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Lexus LC 500 dominates 2016 EyesOn Design Awards

The Lexus LC 500 captured top honors for the best-designed production car and the best interior at the 10th annual EyesOn Design awards at the Detroit Auto Show. The awards are handed out by the Detroit Institute of Ophthalmology. The Buick Avista won the concept car category, just as its four-door predecessor, the Avenir, did last year. Other winners this year included the Chrysler Pacifica, which won for the best-designed production "truck" (as crossovers and minivans are sometimes categorized), and the Audi H-Tron Quattro, which won for the best concept truck. The Acura Precision concept was also recognized for its "innovative use of color, graphics, and materials." And the new Volvo S90 was singled out for its human-machine interface. The panel of jurists this year included designers from an array of automakers and art schools. Several past honorees for the organization's LifeTime Design Achievement Award participated in the voting, including GM's Wayne Cherry, BMW DesignworksUSA founder Chuck Pelly, Hyundai's Peter Schreyer, and Jack Telnack (formerly of Ford). Telnack also served on the select panel of chief judges this year, alongside Chris Chapman from Hyundai, Dave Marek from Acura, and Stewart Reed from the Art Center College of Design. Lexus Takes 2 and Buick Wins Best Concept For 2nd Year at EyesOn Design Awards at NAIAS January 12, 2016, Detroit, Michigan. A panel of design leaders representing worldwide automotive manufacturers and transportation design chiefs from top design schools around the globe today selected these vehicles to receive the following EyesOn Design Awards at the North American International Auto Show: * Production Car: 2017 Lexus LC500 * Production Truck: 2017 Chrysler Pacifica * Concept Car: Buick Avista Concept * Concept Truck: Audi h-tron Quattro Concept * Best Designed Interior: 2017 Lexus LC500 * Innovative Use of Color, Graphics and Materials: Acura Precision Concept * Human Machine Interface: 2017 Volvo S90 Chief Judges were: Chris Chapman of Hyundai, Dave Marek of Acura, Stewart Reed of ArtCenter College of Design, and Jack Telnack of Ford Motor Company (retired). 2016 marks the tenth year the EyesOn Design Awards have been an integral part of the North American International Auto Show. Related Video: Featured Gallery 2016 EyesOn Design Award Winners News Source: EyesOn Design Detroit Auto Show Acura Audi Buick Chrysler Lexus Volvo chrysler pacifica volvo s90 lexus lc 500 acura precision concept

The real reason Audi races

The world has watched Audi have its way with endurance racing since 1998. What started as an intriguing race winner in 2000 that could be rebuilt so quickly that the ACO oversight organization changed the rules to slow Audi mechanics down, slowly morphed into a unique assassin, employing novel engineering methods to achieve series domination with its R18 E-Tron Quattro. Until recently. It's strange, then, that for all these years we didn't fully comprehend Audi's stated approach to motorsport. And so we sat down with Dr. Wolfgang Ulrich, head of Audi Motorsport, and Chris Reinke, head of Le Mans Prototype development while in Austin, TX, for the Lone Star Le Mans and World Endurance Championship race for answers. BMW, Corvette, Porsche, and Ferrari have healthy reputations, lucrative option sheets, and supported a robust trade in special editions by winning races. They have standalone racing divisions and they transfer the entire sheen of their racing endeavors to their road cars, a healthy part of what their customers buy into. Even though we know they improve their road cars with lessons learned racing, the belief is that they race because that's just what they do; those brand names mean racing. "Not one single euro is spent on a separate motorsports program." Yet Reinke said that for Audi, "Not one single euro is spent on a separate motorsports program. We [Audi Motorsport] are part of the Technical Department [of the road car company]. We are a pre-development lab for road-relevant technology." As in, Audi isn't racing out of core philosophy, it's racing only to improve its road cars. That helps explain why Audi's entire road car lineup doesn't bask in the same racing aura as those other brands even though Audi has been racing since it was called Horch. It's not a racing brand, it's a technology brand. Said Ulrich, "Instead of components, look at technologies – not lights, but lighting technologies, not engines, but engine technologies, like injection pressure technology is the same from the race car to the road car." That's nowhere near as exciting as, "Win on Sunday, sell on Monday," but it is arguably much more practical. Quattro is the most obvious example of racing tech for the street. For a less obvious one, Reinke said, "Audi Motorsport developed codes for computational fluid dynamics, and then we'd run the calculations on the Technical Department computers at night.

Next-gen Audi Q7 shows off its wares ahead of Detroit

Audi has put the Q7 on a massive diet, trimming over 700 pounds. Meet what is sure to be one of the bigger debuts at the upcoming 2015 Detroit Auto Show. The next-generation Audi Q7 has been the subject of spy shots and conjecture for quite some time. After all, it was easily the oldest vehicle in the Audi range, having hit the market way back in 2006. But with this new model, Audi has comprehensively updated its fullsizer, adding some cutting-edge tech, updating some classic engines, and taking a whole lot out. As is the theme nowadays, particularly among large crossovers and SUVs, Audi has put the Q7 on a massive diet with a mix of ultra-high-strength, hot-shaped steel and aluminum, trimming over 700 pounds of body fat and lowering the Q7's weight to just under 4,400 pounds. This was accomplished while maintaining virtually identical dimensions to the current model. While Audi USA hasn't released its info on the Q7, the Euro-spec model will continue to offer a pair of engines that should be very familiar to US consumers, with a 3.0-liter, supercharged V6 gas engine and a 3.0-liter TDI V6. The European engines, though, have had their CO2 emissions halved, while actually increasing performance (we should expect similar from the US engines). The 3.0-liter TDI has been bumped up from 240 horsepower to 272 ponies, while torque is up from 406 pound-feet to 443. The 3.0-liter TDI has been bumped up from 240 horsepower to 272 ponies, while torque is up from 406 pound-feet to 443. This extra grunt has trimmed the 0-60 time from a leisurely 7.3 seconds down to 6.3, while the fuel economy has jumped up to 41.3 US miles per gallon, converted from the European cycle (so expect the EPA numbers to be a bit lower). The supercharged 3.0-liter, meanwhile, has been amped up to match the output of its application in the S4 sport sedan, jumping from 280 hp and 295 lb-ft to 333 ponies and 325 lb-ft. Once again, the 0-60 time falls dramatically thanks to the power bump and weight loss, dropping from 7.7 seconds to a far more zippy 6.1. The most exciting news is the long-rumored arrival of the Q7 E-Tron, a plug-in hybrid that's mated to a six-cylinder diesel engine and Quattro all-wheel drive. Audi claims this world-first production powertrain will return 138.4 US miles per gallon, emit less than 50 grams of CO2 per kilometer and allow the Q7 E-Tron to travel up to 35 miles on electric power alone.