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EVO "2012 Car of the Year: The Track Battles" is a sports car salmagundi

EVO has come out with another gotta-watch-it video, throwing its 2012 Car of the Year contestants around the UK's 1.5-mile Blyton Park track. It's actually a 15-minute teaser for the full-length DVD detailing the magazine's Car of the Year selection, but the tease is worth every penny free second.
Tiff Needell and sports car racer Richard Meaden handle the wheel duties, the two driving five pairs of sports cars: Lotus Exige S vs. Porsche Boxster S, Morgan Three-Wheeler vs. Toyota GT86, BMW M135i vs. Porsche 911, Mercedes-Benz C63 AMG Black Series vs. Alpina B3 GT3, the marquee event pits the McLaren MP4-12C vs. the Pagani Huayra. After a head-to-head lap with commentary during drifts, Meaden takes each car out to set a representative lap time.
You'll find the verdicts, lots of tire smoke, and lines like "Anything you can do sideways I can do sideways" in the video below.

James Bond Lotus Esprit submarine car headed to auction [w/video]

We've covered many cars from the movies and TV that have made their way to auction (the original Batmobile, good old General Lee and even Bond's iconic Aston Martin DB5), but this one ranks up there among the rarest and coolest. RM Auctions has just announced that the Lotus Esprit submarine car used in the James Bond film The Spy Who Loved Me has been added to the docket for its upcoming auction in London, September 8-9.
Of course, there are dozens of Bond cars floating around out there in collections, but none as unique as this Lotus, which ended a chase scene in the movie by taking a long walk off a short pier and transforming itself into a submersible. Since CGI was a meaningless collection of letters back then, the producers of the film actually built a fully functional Lotus Esprit submarine for the shoot. They hired Perry Oceangraphic in Florida to turn one of their six Esprit body shells into a fully functioning submarine, and former US Navy Seal Don Griffin was tapped for piloting duties. RM Auctions claims the Esprit submarine cost over $100,000 to build at the time, which is about $400,000 in today's dollars.
The submarine car comes with a incredible story, too. After filming in the '70s, it was shipped to Long Island, NY where it was kept in a storage unit that was paid in advance for ten years. When the storage contract ended in 1989 and no one claimed the contents, they were sold off in a blind auction to an area couple who had no idea what they were getting. The car has been shown occasionally in the years since, but its value remained purely speculative, until now. To date, the most valuable Bond car we know of is the original Aston Martin DB5 used in Goldfinger and Thunderball that sold for $4.6 million in 2010, but when the gavel falls at RM Auctions' London sale in September, we'll find out if the car nicknamed "Wet Nellie" on set can beat it.

Born-again Lotus Esprit will be a hybrid in more ways than one

Volvo parent company Geely is helping Lotus end its drought of new products. The storied British company is allegedly developing a mid-engined hybrid coupe it will position as a spiritual successor to the Esprit. The yet-unnamed model will slot above the existing Evora as a more usable and more refined alternative, according to sources who spoke to Autocar. It will ride on a modified Evora platform, but the two cars won't look anything alike; the upcoming hybrid will liberally borrow styling cues from the electric Evija hypercar.  The planned gasoline-electric powertrain will make the coupe a hybrid in more ways than one. The space directly behind the two-seater cabin will be occupied by a V6 sourced from the Toyota parts bin, and the electrified portion of the system will consist mainly of components provided by Volvo. An output over the 500-horsepower mark is likely, but more specific technical specifications remain guarded. What's nearly certain is that the Lotus engineering team will go to significant lengths to offset the weight added by the lithium-ion battery pack. Insiders described the coupe as a stop-gap between the current-generation Lotus models, including the Elise still sold in many global markets, and an array of upcoming sports cars that will ride on a new platform. Another one of the company's future models is an SUV — its first — built on Volvo bones and aimed at the Porsche Macan.  Lotus will introduce its mid-engined coupe during the first half of 2021, still according to Autocar, and sales will begin shortly after. It's too early to tell whether the model will be sold in the United States, but the company has previously indicated it wants to broaden its foothold in our market in order to grow, so we'd bet on seeing it here. This isn't the first time Lotus has tried to reboot the Esprit. In 2010, under the leadership of Dany Bahar, the company took the Paris auto show by storm when it unveiled five close-to-production concept cars including one that previewed a modern-day Esprit. The project was far too ambitious and none of the models shown in the French capital made it to production. In 2012, Lotus vehemently refuted rumors claiming it had canceled the Esprit, which was penciled-in for a 2013 launch, but hindsight is 20/20. Time will tell if two's the charm.