2016 Rolls-royce Ghost Series Ii Sedan 4d on 2040-cars

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Top Gear has an Extra Gear problem | Episode Review

When the BBC announced Extra Gear, I was excited. As an avid fan of show's like The Talking Dead – companion show to AMC's hit The Walking Dead – a behind-the-scenes look at my favorite motoring show sounded promising. But with the fifth episodes of each show, I'm worried that Top Gear is suffering to keep Extra Gear interesting. We'll start with Chris Evans, inarguably the most heavily criticized member of the new Top Gear team. Evans is progressively less shouty and more comfortable filming while driving in each episode – the fifth is no different. He's almost likable in the Zenos E10 video, like a ginger James May, and he delivers accurate and eloquent driving impressions. The review is entertaining, until Extra Gear shows the producers cut a huge element – an old-versus-new sprint around the Race of Champions circuit at the Olympic Stadium in London. Former Formula 1 ace David Coulthard would drive a Caterham 360, while current F1 pro Daniel Riccardo rocked the Zenos. If the entire premise of Evans review is that the Zenos E10 is the newest of the new for British super-lightweight track toys, why did the producers decide to leave a race against the segment's standard bearer for Extra Gear? It's a baffling move, cutting a segment of the film that reinforces Evans' excitement over the Zenos. Rory Reid's Jaguar F-Type SVR piece is excellent. Fifty five years to the day after Jaguar test driver Norman Dewis raced to the Geneva Motor Show in a second E-Type for display, Reid would attempt the same feat in an SVR. If he failed, Jaguar wouldn't have a car to display. Dewis made the 750-mile trip with 13 hours of notice, and Reid would need to do the same. It's a brilliant, simple premise that reminded me of Jeremy Clarkson's so-called "Race against God" in a Jaguar XJ, way back in season 16. The history of the challenge and Dewis' gravelly commentary add gravitas. But the entire film goes by so fast. It's longer than Evans' Zenos video or Harris' BMW M2 film, but at less than ten minutes, Reid and the SVR deserved more screen time. Extra Gear poured salt in that particular wound with a great segment featuring Norman Dewis that deserved to be in the main show. Reid takes the famed test driver for a spin around the Dunsfold track, then, instead of the comedian of the week, the hosts interview Dewis on Extra Gear's couch.

New Rolls-Royce Boat Tail shows off coachbuilding chops of the Phantom platform

Rolls-Royce is flexing the coachbuilding muscles of its highly versatile new Phantom platform with this gorgeous Boat Tail commission. Rolls-Royce claims the build required the fabrication of more than 1,800 unique parts and 20 years of combined man-hours to complete.  Even by Rolls-Royce standards, this is pretty ambitious stuff. The commission was inspired by a 1932 Rolls-Royce Boat Tail, and like the original, it was inspired by, well, boats. Shocking, right? The trim elements both inside and out (Caleidolegno veneer, if you're curious) were designed to be reminiscent of the teak decking you'd see on a wooden yacht. "Today marks a seminal moment for the House of Rolls-Royce. We are proud to unveil Rolls-Royce Boat Tail to the world, and with it, the confirmation of coachbuilding as a permanent fixture within our future portfolio," said Rolls-Royce CEO Torsten Muller-Otvos in the Boat Tail announcement.  "We have formally re-established our Coachbuild department for those patrons who wish to go beyond the existing restraints, and explore the almost limitless possibilities this opens up for them," Muller-Otvos said previously. "We are able to offer our customers the opportunity to create a motor car in which every single element is hand-built to their precise individual requirements, as befits our status as a true luxury house." There are quite a few bespoke accessories as well, though apart from the full picnic service shown in some of the pics (there doesn't appear to be much of a trunk — sorry, boot), most of it was left out of the promotional materials. Most notably absent are the custom his-and-hers Bovet 1822 timepieces that were commissioned alongside the car. They can be either mounted in the dash or worn on the wrist (of course), but we see only a glimpse of one in the top-down image Rolls-Royce provided.

Rolls-Royce Wraith revealed, ready to battle Bentley

Bentley may have rounded out the redesign of its Continental line of cars with the new Flying Spur four-door's debut at this week's Geneva Motor Show, but Rolls-Royce has shown up in Switzerland with the Wraith, a GT coupe version of the Ghost sedan that moves the brand one step closer to having an answer for everything that wears a Flying B.
The Wraith's natural combatant would be Bentley's Continental GT Coupe, though as all Rollers come in orders of magnitude more expensive than their already costly competitors from Crewe, the new coupe's €245,000 initial starting price will be $100k USD more than the base price of the most expensive Continental, a GT Speed coupe.
What your CEO bonus money will get you is a 624-bhp V12 engine cranking out 590 pound-feet of torque. The sprint to 60 miles per hour will pass by in 4.4 seconds, with a unique 8-speed ZF automatic transmission snapping off shifts using a new Satellite Aided Transmission technology that works with GPS to pre-select the right gear for not only the road you're on, but the road you'll be coming up on ahead.