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Ken Block's Gymkhana 8 to feature Dubai Police cars?

Yesterday we showed you the shiny Ford Fiesta that Ken Block will slide, spin, and hoon through the next Gymkhana video. In case the image above isn't clear, that video will drop at midnight EST on February 30th on the Ford Performance YouTube channel. We don't know all the entire premise of the video yet, but this Tweet from the man himself reveals that the video will be set in Dubai. Block is standing on the Fiesta we saw yesterday, and arrayed behind him are a handful of those famous Dubai Police cars you're probably familiar with. The force has a fleet of sportscars and supercars, and the purpose is outreach and goodwill among its citizenry, not necessarily the pursuit of criminals. This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings. From left to right, we can see a Maserati GranTurismo, Porsche 911, what looks to be a Nissan GT-R obscured by Block's Fiesta, a McLaren (likely a 650S), Ford Mustang, and a Ferrari 599 of some ilk. Will they take part? Maybe Block will try and run from what might be the most horsepower-intensive police fleet in the world. We'll have answers (and a few minutes of pure Block hooniganism) in a few days. Related Video:

Romania's Forza Rossa to join 2016 F1 grid

Bazac's Maranello ties have prompted speculation that Forza Rossa could be as closely affiliated with Ferrari as Hass. Formula One may be in a bit of a crisis at the moment, with two of its smaller teams collapsing into bankruptcy, but there may yet be light at the end of the proverbial tunnel as two new teams are gearing up to take their place. One of those teams is Forza Rossa, and while we haven't much anything about the Romanian entry in in recent months, a new report from Pitpass indicates that plans are well under way – if not without their complications. Forza Rossa is being backed by a number of Romanian parties, including veteran race strategist Colin Kolles (who was most recently involved in the Caterham buyout) and Ion Bazac, former government minister and Ferrari's Romanian importer (pictured above next to Giancarlo Fisichella). Interestingly, the latter's ties to Maranello have prompted speculation that the team could be at least as closely affiliated with Ferrari as Haas (the American team being started by industrial machinery magnate and NASCAR team owner Gene Haas). A third Romanian individual – former soccer player Constantin Cojocar – turns out to have been the one who bought Caterham Sports Ltd, the company which designed and built the cars for the Caterham F1 Team until its recent collapse. The plan was to supply chassis and components to both Caterham and Forza Rossa, but Cojocar evidently had trouble paying the bills and keeping the lights on. Caterham's bankruptcy, however, could present a golden opportunity for Forza Rossa to scoop up the assets of both the team and the manufacturer at a good price, building the new team on the burnt foundations of the old one – even if it has already been granted the go-ahead by the FIA to form its own entry. That, however, won't happen until 2016 at the earliest, whittling down the grid in the meantime from 22 cars to 18. According to the arrangement between the FIA, Formula One Management and the teams, that threshold would oblige at least the leading teams to make up the lost places on the grid by fielding a third car each – something they couldn't prepare in time for US Grand Prix this past weekend, but which could be put into action for next season.

Ferrari 458 Speciale speeds toward Frankfurt

When the doors open at the Frankfurt Motor Show in a few weeks, there'll be loads of new cars and new versions of existing ones. And as far as the latter category goes at least, this will undoubtedly be what show-goers will look forward to most.
What we have here is the Ferrari 458 Speciale - the successor to the 360 Challenge Stradale and 430 Scuderia, and the hard-core version of the 458 Italia. It was expected to carry the name Monte Carlo, but then Ferrari has never been fond of letting the press dictate what it would call its cars. But forget the nameplate: what really matters is what it's got to offer.
For starters, the award-winning, high-revving 4.5-liter V8 has been retuned to deliver 605 cv (596 hp by our standards), up from 562 hp in the standard 458, while torque remains the same at 398 lb-ft. But the other side of the power-to-weight ratio (quoted at 2.13 kg/cv) is the extra mass Ferrari has cut out of the equation: the 458 Speciale's dry weight is quoted at 1,290 kg (2,844 lbs), representing a significant drop from the 458 Italia's 1,485 kg (3,274 lb) curb weight.