14 Ferrari 458 Italia Spider F1 4k 1 Owner Navigation Rearview Camera on 2040-cars

Auto blog

Daytona decision reversed, Level 5 Motorsports reinstated as class winners [w/video]

After its first ever race at the Rolex 24 at Daytona, we can already tell that there should be plenty of excitement in the newly formed United SportsCar Racing series. Of the four competing classes, three of the winners came down to close last-lap performances, but perhaps none were as close - or controversial - as the GT Daytona (GTD) winner. Spoiler alert.
Midway through the infield portion of the Daytona International Speedway, the Level 5 Motorsports No. 555 Ferrari 458 Italia was trying to hold onto its first-place position over the Flying Lizard Motorsports No. 45 Audi R8. The R8 took an aggressive line trying to pass the Ferrari, and it ended up running out of track and driving off the course momentarily. International Motor Sports Association (IMSA) officials originally thought there was avoidable contact on the Ferrari's part and penalized the team accordingly, which meant Flying Lizard was the class winner. After watching the video replay, though, it was clear that there was no contact between the two cars. Officials overturned the ruling, rightfully giving the Level 5 Motorsports team the Rolex win.
A brief statement from IMSA is posted below regarding the matter, and we've also included a full video recap of the race from FOX Sports where you can see this GTD incident starting at the 2:30 mark.

World Car of the Year finalists announced

To say the 2014 Geneva Motor Show was packed full of news is an understatement as big as the show's home at the Palexpo convention center. Despite everything that we were able to cover during this year's show, there's still more coming out of Switzerland, including the announcement of the finalists for the 2014 World Car of the Year Awards.
We reported on the original list of finalists over three weeks ago, and now, that initial list has been pared down to three finalists for each of the five awards. The finalists were announced at a press conference by frequent Autoblog contributor and co-chair of the awards, Matt Davis (above).
The finalists for the overall title of 2014 World Car of the Year are the Audi A3, the BMW 4 Series and the Mazda3. The World Luxury Car of the Year will be either the Bentley Flying Spur, the Mercedes-Benz S-Class or the Land Rover Range Rover Sport, while the Performance Car of the Year will be awarded to the Chevrolet Corvette Stingray, the Ferrari 458 Speciale or the Porsche 911 GT3 (which, um, yeah...).

Ferrari threatening to fine journalists $69,000 for breaking LaFerrari embargo?

In automotive journalism, we deal with embargoes on a regular basis. For the uninitiated, these are agreements between publications like Autoblog and manufacturers. While news embargoes (where pubs are provided with information and images and agree to hold until a predetermined date) are fairly common, today, we're focusing on drive embargoes. These are what we generally end up signing when we attend a vehicle launch. Generally, these are in the media's best interest. As drive programs are spread out over a week or two with multiple different "waves" of media, drive embargoes put the biggest and smallest publications on level footing when it comes to publishing reviews.
According to a report from Autocar's Steve Sutcliffe, Ferrari has taken its drive embargo for the LaFerrari hypercar a bit too far. See, initial reviews from the few publications that attended the drive event for the hybrid-powered monster can hit the newsstand or internet on April 30. Originally, syndicated stories - those sold by freelancers or publications to other outlets - couldn't be published until May 12. These syndicated reviews are big money for larger magazines and, in the case of freelance journalists, are a primary source of revenue. Inexplicably, though, Ferrari has pushed the syndication embargo back to May 26, which is bad news for everyone involved (aside from Ferrari).
This could have been nothing more than an annoyance. The stories would still get sold (although it might be for a bit less coin, considering the initial reviews will be nearly a month old) and you'll still be bombarded by reviews of the LaFerrari not once, but twice, just as Ferrari planned.