price, then from here you can work out how much money you need to borrow. When deciding on a figure, choose one that you can afford to make the repayments, not too high that you won’t get loan approval or you can’t afford to put petrol in the car.From here you can choose if you want to look at a personal loan or car loan. Usually the car is used as collateral against the loan so the rate is slightly lower than other loans. But it’s worth comparing different rates and deals online to find one with the features that suit your needs.Now, the most timely (and important) part of this whole process is deciding which lender to go with, and let me tell you it pays to compare. Comparing online at financial comparison websites like RateCity takes the pain out of this process. No matter whether the car is new or old all you have to do is choose what to search for, enter the amount, term and which state you reside in then it spits out the results of some of the best deals in town. You can apply online too!So how do I choose the right car loan for me?Start by expanding your horizons and consider the smaller lenders too. They have some great rates and are very competitive.When deciding on car loan lenders, the best tip is to look for the lowest interest rate and the lower the better. But don’t get swayed by this alone as some of the lower interest rate deals may charge more for fees. These may include application fees, monthly fees, annual fees, penalties for early payout or extra payment fees.From here you need to work out how much you will pay back in the long run and which option will save you more. RateCity does the calculations for you showing how much your total repayments will be over the term of the loan, and then add on any additional fees to see which one saves you more.Start haggling!Once you have decided on a few lenders, don’t hold back with haggling because you can negotiate your car loan as much as you would with your car price, especially now that you have done the legwork and know the market.Then before you go any further most lenders will ask for evidence to prove that you are earning the income you state in your application and you can afford the repayments. They will most likely ask for copies of payslips and bank statements – usually for the past six months.Be honest in your application, check you filled it our correctly and most importantly, read all of the fine print in your contract.Once those key are in your hot little hand, won’t your new wheels look that much sweeter knowing that you found the best car loan deal in town to match? Good luck and happy driving!

From the revered Bugatti Type 35 to what is arguably the most successful sports-racing car of the modern era, the Audi R8 Le Mans, we’ve compiled an image gallery of the greatest racing cars of all time. Click through the photo gallery above to look at some of the fastest, most successful and most beautiful race cars in history.

The list so far:

You’d need both a heavyweight accounting degree and unprecedented access to McLaren’s books to work out exactly what an hour of Ron Dennis’s time is worth.

But with the Sunday Times Rich List estimating his net value at A$154m you can guarantee that 60 minutes with the executive chairman of McLaren Automotive isn’t going to be cheap.Yet for this interview he gave us nearly two and a half hours of exclusive access. In an industry where you often have to bid months in advance to get 20 minutes with a big hitter, that’s a refreshing change. But then, Ron Dennis does have plenty of record to set straight.The raw facts of his career are impressive enough. Dennis was an F1 mechanic at the age of 18 and was heading McLaren by his 33rd birthday. He took the team to seven constructors’ championships and 10 drivers’ titles, managing the disparate talents of Alain Prost, Ayrton Senna, Mika Hakkinen and Lewis Hamilton along the way.He also led McLaren into road cars, signing off the creation of the F1 and then – a decade later – persuading Mercedes to entrust his firm with the development of its own vanity-hypercar, the SLR. Now he’s stepped down from running the F1 team to be boss of McLaren Automotive, intent on turning the company into a fully-fledged sports car manufacturer.Oh, and in case you’ve forgotten, he was also on the bridge when McLaren got hit with the biggest fine in the history of motorsport – the $100m levelled in the aftermath of the ‘Spygate’ affair.With the exception of the nine-figure sanction, it’s a CV to rival that of Enzo Ferrari or Colin Chapman. But Dennis’s downbeat public persona has often led people to view him as being less than the sum total of his considerable achievements. His reputation has always been of a careful corporate player, sitting steely-eyed on the pit wall and carefully remembering to thank sponsors afterwards.It’s an impression reinforced by his tendency, whenever a microphone is near, to give long-winded and cautiously-phrased answers to questions. The F1 paddock even coined an expression for it: ‘Ronspeak’.But in his domain – the office that sits at one end of McLaren’s magnificent Technology Centre – Dennis is far more relaxed. Up close he possesses an intense, focused charisma that doesn’t come across on TV – and evidence that a dry sense of humour lurks somewhere in there. So how does he respond to criticism that he lacks passion?“I wouldn’t say it was criticism, I’d say that observation would be a little fairer,” says Dennis, with a wry smile. “I can completely understand, but I can answer it simply: I’ve never seen an angry person effect good judgment. It’s a luxury you can’t afford because it makes you weak.”The other strand of Dennis’s public persona is that of a driven perfectionist, a man who famously ordered the F1 team’s trucks to be parked in Grand Prix paddocks with millimetre-perfect precision.“I always thought that winning races was just doing your job,” he admits. “After that it was a question of how did you win a race, how immaculate was the car, how polished was the driver? How did we present ourselves: did that constitute a good magnet to invest in us?”Dennis tends to pause before delivering his answers. The next question – an apparently simple one – produces one of the longest hesitations: do you regard yourself as a Formula One fan?“I was a fan of the challenge,” he says, carefully. “It’s totally and utterly addictive.” Another of the keys to McLaren’s success under Dennis has been his ability to develop and nurture drivers and engineers. There have been some notable failures – Fernando Alonso’s tempestuous year (2007) with the team probably the best example. But does Dennis agree that his ability to spot talent – including that of his successor as F1 boss, Martin Whitmarsh – has been vital to the team?“All you’re describing is one of the qualities you need to have as an entrepreneur and if you asked me what I wanted written on my tombstone I’d say ‘Ron Dennis, 1947 to so-and-so, one of the world’s greatest entrepreneurs’, not anything to do with motor racing.When you harness talent, by being persuasive, or offering better working conditions, or promising people levels of commitment they might not have experienced before, then you are being entrepreneurial. What you’re doing is putting together the components of success.”Time to skip to 2007 – McLaren’s nightmare season. Schumacher had retired and McLaren had a strong car and what looked like the dream combo of world champ Alonso and fancied newcomer Lewis Hamilton. But then McLaren’s chief designer Mike Coughlin was discovered in possession of a 780-page Ferrari technical dossier that had been passed to him by Nigel Stepney, a senior Ferrari mechanic.The scandal threatened to destroy the team – although Dennis continues to argue that no Ferrari DNA had leaked into the McLaren design – and led to the imposition of that record-breaking fine by the FIA. Dennis’s face clouds when I ask for his version.“We had someone who was in a senior technical position who made some very unwise decisions… there was just a phenomenal naivety and a belief that this was quite common and acceptable. It was clearly two people looking to move as a unit, that’s widely known and well documented. It was never something that he or anybody else did to further the competitiveness of our team.”Dennis does admit that the espionage scandal had a direct effect on his long-planned decision to step down from managing the F1 team – he deferred it for a year. “It was so unpleasant I just didn’t want to stop participating at that point.” But now Martin Whitmarsh has taken over as McLaren’s racing boss and Dennis is giving his considerable attention to the company’s new project – establishing itself as a sports car manufacturer with the new MP4-12C.“Why do we want to become a stand-alone automotive brand?” asks Dennis, his body language loosening as he moves to a favourite subject. “Because history shows the alternative is that you fail. In ’66 I stood in the pitlane in my first Grand Prix, Mexico City, and the only two brands in the pitlane then that are in the pitlane now are McLaren and Ferrari.You can see that manufacturers who do not have Formula One as a core business inevitably have to move in and move out according to the pressures and the commercial realities that they have on them.”Although intensely proud of the McLaren F1, Dennis admits that its limited production (only about 100 of the planned 300 cars were built) meant that it was “…a program, not a car company”.“All of the lessons behind our automotive company have come from our experience of producing the SLR and working with Mercedes-Benz,” he says. Dennis also insists that the final split from Mercedes – with its purchase of the Brawn team – was amicable: “…this is one of those occasions when everybody involved got out in a win-win situation.”Barring the distraction of the SLS, Merc’s own SLR-lite supercar spoiler, McLaren’s target is unashamedly Ferrari. The company plans to produce a range with three models, all built around the same carbonfibre tub, with exclusivity guaranteed by limited numbers.“We never see our production, even in our wildest dreams, going over 5000 units a year,” says Dennis. “Our view is that this is a market which exceeds 100,000 cars a year and our ambition is to achieve three-and-a-half to four percent of that market on a regular basis.”It’s time to wind things up. And there’s a question I’ve been dying to ask: Does Ron Dennis feel regrets? He gives another carefully considered, but clearly heartfelt answer. “You sacrifice a lot to be really good at what you do, not just in sport but in all business. You have to do what the job takes and very often that takes you out of your comfort zone… I think I did a pretty good job at integrating my family into my life and my business and vice versa, but obviously as I’m separated from my wife, I didn’t quite get that right.“If you ask what’s the overwhelming thing I regret, it’s that people have had reason to question my personal integrity or commitment to running the company in an honest way. But, by and large, I look back on my career to date, which is a long way from being finished I might add, and feel very comfortable with the decisions I made.”So how would he respond to a hypothetical comparison with Enzo Ferrari? “To use my name and Enzo Ferrari’s in the same sentence – I couldn’t possibly get my head around it… no one individual ever achieves anything unless he’s surrounded by competent people who gain their own satisfaction from what they do, and who want to be part of the making of history. And I’m just that, I’m a part of it. But I will never take sole responsibility for the success of McLaren because it’s never about one person.”And there’s the addition to Ron’s ‘great entrepreneur’ epitaph: he was, and will always remain, the ultimate team player.