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Mercedes chief invites Audi, BMW to compete in F1

Mercedes-Benz didn't just win the Formula One World Championship in 2014 – it positively dominated it. The team won all but three of the grands prix this season, scoring a one-two finish at more than half of them and landing at least one car on the podium at every race without exception. It goes without saying, then, that the German automaker thrives on competition, but now it's welcoming even more. Speaking with Germany's Sport Bild at its homecoming celebration in Stuttgart, Daimler chief Dieter Zetsche welcomed Mercedes' biggest rivals Audi and BMW to join it on the F1 grid. Noting that the three German brands share some 80 percent of the market for luxury automobiles, Zetsche said that F1 would make a natural arena of competition for Mercedes, Audi and BMW to fight for top bragging rights. The three currently compete against each other in front of home audiences in the DTM touring car series – effectively Germany's equivalent to NASCAR – but of the ten races held this year, the majority were in Germany itself, and all of them took place in Europe. BMW last competed in F1 when it bought the Sauber team in 2006, but withdrew from the series in 2009. Despite its progenitor Auto Union having fielded the famous Silver Arrows in pre-war grand prix racing, Audi has never been a player in modern F1 racing, though recent rumors have linked it to a potential foray – spurred by the arrival of sister-company Porsche on its home turf at Le Mans, the departure of several of its key endurance drivers and the hiring of former Scuderia Ferrari chief Stefano Domenicali. Porsche had similarly considered an F1 program before getting the go-ahead to compete with Audi at Le Mans. As for the prospect of Mercedes competing in other international racing series, Zetsche added that year-long preparations for 24 hours of racing at Le Mans didn't present a good cost-benefit ratio in his estimation, but that Formula E (where Audi currently supports a quasi-works entry) would be worth a closer look.

2015 Mercedes-Benz S550 PHEV offers the best of both worlds it's ready to conquer

The Mercedes-Benz S-Class just keeps growing – both in terms of dimensions and in terms of variants. Nevermind the S-Class Coupe for a moment and focus only on the sedan: in North America alone, you can get the big Benz in S550, S600, S63 and S65 spec, and at the Los Angeles Auto Show this year, Daimler has rolled out the new Maybach version as well. But if it's a more environmentally friendly way to woosh around town in serene luxury that you're after, you'll want to look at the new S550 Plug-In Hybrid. Joining Daimler's growing range of battery-powered models alongside the E400 Hybrid, B-Class Electric Drive and Smart ED (the latter soon to be replaced by an all-new version), the S550 PHEV is the German automaker's first plug-in hybrid. It was first announced over a year ago and made its debut at the Frankfurt Motor Show last year, but now the US-spec car is making its North American debut in LA. Promising "the performance of a V8 and the fuel consumption of a compact model," the S550 PHEV pairs a 3.0-liter twin-turbo V6 to an 80-kW electric motor, the S550 PHEV packs a combined 436 horsepower and 479 pound-feet of torque to reach 62 in just 5.2 seconds, top out at 130 miles per hour or drive up to 20 miles on electric mode alone. On the European combined cycle, it'll return an impressive 84 miles per gallon, all the while never skimping on the luxury. Scope it out in our gallery of photos from the show floor in LA and delve into the details in the press release below. First PLUG-IN HYBRID with a star: S550 PLUG-IN HYBRID The new Mercedes-Benz S550 PLUG-IN HYBRID blends an ultramodern hybrid drive configuration with the unique innovations and the luxurious equipment and appointments of the S-Class. The luxury sedan impresses with exceptional dynamism and efficiency. Thanks to standard pre-entry climate control it also offers unique climate comfort. The first certified three-liter luxury sedan in the world is a further milestone on the road to emission-free mobility. "The S550 PLUG-IN HYBRID is the first luxury sedan with the performance of a V8 and the fuel consumption of a compact model. The greatest challenge in this is to translate efficiency into superior performance. In this respect there is a highly interesting parallel with our successful Formula 1 racing car, which likewise has a turbocharged V6 engine and a high-tech hybrid drive," says Prof. Dr.

2015 Italian Grand Prix is smoke, mirrors, stalls, and stewards

For the first day-and-a-half of the Italian Formula One Grand Prix weekend, everything went to blueprint: Mercedes in front, Ferrari lurking, everyone else scrambling in their usual orders behind. Then qualifying came, and someone stirred the pot. About the only thing we expected was for Lewis Hamilton to put his Mercedes-AMG Petronas on pole position, the 11th time he's done it this year. He did it with a brand-new specification engine, one that represents not only an evolution in components, but also in power unit philosophy. Kimi Raikkonen lines up in second. It's been a long time since we read those words; the Iceman hasn't been on the first row since the 2013 Chinese Grand Prix, when he put his Lotus second on the grid behind... Lewis Hamilton. Raikkonen lined up just ahead of a Ferrari at that China race, then driven by Fernando Alonso. In Italy this weekend, he lined up in front of the Ferrari driven by his teammate, Sebastian Vettel, who qualified third. Both Ferraris benefitted from an upgraded power unit, ending a front-row drought for the scuderia that goes all the way back to Monaco in 2009 Germany in 2012. Nico Rosberg has a lot of work to do from fourth in the second Mercedes-AMG Petronas. Mercedes discovered a problem with Rosberg's engine but couldn't figure out the cause, so he reverted to the previous-spec engine he used in Belgium, one that's six races old. The lack of power hurt. Williams teammates Felipe Massa and Valtteri Bottas took fifth and sixth, with Massa seemingly given a team-ordered helping hand. Williams told Bottas to tow Massa down the front straight, giving Massa a blistering time in the first sector. Then Bottas did it again, ensuring he would line up behind Massa. The first Sahara Force India of Sergio Perez nabbed seventh, three places ahead of teammate Nico Hulkenberg in tenth, with Romain Grosjean in the Lotus behind Perez in eighth. Marcus Ericsson in the Sauber qualified ninth, but some clumsy driving saw him impede Hulkenberg twice. The stewards penalized Ericsson with a three-place grid penalty and two points on his superlicense, so Hulkenberg inherited ninth and Pastor Maldonado in the second Lotus inherited tenth. We hardly saw Hamilton during the race, because he led from the start, worked up a larger gap to second place on every lap, and didn't give up the lead for the whole event.