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Dax Shephard, Lamborghini Super Trofeo racer?

Dax Shepard is no Paul Newman, nor even Patrick Dempsey, but he has a pretty cool gig mixed with plenty of acting and racing. While you might know him from Hollywood comedies like Employee of the Month and Hit & Run, the Michigan native now seems to be dabbling in road racing after competing in the Lamborghini Blancpain Super Trofeo North America, and to celebrate, Lamborghini has issued a new short video introducing Shepard and kicking off its new pro-am racing series.
Like many kids of the '70s and early '80s, Shepard's love of cars can be traced back to a Lamborghini Countach, and, fittingly, his first time road racing in a car happened to be in a Lamborghini - an experience he comically suggests would be like another sort of "first time" with Selma Hayek. In addition a few chuckles, the video posted below also gives us some of our first racing footage of the Super Trofeo North America's opening weekend at Lime Rock in early July, in which Shepard grabbed a third-place finish.

Lamborghini chief stands by V12s

Despite the push for fuel efficiency and low carbon emissions, the V12 is still a staple of high performance. Ferrari, Mercedes-Benz, Aston Martin, and yes, Lamborghini maintain fleets of these monstrous dinosaur engines. And for the final entry on that list, that's not going to change. Lamborghini CEO Stefano Domenicali sat down with Autocar and explained in no uncertain terms that his company will continue to offer V12s for the time being. "Our major customers and dealers around the world say: 'Please do not touch the V12'," Domenicali told Autocar. "So we will continue to work in that direction." But there's more than just customer demand driving Lambo's V12 loyalty. According to Domenicali, the company's niche is small enough to weather V12-ruining storms. "In the short term, there is still a lot of development potential in the V12," Domenicali told Autocar. "Of course, we need to understand what the market is doing in terms of emissions and legislation, but I don't see that will be a problem. We are always very open to how the market might evolve." That evolution, lately, has tended toward electrification. The flagship of Lambo's arch-nemesis Ferrari pairs a 12-cylinder engine with a hybrid system for blistering performance. Then there's the stuff happening with the V8-powered Porsche 918 Spyder and McLaren P1. These three hybrids are in an entirely different and more potent performance (and price) class than Lamborghini's hottest model, the Aventador LP750-4 SV. Hybrids are the future of performance, for Lamborghini included... Eventually. "We cannot be disconnected to the world of the future but we want to be balanced," Domenicali said. "We need to make sure that as soon as the technology of electrification is relevant to our car at a cost level, and will add value, we are flexible to shift in that direction." Finally, Domenicali addressed advanced connectivity systems while parrying Autocar's question about autonomous vehicles. "If you own a Lamborghini, you want to have the passion of driving it and we need to keep that. But new technology could have some relevance to the driver. For example, if you are on a race track, you could have a head-up display which shows you how to maximize your performance [around a corner], using the telemetry we have now," Domenicali told AC. "That's an approach where I see that technology could be very useful for our customer." Related Video:

The Huracan Performante is still a supercar steal, regardless of 'Ring time validity

When Lamborghini released video of its new Huracan Performante lapping the Nurburgring in a stunning 6:52, not everyone was convinced the record was honest. As a result, Lamborghini's director of research and development provided some data to Roadshow to shore up the lap time claim. He addressed the tire issue by telling Roadshow that the car used the optional Pirelli Trofeo Rs. And he noted that it was quicker than its more powerful brother, the Aventador SV, because it cornered and accelerated faster. He even provided VBox data of the lap. The thing is, none of this really matters in the end, particularly for the Huracan. Let us explain. For one thing, if you're going to question the Performante's time, you should question all of the times. All of these records are presented by the manufacturers, so there isn't a truly impartial party measuring the results and inspecting cars. Even with a company presenting plenty of data and explanations, it's hard to be 100 percent sure everything is on the level without an unbiased third party inspecting the cars before and after the lap, and keeping timing. But besides the issue of impartiality, the times themselves aren't really important. As interesting and fun as it is to compare lap times at the Nurburgring, they're really only relevant for rich owners and car companies to brag, and for less-rich fans to bench race. That's not a bad thing, but to look at the lap time of one single track doesn't really give a full picture of a car's performance. A car that's fast at the Nurburgring could be really slow on a tight course like Streets of Willow Springs. There's also the issue of who's driving the car. The manufacturers put their top drivers out on the 'Ring to set times. If you're not a factory test driver, you'll probably never go that fast even if you did get your car to the track. It's all a bit like the silly "blind" or two-wheeled car records. They don't actually provide much info on what the car is really like, or how you could drive it. Even if you're not on board with this explanation, and trust all the 'Ring records except this Lamborghini, we still have a reason why it doesn't matter. You see, even if you're convinced that there's no way the Huracan could best the Porsche 918 Spyder and the Aventador around the Nordschleife, it's still a screaming supercar bargain. The Porsche is a million-dollar car, and the Aventador, just the base model, is $125,000 more than the Huracan Performante.