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IIHS Top Safety Pick and Top Safety Pick+ awards get tougher: Here are the latest winners

Automakers love to trumpet the accolades from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, but the agency keeps making its best grades harder to achieve. For 2020, it is raising the bar again, requiring a better score in the passenger-side small-overlap crash test, wider availability of top-performing headlights, and automatic emergency braking systems that effectively avoid collisions with pedestrians, in addition to its previous benchmarks. Why the 2020 criteria is harder: To be named either a Top Safety Pick or Top Safety Pick+, the required performance in the passenger-side small-overlap crash test has been raised from Acceptable to Good, meaning that the model must achieve Good ratings in all crash tests. The Nissan Rogue, for example, scored an Acceptable in the passenger-side small overlap crash, and so it loses its Top Safety Pick rating for 2020. To achieve either of the top ratings, a vehicle's automatic emergency braking system must effectively avoid hitting pedestrians as well as other vehicles. (The automatic emergency braking system can be optional, but then the award applies to the model only when so equipped.) Any vehicle whose automatic emergency braking system does not include pedestrian detection would lose its TSP or TSP+ rating for 2020, the Ram 1500 being one example. To be named a Top Safety Pick+, the model can have no variant with headlights that achieve less than an Acceptable rating (most new cars have different headlights — often LEDs — that are exclusive to upper trim levels).

Hyundai Ioniq Hybrid plus nitrous equals FIA speed record

As Hyundai prepares its trio of Ioniq electrified cars for sale in the US, the Korean automaker is taking the opportunity to showcase its strengths. One thing that definitely doesn't hurt its pre-launch standing in the eyes of potential customers is an FIA-ratified land speed record. As you'll see in the video above, Hyundai took a race-prepped Ioniq Hybrid prototype out to the Bonneville Salt Flats, where there are no speed limits or concrete barriers to hold it back. The result was a new record for a production-based hybrid, at 157.825 mph. The car also achieved a peak exit speed of 160.7 mph. To push the limits of the eco-focused Ioniq Hybrid, Hyundai boosted power and decreased resistance. In terms of output, the company's Engineering and Quality team added low-restriction intake and exhaust systems, minimized parasitic losses by removing the air conditioning and other systems, remapped the ECU, and added a freakin' nitrous injection system from Nitrous Express. They swapped the standard hybrid model grille for that of the all-electric Ioniq, tweaked the underbody and air dam for aero, and stripped or otherwise modified interior components for weight. The lowered ride height (thanks to a Progress Competition coil-over suspension) and Goodyear Eagle rubber wrapped around aero wheels were a final visual testament to this hybrid's singular purpose. For the sake of the driver, the Ioniq received a safety cage, racing seat, six-point harness, and fire suppression system. Finally – and while style points aren't part of the FIA record — the Ioniq was equipped with a racing parachute, which looks impressive on video, especially when you remember this car will be a fuel miser for the masses when it goes on sale later this year. "We couldn't be more proud in setting the FIA hybrid-category record with our new Ioniq hybrid," says Hyundai VP of Corporate and Product Planning Mike O'Brien. "Our engineering team really pushed the limits to set this new segment benchmark while demonstrating the impressive durability of the entire Ioniq vehicle platform. We expect this will be the first of many accolades for Ioniq." Related Video: Related Gallery Hyundai Ioniq Hybrid Sets FIA Land Speed Record At Bonneville View 10 Photos News Source: Hyundai, YouTube: HyundaiUSA Green Motorsports Hyundai Hybrid Videos fia land speed record hyundai ioniq ioniq

How the Blue Link Apple Watch app talks to Hyundai Sonata PHEV

Getting all of our electronic gadgets to talk to each other is the technologist utopia normally called the Internet of Things. Cars are no strangers to this new Internet and that means that your smartphone is getting more and more chatty with any number of vehicles, especially plug-in vehicles. The new 2016 Hyundai Sonata Plug-In Hybrid is the latest that can communicate with your phone, and it also has a new-found ability to talk to smart watches. We talked with Hyundai's manager of connected care publicity, Miles Johnson, about the new features in the Apple Watch app during out recent test drive of the Sonata PHEV. To be honest, there's nothing groundbreaking in the new Blue Link Apple Watch app except that it works on your wrist instead of your palm – you can see the state of charge and be guided to your car in a crowded parking lot – but we're still in favor of anything that makes electric vehicles seem one step ahead of your non-connected ride. You can get an up-close and personal look at the new app's capabilities in the video above and read our first drive of the PHEV and the standard hybrid here.