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Episode 83: Monterey Pod Week
Episode 83: Monterey Pod Week
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About this episode
Monterey Car Week is back, and the hosts dive into the excitement surrounding the events, particularly the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance. Rory shares his experiences and expectations, including the allure of classic cars and the high-stakes auctions. The conversation touches on the contradictions of enjoying such opulence while critiquing the automotive industry's elite culture. The episode also features discussions about personal car projects, including Rory's ongoing struggles with his 911, and the challenges of maintaining classic vehicles in today's market. Humor and camaraderie shine through as they navigate the complexities of car culture.
Topics:
monterey car week
pebble beach
classic cars
auctions
car culture
personal projects
911 maintenance
automotive elite
Cars:
Ferrari 250 GTO
Ford Model T
Lotus Esprit
Mazda MX-5 / Miata
McLaren 650S
McLaren 720S
McLaren 765LT
McLaren F1
Porsche 356
Porsche 911
Porsche 914
Shelby Cobra
Step briefly back in the timestream to before Monterey Car Week 2025. We caught Rory just before he left town, and if you want his report, you'll have to go pick up ep. 84 on the Patreon feed. Also: press F in chat for the SC63, remember that ICE agents are not people, and what's new with our #1 frenemy?
Subscribe to the Alloy newsletter to keep up with Rory & Fernando, who are here to fix your internet: https://alloymag.com/
Pre-order Peter's new record Half-Staff Blues here: https://peterpeterhughes.bandcamp.com/album/half-staff-blues
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Technical
Too Afraid to Ask
Car
Porsche 356
"...it's a place where it's like if you see a Porsche 356 Speedster on the street, you're like, oh, that's ..."
Car
Shelby Cobra
"... normally if you see a Speedster or like a Shelby Cobra, you're like, that's fake."
Car
Ferrari A250 Gto
"fake. Or if you see a 250 GTO, you're like, oh, that's fake. But if you see one in Monterey, they're real."
Car
Mclaren F1
"and stuff. Larry Ellison's personal McLaren F1 is being sold by my former employer, which will b..."
Car
Porsche 914
"... Lancia. One of them is that like hot rod Porsche 914. And I was like, OK, like I could."
Car
Ford Model T
"...od to talk about the new EV. You should. With the Model T moment. Yeah, but the bigger news is"
Car
Porsche 911
"Yeah, but the bigger news is we figured out what was wrong with the 9-11. Did I tell you that on the last one?"
Car
Lotus Esprit
"like envisioned as like a V8 successor to the Esprit, which was a 70s Giugiaro design that had been up..."
Car
Mclaren 720S
"...story, but the last time I had a McLaren, I had a 720S, which is a phenomenal car."
Car
Mclaren 650S
"...ney. And he filled that spot in his garage with a 650S, which is just kind of earlier version of that ca..."
Car
Mazda MX-5 / Miata
"... like to name their cars, and I've never, but the Miata, my old Miata, that was the one car that got a na..."
Select text to request an explanation
All right, well, let's just start with a formal introduction.
Hi, everyone.
Hi, listeners, tired podcast listeners.
Thank you for joining us.
We're back for a minute at least.
You're listening to Tired.
The car podcast where people understand that cars are bad, and, yeah, Rory, Mattie, Peter,
we're all here, and it's that time of year, first week in August, second week of August,
where people gather.
Go crazy.
And there's two big events that happen, yeah, there's two big competing events that
happen right now.
And the one that Rory is going to, well, maybe you can tell us about Rory.
Yeah, going to the, what is known now as Boundary Car Week, I think it used to be kind of
colloquially called Pebble Beach.
The week leading up to the Pebble Beach Concorde Delegance, a very fancy car show.
I think the tickets are like 200 and 50, 300 bucks now.
And there are even fancier car shows all week leading up to it.
There's some track time at Laguna Seca, they bring out a bunch of old cars and run them
around Laguna Seca, which reminds me I need to get a credential for that.
But it's cool, I mean it's, honestly, it is a very, it is a once in a, like if you are
into cars like old cars, or new cars, if you're into cars, it is a thing to go see, I think.
I typically, I mean, I probably have gone, I think my first one was like 2006, and
I think I probably missed four or five since then.
But it's a good thing for me to go just see people who I don't typically get to see.
And it's kind of like taking the place of auto shows in that respect, it's just like
the whole car business is all in the same place for a week.
It's generally fun, I think it can be a very boozy party filled weekend, I'm kind
of hoping that it will not be a boozy party weekend for me.
I'm sure it won't actually, but it's, yeah, it's cool.
It's like, it's a place where it's like if you see a Porsche 356 Speedster on the street,
you're like, oh, that's a real Speedster.
Whereas normally if you see a Speedster or like a Shelby Cobra, you're like, that's
fake.
Or if you see a 250 GTO, you're like, oh, that's fake.
But if you see one in Monterey, they're real.
So it'll be the biggest auction weekend of the year by far, it'll be hundreds of millions
of dollars of cars being sold.
Some of the absolute pervious of the rich guy perverts will be there doing insane rich
guy pervert stuff.
I mean, it has been our joke for many years now that I think the first time that you were
out there kind of post Epstein Rory, and this would have been like immediately in the wake
of his mysterious demise, I think I asked like, so how many people, how many people on
the lawn at the Bevel Beach do you suppose are in the flight logs?
Probably 50, 60% of them, I would guess.
And then at some point, at some point, the obvious joke suggested itself, which is that
it's pet pet over here, I've never been able to get out of your head once it's in there.
Thank you.
They're going to, it's yeah, I think like it is one of those things to me, there's
a lot of this stuff in car world for me where it's like contradictions of like being like,
man, is it good that this is all here?
Not really, but am I enjoying it kind of?
Yes.
You know what I mean?
Like, it's like, you know, these 25, 30 million dollar cars running around and being sold
and stuff.
Larry Ellison's personal McLaren F1 is being sold by my former employer, which will be interesting.
I mean, that could be a 25 plus million dollar car.
And there's a lot of that kind of like, icky feeling, I was talking to Norman Mayerson
about it the other day, and he's like, you're just going to hang out at the track,
aren't you?
Yeah, probably.
Like that's kind of like my ammo because it's like those guys are absolutely wealthy too.
But like the cars are running.
There's like grease around.
It smells weird.
It's you know what I mean?
It smells like race here.
Like it smells.
They're playing.
They're at least playing with their toys.
They're not just fucking showing them off on a fucking golf course.
And I think that different mindset.
Yeah, that that's a little bit more appealing.
I think, you know, I do this is going to be kind of surprising to people,
but I do tend to like get up to Pebble Beach.
One of the things is you have to so that a concor is a car show that takes place
on a golf course, typically.
Why this is the case?
Is that is that the actual definition?
No, but that's pretty much what it is at this point.
I know it's that's totally perfect, though.
That's that's exactly how you'd explain it to like somebody who had no
concept. You can pretty much imagine everything you need to know.
But I think so the concor initially like back in pre-war Paris,
you used to commission bodywork for you'd buy a chassis from a high end
automaker and then you'd commission a coachbuilder to build custom bodywork
for you. So they would hold these concor's
elegance where you'd bring out your car and then you'd have all your fancy
clothing and then the award prizes for who had the most elegant or whatever
car. That idea is almost like it's like an automotive fashion show.
Exactly. Yeah.
So that that idea kind of went away during the war, as you can imagine.
And then it kind of came back.
And I think it was I want to say was Briggs coming in one of those guys,
but there was there was a race in Monterey, an actual like sports car race
that took place in the woods, kind of like where 17 mile drive and like
where the golf course like around Carmel.
Yeah. So that race then
somebody got killed there and they don't do the race anymore.
But that kind of spawned the concor and that was kind of like the revival
of the idea of having a concor.
But of course, by then it was like they were showing off the same cars,
the same French and Italian cars that were made pre-war and German cars.
As very notably some German cars that were showing off the same cars.
They're like, Oh, we'll call it a concor de elegance.
And then it kind of stuck.
And then like for the longest time, like up until the 19
probably 2010s, really, it was almost all pre-war cars.
It was almost all like the same coach built pre-war stuff,
Duzenbergs and Boisans and all that stuff.
And then because of a guy I know, Ken Gross, who is awesome,
he was like Playboy's automotive correspondent like in the 80s and 90s.
And he is he has kind of been like the guy behind modernizing Pebble Beach.
So he's like brought in hot rods.
He was brought in Ferraris.
He's like kind of been a driver of like the unrestored stuff being there.
So like survivor class stuff has kind of made the show a lot more interesting.
Ken Gross, have I told this in the podcast before?
I don't think so.
So we're Ken and I were in New York.
Ken's like probably now he's probably in his seventies or eighties.
And we're in New York for an auto show thing.
We were both drinking and he was like, I was like,
let's go to another bar and he's like, now I got to go meet my son.
And I was like, oh, I didn't realize your son lived in the city.
And he's like, yeah, I live in, I think West Village.
And I was like, oh, cool.
What does he do?
And he's like, you know, that band, the spin doctors.
And I was like, yeah.
And he is like, he's the singer from the spin doctors.
It's like, oh, my God.
Wow. Yes.
So weird.
I know a bunch of spin doctor songs like word for word,
because my brother and I were huge spin doctors.
Fans are wearing like first and second grade.
But yeah, it's like, no, I absolutely know who that is.
But yeah, it's then from there, like the concor is kind of like
spawning to other, you know, the race.
There's when you met him, sorry, when you met him, where you just like,
dude, I loved your band when I was like six.
Oh, I didn't meet him.
I didn't meet him.
Ken went by himself.
I went to another bar.
Damn.
But yeah, it was shocking.
And then anyway, so yeah, it spun up like there's there's so every automaker
now has like, not every automaker, but most of the automakers have a big
presence there.
There's like, it's kind of like a lot of the auto show money
is is going to to moderate.
There's a super exclusive show called the quail, which has held
that the quail resort.
It's like another golf course, actually.
Many, many good episodes of the auto week podcast
relating to attendants of the quail and taking very appropriate
and colleaguey jabs at the nature of the quail.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So the quail is is an even kind of fancier, more exclusive.
I think those tickets are I want to say they're over a thousand dollars,
which yeah, I mean, it's it's a car show.
And it's it's a very swanky,
swanky environment.
I am that's kind of like the weekend.
Like I said, I'll probably spend most of my time at the track.
And then there's also like a selection of like
rest of mod cars that I'm supposed to drive, like a handful of like
that the Lancia zero three seven
Redux thing, the hot rod.
Yeah.
And I don't know how I feel about that car
because I fucking love those launches.
Like that's like one of my favorite like eighties, you know,
of the like the kind of that groupie era cars
and the kind of the the new version.
It just it feels a little bit just kind of by the numbers, you know.
Yeah. Yeah, we'll see.
I mean, I don't really know a ton about them.
I like, you know, I initially was like someone proposed like,
hey, you should talk to these guys.
They've got a bunch of cars out there.
They'll probably let you drive some of them.
And I was like, yeah, I don't really like that's really not why I'm there.
It's like super trafficky and like, but then it was like,
well, one of them is the Glickenhouse zero zero three four.
One of them is the Lancia.
One of them is that like hot rod Porsche 914.
And I was like, OK, like I could.
Maybe clear some time to go out and do some of that stuff.
Yeah. But yeah, it'll be it'll be it'll be fun.
I've got some kind of important business type stuff to attend to out there as well.
So it'll probably be less of a party time for me.
And it's like my life is less of a party
than it was in previous iterations of my Pebble Beach attendance.
Yeah, lower stakes in the past.
Yeah. Yeah.
And just like my, you know, my natural
proclivity for that kind of stuff is kind of diminished.
But some of the absolute worst nights of my life,
carousing and drinking in Pebble Beach previously, it's just
it's really easy, like you get out there and everything's free.
Like people are just handing the champagne everywhere you go.
It's like once you've paid for the whatever
$1,000, $2,500 ticket to the thing.
Everyone's just there to make sure that you're drinking.
And it's very hard to avoid
finding yourself in a bad spot or two at three in the morning.
Yeah. But and if you're and if you're just there
as a journalist, journalist,
a hog, if you're just a hog at the trot,
as I have been in previous.
Oh, man.
Actually, I'm going, I'm going with my former
employer, Hagerty.
They.
So Hagerty, like when I used to go to Pebble Beach,
it was like I would go and I was wrangling
twelve kids and their parents all weekend, like in vans.
Like I was because we did this National Model Building Contest,
where like we'd send out a thousand plus
little plastic models and then kids would photograph them,
put them on a website and we'd vote.
People would vote nationally to like decide who won.
And then the top 10 or 12 would come to Pebble Beach
and we would do this like
judging thing and it would be like me and Jay Leno and like,
you know, like it was a weird, it's a weird thing.
I was like, this is why it was 23, 24.
And so I would take these parents around
and the kids around all weekend, take them to the auction,
take them to the whatever, like go meet them at their hotel.
And it was like by the time Saturday night came around,
I was ready for a drink.
Like I was ready to let my hair down a little bit.
And I very frequently did,
which there are some some non pod stories out of that that.
Really embarrassing.
But yeah, are they are there still?
Are they still doing the special Don Petrol hats?
I remember back in the time of the odd pod that was a big out.
Oh, are you are you a shoe in to get a Don Petrol hat?
Special Hatterty Don Petrol hat?
I don't do that anymore.
I don't come on.
You can I can't wear a hat.
I can't wear a hat.
You can sell it later for dollars for money
and you can exchange money for goods and services.
That actually is more appealing now
than it was last time I went to Pebble Beach.
I do need the money.
I just grab a whole sleeve of them.
Yeah, if you're there with Hatterty,
yeah, sneak an extra hat.
That's a good idea, actually.
But yeah, it'll be good.
I think, you know, it it is.
Something I kind of like.
Just on the calendar every year, you know, you're like,
I'm going to be gone for a week.
And it's always kind of like, yeah,
it's just going to be fun to go to for the 30th time to this.
And I think it always is mostly fun.
Yeah, it's it's like obviously important for me to go now
with the LA stuff and obviously be promoting
Tired Pod to all the cards.
There you go. Folks that are there.
You should come on, Jim, Farley,
you should come on Tired Pod to talk about the new EV.
You should. With the Model T moment.
Yeah, but the bigger news is
we figured out what was wrong with the 9-11.
Did I tell you that on the last one?
You mentioned years were
if you don't know what it wasn't,
it was not what you thought it previously was, right?
Yeah, so for like this is actually this has happened.
This has happened to be I didn't drive the 9-11
for a year when I was when I had it
kind of the first few years I had it.
I was my girlfriend and I
at the time drove down to Lansing and drove it back
and it died on the side of the road.
And for some reason, I got it in my head
that the engine was fucked.
There was something engine wise and I needed an engine.
This is like I knew less about the world in cars
at the time.
And so I got it towed back to Trevor City
and just sat in the garage.
And that's when I bought that Beetle.
I bought a 73 Beetle.
I was like, oh, this will just be my daily driver.
And I didn't touch the 9-11 for like a full year.
And then somebody I forgot who I was talking to was like,
it's probably just a bad ground.
And I was like, bad ground.
No way it's a bad ground.
I like killed the car.
And they're like, no, yeah, that's probably just
the ground where it shook loose and killed the anyway.
So I went out and all the grounds, the car started right up
and I drove it again for the four years.
And then so this time this car has been
I have a video of me in the garage in 2018
trying to start at the car
after having spent a year or two working on it,
moved it obviously up here,
moved it to a bunch of different houses,
had it sitting in the garage,
built the Lada from scratch again.
And then the whole time I thought
there was some mysterious no spark issue.
Yeah, yeah.
And well also like a year ago, two years ago,
maybe two years ago,
Jimmy and Henry and I were out there kind of drunk
and we're like, let's make sure,
we ran some tests to make sure that it wasn't sparking.
None of us remember the details of the test.
None of us remember the results of the test
but we all were like, oh, it's a no spark thing.
Anyway, we fired some ether into the intake
the other night and it fired right up.
And I was like, God damn it, this is sparking fine.
So over the course of the last week,
I've taken the entire fuel system apart,
which has mostly just been me being soaked,
head to toe in gasoline every night
when I come into the house.
But so this weekend took all the lines out,
blew them all out, took the fuel rails off,
took the injectors out.
You know, Frank Fardal,
we've talked about Frank on the podcast before,
but Frank called me today
because he had been texting with Jimmy yesterday.
He does not think it's the injectors.
He thinks it's a power thing.
Like they're not, the injectors aren't getting enough juice.
And he's like, oh man,
these old German cars are finicky.
Like if you give the injectors 12 volts,
they won't fire, but if you give them 13,
they'll fire, and I was like,
it just doesn't add up to me.
I think like there's no reason in my mind
why it should be delivering,
it should be getting less voltage back there.
You know what I mean?
Like just from sitting,
it's like if the wires are all connected
and it's getting some voltage,
why would it be, why is there a voltage drop
just from sitting?
Granted the batteries really bad,
but my theory is that the injectors are clogged
because I have run a bunch of 10 year old gasoline
and so I'm going to just send them out to some guy
who's going to supposedly rebuild them
and then hopefully we'll be back in business.
But man, to spill a ton of gasoline this weekend.
There's just really no way to avoid it.
And it's like, you know, just like take a shower
and get out like, nope, still smell like gas.
Like somewhere there's gas soaked in my hair or whatever.
But you're just coming out of your pores, man.
Yeah, man, it's in there.
I drank some of it by accident.
And not actually, it wasn't really by accident.
I was trying to suck a fluid out of one of the injectors,
which I knew was gas.
Swallowed by accident, drink on purpose.
Yes.
But yeah, I think we're getting close.
We're getting into the old neighborhood.
Were you able to source a non-Israeli fuel filter?
No, that is the actual Porsche OEM part.
And I did not, I took it out of the box yesterday.
And I was like, what?
Like, so the Porsche fuel filter is like a can.
It's like a big can.
And I took it out of the box today and looked at it
and it says made in Israel on the back of it,
which is like, there's a Porsche fuel filter factory
or at least a factory that's building.
Maybe that was part of their Porsche fuel filters
under the German restitution thing, yeah.
Yeah, it was.
They had to build a fuel filter factory in Israel.
And they had to help us with our rockets.
It's like, all right, you and you are gonna come help
with the rockets.
It's like, all right, great.
And they're like, what do you do?
It's like fuel filters.
And they're like, all right, Israel, get out of here.
We got fuel filters in the United States already.
We need.
Yeah, we don't need those.
You can go do it.
Yeah, we're kind of good on that.
But yeah, hopefully we will be back in business,
as they say.
I have, there's a guy in this town I've never heard of.
Oh my God, this is crazy.
Okay, this guy, Rob Hack.
Rob Hack, Deborah Hack and Howard Hack.
Motor Man Fuel Injector Supply.
Wideman Road, Wideman, Michigan.
Says they'll recondition all of my,
like, rebuild all of my injectors for $15.
Like, how is that?
Each?
This is one of those, this is one of those businesses.
The whole package.
Per injector.
Okay, so still, but still.
Six, these injectors are almost $200 a piece
for the cheap ones.
Yeah, I mean, that's crazy cheap.
That's wild.
Like you were talking, like when you said that,
I was just thinking like, oh Christ,
that's gotta be like a thousand bucks.
Oh yeah, this is one of those things
where it's like you want to walk in there
and be like, what are you doing?
Show me your books.
Like you're not doing this right, yeah.
Like you could have told me the service cost $600
and I'd have been like, yeah, that sounds right to me.
Like that.
Do they specialize in like Porsche or like German stuff?
Or is there just like across the board
just general purpose fuel injector cleaner guys?
That's it.
Yeah, and I was, bring us your dirty injectors.
I was pretty, so Frank called these guys a year ago
and it was like asking them for like obscure
Japanese part numbers.
And he was like, they had everything in stock.
And he was like, this is so weird.
Then I went to the guys website and it says,
having trouble finding the injector you need,
please call Rob at blank.
And I will check our inventory.
We stock almost every electronic gasoline fuel injector
ever made for any vehicle, any make and model.
If we do not have it, I will help you find it.
It's like, this is my kind of guy.
Like this is like.
That's fucking crazy.
I am very interested in becoming a part
of this guy's deal now.
You know what I mean?
I mean, I feel like it's definitely worth a story
if nothing else.
Yeah.
I mean, just like, I mean,
I just love that like businesses like that still exist,
you know, like, like what, like in a world
where just everything is just so fucking scammy
and so just like, you know, it's like, no,
what do we do here?
We do one thing, we do fucking fuel injectors.
We have every fuel injector ever made.
We will fix your fucked up ones and it's dirt cheap.
It costs nothing because we do so much of it like,
and we're just the, we're the fucking people
who will help you out.
Yeah, we have not thought about whether or not
this makes money in such a long time.
Fucking rules.
Well, yeah, they live in fucking wide body Michigan.
You know, it's like, I don't imagine.
I mean, it's probably a fairly, fairly.
Buildings paid off.
Right.
Yeah.
Exactly.
Yeah.
I imagine their house is probably paid off as well.
They probably have like a bunch of acres.
And it's like, yeah, man, we're good.
We're fine.
Yep.
I, I'm really like that rules then.
Yeah.
It does.
It's a lost world.
It's one of those things that like,
I see a website like this and I'm like,
ooh, I have to get involved with this person's life.
Like I have to like know these people.
Like I want, I want just to,
just a picture of what's going on here.
So yeah, pretty excited about that.
And probably somewhat less excited.
Man, the thing is, is like once the 9-Eleven's running,
it's like a cascade of like $600 problems
and $900 problems.
I was like, I looked up, there's like parts on that car,
like tail lights that I was like,
oh, these are 30 bucks or 50 bucks or whatever
when I was first doing this eight years ago.
And they're now like, obscene.
So.
Can we, can we back up briefly to just,
just circling back to, to Monterey.
Was that Lotus, Etna auction that I sent you guys
that link to, isn't that a Herigarty auction?
Yeah.
Yeah, so they brought, they bought,
well, a bunch of the guys from RM set the bees
went to start this company called Broad Arrow,
that is Herigarty's in-house auction company.
So that's theirs.
That's fucking rad, man.
That car.
That car is fucking cool, yeah.
On fucking believable, I remember.
I had no idea that existed.
Oh, see, I, I mean, I remember that car so vividly
from when it, I mean, I think it's like 84, 85-ish
when it kind of made the car show rounds.
And this was a Lotus concept car,
but it was a Giugiaro, Giorgetto Giugiaro, the king.
It's all designed, this car is just like for me,
it is just the fucking ultimate like just peak Giugiaro car.
It's so beautiful and clean.
And it's just like, it just epitomized everything
about kind of the 80s kind of it all design vocabulary.
And I feel like it's just, it's the kind of purist
and most elegant expression of that kind of vernacular.
And it's just, it's such a fucking,
and it didn't get built, you know?
I mean, it was like, they showed this car
and it's like, oh dude, that would be amazing
if they built it, you know?
And it was like, and it was kind of like, you know,
like envisioned as like a V8 successor
to the Esprit, which was a 70s Giugiaro design
that had been updated a few times.
But this was total clean sheet of paper car.
And it was one of the, and I had, I mean,
full fucking magazine spreads of that car,
like taped to my walls.
Oh, wow.
Like as like a 14 or 15 year old, whatever.
And like lots of people, you know,
I mean, it's a pretty, pretty tired trope, you know,
that it's like, oh, you know, that's the car
that was on my wall as a teenager, as a kid, whatever.
But it's like, in this case, it's not just that like,
oh, it was a Lamborghini, you know,
I had a Lamborghini Cuntage poster or whatever.
This was like the car, like there's only one of these,
you know, and it's like that fucking car
that was on my wall when I was like
a fucking 15 year old and Chino is now up for auction
like this week at fucking Monterey.
And I mean, what are they expecting to get for it?
Like, what are they expecting to get for it?
Like maybe like 200,000 or something like that.
I mean, the thing is like,
like looking at the photos of it now,
it's rad because it's such a,
like it's such a beautifully clean
and kind of futuristic, you know, for the time shape.
But what's amazing about it now
is you see the kind of the patina,
you know, the weather, like all this kind of 80s plastic
and like the interior especially,
I mean, there's like the Lotus badge on the front of the car
that's, you know, kind of cracking and stuff.
But like when you see the interior
and how like everything is just like,
you know, this kind of like space age looking,
you know, very elegant functional plastic, right?
And it's just that, you know, completely beautiful
and awesome to me, Shujaro, you know, thing.
But it's so like funny and great to see it,
like instead of being like super, you know,
clean and space age and modern to see like.
Looks a little tired.
Yeah, it's like, you know, the cracking
and you know, the leather is just like a little bit,
you know, it's like cracking in places.
And but the thing is like originally, supposedly,
I mean, according to the history that they have accompanying,
yeah, I mean, that car was just a roller
when it was shown, but at some point
they did fucking like put a full powertrain in it.
And it's just kind of like pretty advanced,
like one of two, like, you know, V8s that they made
for this, you know, like a prototype.
And so like, you know, they turned the car
into a driver at some point.
Like I think like in the 90s, you know,
whoever owned it for a while actually, you know,
turned it into a functional car and not just a showpiece.
And to me, just the combination, like the idea
that you could fucking drive that and like,
and the kind of the contrast between the kind of,
you know, utopian future that it promised
and the slightly, you know, kind of like,
not shoddy, but just like, it's a real thing, you know,
it's a real car and it's like, oh yeah,
no those plastics, they're gonna fucking degrade over time,
you know, and it's like.
I can smell this car looking at the pictures.
The best detail on this car for me.
It's so evocative to me, yeah.
Yeah, is the, on the trunk lid
or whatever the engine cover lid.
There's a little decal that says Etna,
but instead of it being a decal,
it's just straight vinyl tape.
Tape, it's just fucking tape.
Yeah, I'll put it together.
I mean it does, it looks legit, yeah.
It totally does.
And it's like, but it shows the extent
to which like so much of that,
that kind of like 70s and 80s Italian stuff
that was so out-tray and so like outrageous
and so kind of stunning and still is, you know,
a lot of those cars,
but like how, how just kind of like,
not fully finished those things.
Yeah, I mean, it's a show car,
like that's very typical too.
Yeah, they were concepts, they were ideas,
they were just fucking like cranking these things out
and just like, just to have something to show on a stage.
And you know, there's a little bit of smoke and mirrors
with it, and that was fine, you know,
because it made the statement that it was supposed to make,
you know, and it's like, you can go and see, like,
I mean, a lot of those kind of, you know,
the 70s concepts, you know, especially,
I mean, like, you know, there's that Peterson wedge
exhibition that's opening up,
that has like the launch of Stratus Zero car,
which is that crazy, incredibly low orange car
that just looks like completely under, you know,
like how could that even function as a car
because it's just so impossibly low
and it's like the windshield is essentially flat,
like, you know, like horizontal, you know?
There's no like, but like, you know,
I saw that car when it was at,
I think a few episodes ago, I was talking about
when we were recording in Nashville
and I got to go to the Lane Museum
and I think it was that same trip.
I also ducked out and went to
the, I forget the name of the museum, I know it,
this art museum in Nashville
that had like this big kind of art of the automobile,
you know, traveling exhibition and that car was there.
And that's, you know, it's another one of one,
but I mean, it's just, you see those things in real life
and it's just, they're so breathtaking
and that car in particular is a really just interesting,
there's a lot of like really ingenious details to it
that I had never noticed in, you know,
decades of, you know, seeing pictures of it.
So if you have a chance to see that
at the Peterson in Los Angeles,
you should definitely check that out.
But yeah, also if you're in Monterey, man,
go and check out that Lotus Etna
and maybe think about buying it and giving it to me.
Yes.
Do we think the, do we think that the radio
and cassette players still work in this?
One, two, such as a block of wood under there?
Well, the thing is, what is with that, that,
I mean, it looks like there was a digital display there
once kind of, not even, it just looks like
they put a piece of cardboard with like some,
like they just sharpied like some baby blue
and red graphics onto like a piece of card stock
and just like inserted it in there.
It's like, yeah, that looks kind of,
that looks like something.
Yeah, no, it's great.
I mean, all it had to do is to look at it in photos
and look at it from 10 feet away.
Yeah.
I need someone to get it who will replace the cassette player
and calibrate it and get the radio working.
And also I'm obsessed with the block of wood
that's under here, just sort of holding this part up.
Hang on.
Well, no, that's a real Lotus part.
That's, they all have it.
Like, this photo and like all the plastic
and like paint is rubbing off on the stuff.
Like it's so good.
It's beautiful.
Yeah, it looks like it's,
it looks like it's actually been used.
Like that's so cool about it.
It's like a real hardcore.
Yeah, someone's been driving this thing.
Yeah, unbelievable, man.
Just to show up in that, holy fuck, man.
Sick.
It's pretty cool.
Shucking whips, dude.
Yeah, I, yeah, maybe I'll go to this.
When is it?
Wednesday?
Oh, I will be there.
Yeah, I'm gonna be there.
Yeah.
Dude, you gotta send a text.
It's a 250 to 400 is the estimate.
Yeah.
To me, it's priceless.
There's a few kind of related stories
having to do with our shared
IMSA passion, but also
kind of the larger economic headwinds
that I think are interesting.
The
first one is and this is like by far
the least surprising.
Lamborghini to press pause on SC 63 program in 2026
from daily sports car.
I don't think that this will come as a surprise.
And it's too bad because I mean, this is the Lamborghini,
what do you call it?
Hypercar slash LMDH car prototype that they've been running.
They kind of pulled out of WEC this season
and have been just running exclusively
in the IMSA endurance cup races.
And the car has looked good.
I mean, it's actually, I mean, it's been
like reasonably competitive.
And it's worth noting that like,
I mean, when that car did run at Le Mans last year,
before this past year,
both of those cars finished, you know?
And I mean, it was a, you know,
thoroughly respectable showing, you know, they weren't,
yeah, they did not embarrass themselves at all.
Like, and I think the car was just like a bit underdeveloped.
I guess they kind of had some,
there was a big crash like in their testing program
that kind of set the whole program back.
And it just seems like they never really fully committed to it.
Yeah, it's funny.
There's a lot of just kind of like corporate doublespeak
in the Lamborghini statement that about it.
About it.
Initially conceived as a natural evolution
of Lamborghini's successful customer racing platform.
The hypercar GTP project was launched
with the ambition of further expanding the brand's presence
in top tier endurance racing.
The program was designed to ensure a global visibility
through the presence of a hybrid racing car
in each of the two championships.
Blah, blah, blah, however, the conditions
on which the program was based
have significantly changed.
As the project developed, resource demands,
both in terms of budget and technical complexity
have grown beyond original projections.
I mean, really the only thing that changed
is what kind of mandated that everybody
had to bring two cars instead of just one.
But yeah, it just, it feels, I mean, and it's weird
because it's at a time when Lamborghini
is kind of ramping up, they're introducing
like the new, what's it called, the Tamarario or something,
like the Hurricane successor, the GT3 version of that car,
which is gonna come online, I think,
I think actually this year, like next season fully,
but I think they're kind of like gonna kind of
start putting it out there maybe this year
before the end of the season.
Which is like a huge, that's a big
and a pretty successful customer program.
And for as successful as that's been,
the whole, the hypercar thing, it just seems really
just kind of half-assed and...
Here's my two things on this.
One, I don't believe that Lamborghini should be erased.
I know that's controversial, like within Lamborghini world,
but I don't think that's part of their deal.
I think it was kind of weirdly cool
that they were like the only car in that whole universe
of cars, supercar, hypercar world that didn't race.
So it's kind of cool.
But the other thing is I think VW
is having enough headaches for anything
that is potentially problematic
is kind of like getting some real extra consideration.
And I think that's probably what's happening here
because it's like if you're VW
and you've got Audi, you've got Porsche,
you've got that whole,
there's a lot of money going into racing.
And you have to start wondering
how many brands do we want competing
against each other in the same series?
You know what I mean, like it's just to me it's like
and it's like, okay, they're also struggling.
I don't know, it just to me it seems like,
yeah, that's logical for them.
Even if it's a bummer, the car was cool.
But yeah, it just, like I said, it kind of adds up.
But RIP was fun.
Yeah, yeah, fun while it lasted.
Fun while it lasted, yeah.
Good looking car.
It's cool to see.
We, I think we talked last time about the Alpine,
Alpine's IMSA plans delayed as expansion
to US market stalls.
I think we did talk about that.
And I think I mistakenly called that a Stalantis thing,
which it's not.
Alpine is part of Renault, not Stalantis.
But yeah, so that Alpine is not coming to the US.
That is on ice.
But as we previously established,
but there's also
Cupra,
which is currently competing
in the Michelin Pilot Challenge.
Cupra, which is a spin-off kind of sporty brand
of Volkswagen's Spanish Seat brand.
Apparently there was a plan to bring it to the US.
And that's the reason that we see that car
in competing against the Hyundai's and Audi's in TCR.
But yeah, I guess those plans are off the table as well.
According to this story in Sports Car 365,
IMSA will continue to honor the investments
made by teams with the Cupra Leon VZ TCR
by maintaining its eligibility in the Michelin Pilot Challenge
despite the Spanish brand's recent announcement
that it will postpone.
It's planned road car launch in the US.
I think postpone might.
Yeah, there's another word for that.
It's like, yeah, that's not gonna happen.
We're not going to,
I think Volkswagen is having a hard enough time
just generally speaking without introducing
completely unknown brands from countries
that have no history in the US market to the US.
Also, yeah, unknown countries to most of the US.
Right, yeah, that's the thing.
There's never been a Spanish car sold in the United States.
Yeah, could most Americans point to Spain on a map,
would say, very unlikely.
That's a good question, I wonder.
I don't like our odds, increasingly don't like our odds.
Yeah, I would say that's a good thing.
I don't think that most Americans could point out
the United States on a global map, to be honest.
It's getting worse.
Yeah, I would bet we're less than 20%,
and probably less than 10% with Spain
with an unmarked map if you're up.
Yeah.
Be rough.
But, yeah.
Now we don't have to find out, so don't worry about it.
No big deal.
Who cares?
Yep.
You're off the hook.
I think the only thing helping us is that sometimes
I know with my phone, my Google Maps will glitch out
and zoom out really far, and then if I have to
tap back in, does zoom you back in manually into the US?
So some people may have zoomed out on their Google Maps
and may have some idea vaguely of the US.
From that, outside, we had no shot, no way.
That's how the GeoGuessor guy learned
how to do all that stuff.
I love watching people play GeoGuessor.
That's crazy.
Have you ever watched Michael Hudson?
No.
Yeah, yeah.
He's really good.
He's a very funny guy, but he does a lot of GeoGuessor
stuff.
Very good at it.
Seems fun.
Wait, are you talking about a different Michael Hudson?
I don't know.
Michael Hudson, he was a nurse in Detroit,
he is Eminem Obama, it's his Twitter handle.
No, the Michael Hudson that I think of
is the economist guy.
No, that would be funny.
What's up gamers?
I have a very hard time picturing him playing GeoGuessor stuff.
GeoGuessor stuff.
No, it's a totally different guy.
He's on a lot of podcasts where it'll be like
him and Richard Wolfe together.
Now, that's a stream is get two Michael Hudson's together.
One of them's playing GeoGuessor,
the other one's explaining something about tariffs.
Yeah, totally.
Sounds soothing.
I mean, his shit, he specializes,
he's written a bunch of books about,
he's really into debt and also the history of debt
and he's written a bunch of books about like,
he loves to talk a lot about how in kind of ancient times
that like jubilee, like this was like debt forgiveness,
this was a thing and a thing that was pretty widely agreed upon
across like lots of different societies
that was just kind of like good for everybody.
Like even like during times like where like,
I mean, this is long pre-capitalism.
I mean, this is like a very long pre-capitalism
I mean, this is like feudal era, but it was just like,
yeah, no, everybody just fucking get zeroed out
and you start over and it's, and everybody's just chill
and nobody can, yeah, nobody can accumulate a shit ton
of wealth and we're all just kind of happier for it,
you know, other than the, you know, the nobility
or whatever, but yeah, anyway.
But in exchange, they don't get killed.
That's my Michael Hudson.
Yes, right, exactly, yeah.
So they do end up happier, that's fine.
So they, everybody wins.
They're getting some out of it too.
They get to be alive.
Exactly, yeah.
Yeah, I, yeah, I've been listening to that David Gray
where you know, you also wrote the book about debt
the 5,000 years, been listening to the other one
about the different civilizations at night when I sleep.
And so like I'll wake up at four in the morning
and be like, ooh.
Is it the one that he wrote with the other David?
Yeah.
Yeah, it's.
What's it fucking calls?
I've been, I have that book and I,
like no joke, I mean, it's really big.
Don of everything.
Don of everything, thank you.
I've read, I've read about a quarter of it,
but the thing that I mostly use it for
is when I'm upstairs in my office
working on the laptop,
and I don't want the laptop to make my lap hot.
That's the book that I put underneath my laptop.
It's really good, it's a great book for,
and it's great for that.
It's good stuff.
It's both.
It's both.
Lotus.
You could use that instead of the block of wood.
There you go, you should pitch it.
Fellas?
Gamers?
Sharks?
I need $15 for a back copy.
Sharks, I literally need $15.
Sharks, I want to go race my Lada.
Can I have $150, please?
Ah.
Did you guys see that,
that Penske was in the news for non-racing stuff?
Penske, the Penske truck rental thing had to respond to,
had to make an official statement regarding federal agents'
use of a Penske branded,
looks like a, that's a big truck.
That's like, I don't know if that's like a 16 footer.
So the ice guys used it?
Yeah.
They, you know, not to throw people in,
but rather they jumped out of it.
Like they rolled up to a fucking home depot.
First of all, that's not safe.
Those guys need to have seatbelts on.
Well, that's the thing and that's what Penske said.
Penske was forced to come out and say,
look guys, don't go right around in there.
Penske strictly prohibits the transportation of people
in the cargo area of its vehicles under any circumstances.
The company was not made aware of that its use
would be used in today's operations
and did not authorize this.
Penske will reach out to the Department of Homeland Security
and reinforce its policy
to avoid improper use of its vehicles in the future.
Those first of all are not people,
those are ice agents, but the other part of it.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's unsecured cargo.
They're just shifting.
That's what you get, man.
That Roger cozyed up,
did all that nice stuff for Donald Trump
and then he just goes ahead and stabs him in the back,
embarrassing him publicly like that.
Not good, I gotta say.
Yeah, he's starting to think this Trump guy
is not a good partner.
He's not a good...
Not good for racing, maybe, you know?
Yeah.
Well, yeah, I think, no, I think, I mean, he's just, yeah.
What about Will Power?
I saw he won in the Portland.
Yeah, let's go and he won right after a bunch of rumors
started going crazy for a couple of days
that they're gonna cut him
and that they're not renewing him.
Yeah.
Yeah, how old is he now?
40, 40, mid 40s, mid to late.
That's pretty old.
That's pretty old.
He's still doing it well though.
I mean, what are you gonna do?
I mean, for IndyCard driver.
Oh, yeah.
I mean, who's, he's 44.
He's 44, yeah.
Yeah, and Penske does, I mean,
when it's time to move on, they move on.
It's like, it sucks
because like the guys become big celebrities
and they're like really associated with Penske,
but like when it's time to go,
it's time to go and they'll push it.
Yeah.
But I mean, isn't, I mean, IndyCard is a bit
of a younger person's game, right?
Yeah, of course, yeah.
I feel like that's kind of.
There are guys who hang on.
I mean, there's guys like, you know,
Elio Castroneves who comes back
and does Indy every year, you know,
even though he's like practically as old as me.
But I mean, for the most, I mean,
the guys who were actually like competing in the series,
like.
Yeah, they're all in their 20s.
But there are guys like actually two Penske guys,
but Elio was with Penske late in his career
and Simon Pedge know also with Penske late in his career.
Simon had that really bad accident a couple of years ago
and hasn't raced since.
But he had been bounced from Penske by then.
He was with Meyer Schenck when he got in the crash.
But yeah, he was with Penske until he wasn't.
Like I said, I think like,
yeah, they will move on when it's time to move on.
I was shocked by him getting dumped from Penske,
but he had tough year in 18 and then one Indy in 19
because we're there.
This is Pagano now?
Yeah, and then, yeah, then he got bounced.
But yeah, oh, I guess that was, no, that was later.
It was like 20, 22 maybe?
But anyway, yeah, they will bounce guys
like Will Power's been there super long time, it feels like,
but I wouldn't have to be surprised.
Although the question that I would immediately.
I mean, more than 20 years
because I remember seeing him win like at Fontana.
Like when I was with my dad in like,
I don't know, I don't, I mean, circa like 2000.
Yeah, he's been 2004 or something like that?
No, he's, I'm looking right now.
But he started at Penske in 2009
replacing Aleo Castronevas in the number three.
But yeah, he, I would wonder who the next guy is
if they're gonna bounce Will.
I mean, I'm glad they're keeping Scott McLaughlin
even though he's been having kind of a tough season.
I mean, they've all had a shitty year.
This is their, that was,
the Portland was their first win, right?
Yeah.
Was best used.
And look who brought it home.
He's like, yeah, all right, see ya, fine.
I get it.
But yeah, I think, I don't know who the,
I don't know who the up and comer is, who the next.
Could be one of us.
Could be one of the nice people you talked to, Rory.
I mean, you saw what the kind of their,
they're looking at.
True, could be, could be Maddie Riley.
You're the only one who can see
if we fit in.
Maddie Riley.
I've never driven over, I would say the top speed
I have hit in any car is probably 95 miles an hour.
And I do not think I, I want to,
I don't, I don't know how I would feel
about driving something, being,
piloting anything faster than that.
I'll ride along, but I don't think,
I don't think I want, I'm good, fine, hanging.
You don't know until you try it, that's the thing.
Like we said with our friend Erica the other day,
she tried it and looked, she was great at it.
The, did you guys see the,
we put up our first car review today?
I did see that.
The Aller, the McLaren thing, is it Travis?
Akulski, first review and first outside author today.
Nice.
The McLaren 765 LT, really loved it.
Which like, I was supposed to grab that car,
like my last week at Jalopnik, I had that reserved
and I was supposed to pick it up in New York City
and go up to the Hudson Valley for the weekend
and then like, return it.
And I had it all planned out and then it was like,
oops, I'm actually not going to be there.
Like, you know, I planned it wrong
so that it was to take place after I had already left.
So I gave it to Andy, calm once,
but I was like, man, I really wish I should have done that.
Cause Travis really loved it.
He said it was like an incredible driver's car
and it was very easy to drive fast and yada yada.
And it's like, these are all things
that are very appealing to me.
I'll tell a version of that,
I can tell a version of this story,
but the last time I had a McLaren, I had a 720S,
which is a phenomenal car.
It was brown, like metallic brown.
And the Run the Jewels guys were in town
and played a show opening at Little Seizures Arena.
Oh, this is actually a different car.
So Andy got the 750S.
Anyway, they played a show at Little Seizures Arena
opening for Lord and Mitski, which was great show.
And then Mike and I went out to Sweetwater Tavern for wings,
which is like kind of old school Detroit wing place.
And then went and ripped the 720S up the freeway
on my like usual fast driving route.
And man, like that incredible car
on the very broken freeways in Detroit.
I was describing it today, like it felt like,
you know that feeling when you skip a Frisbee off the pavement?
That's what it felt like.
Being in that car was like, oh, I'm in the Frisbee.
I'm steering the Frisbee.
I'm responsible for this Frisbee
not hitting a guardrail and killing me and my rapper friend.
But yeah, they are always cool.
Yeah, I always wonder.
I mean, also like with like in New York too,
like I never can fucking understand like how do,
like when people who are like just,
I mean, obviously like rich guys with fucking fancy cars,
but also just like people, you know,
working at New York based publications
and they get like a press car or what or something
and they have to fucking drive it around Manhattan
or just or even not even Manhattan,
but just like larger, you know, the fucking the five boroughs.
I mean, I don't want to take my fucking car there
because it's like, I mean, there've been so many times
like, I mean, I stopped bringing the fucking,
like driving the sob to New York.
Like if I had to fucking go to New York,
I would rent a car rather than bring the sob there
because every time I fucking drove there,
I felt like I was destroying the fucking car
because of the roads are so horrendous.
And it's like, I don't get it.
How do you, how do those cars,
how does like a McLaren deal with that?
They just immediately leave town.
And that was like, that was my plan for getting the car
was like just immediately head up to the Valley.
It's like, I mean, there's a couple of places
where I've like taken so you're basically just getting on
on like the the West, what's it called?
The West End Highway or whatever
and just like going out playing just, yeah.
Okay.
Yeah, disappear.
There have been a couple of cars,
like I've been given cars for like an hour
and I've gone and ripped them in places
where you should, like where I was four or five times
the speed limit, but had good visibility
and like a reasonably smooth road.
But that is not ideal.
Like that's not what you're supposed to do.
I don't think.
So yeah, I think you pretty much immediately get out of town,
but I was really, really jealous.
Travis loved the car and he was like,
said it was like one of the best realized
performance cars ever driven.
And he said, it really like wants you to drive it.
Instead of, he's like a lot of the cars
from other hypercar makers.
Feel like you're an annoyance to the car.
Like, God damn it, like this fucking guy
is doing all the wrong shit in here.
We need somebody else.
But he said it really like was super impressive
and he would buy one and he would take it to the track.
He said, which I don't know.
But I, yeah, I was very excited about it.
It was a good step in the direction
of being like a real publication,
publishing something that I didn't write.
Yeah.
There you go.
There are many, many more to come.
Yeah, we'll see.
If you ever need a press card down in New York, man,
just give me a haul or I'll go down and get it.
I'll, I will take you up on that.
Actually, I'll make you drive some stuff.
That'd be awesome.
Yeah, cool.
Resolved.
So ordered.
Yeah.
I mean, people do.
I mean, like I was just, I was just watching,
you know, I like to watch Harry Metcalfe's stuff,
the Harry's Garage.
And he bought, he had a lotus,
one of those new lotuses for a minute
and he ended up trading it just because the value of it
was like, I mean, it was like depreciating
like a fucking stone in like the year that he had it.
And he was just like, I think I have to unload this
before I lose any more money.
And he filled that spot in his garage with a 650S,
which is just kind of earlier version of that car.
But, but like those, it's like,
it's a model that has kind of depreciated to the point where
like it's now, you know, like a,
it's like a $100,000 car, you know, like that ballpark.
So it's like, you know,
I mean, obviously still expensive,
but for, for what you're getting,
like it's, it's, you can make the case that it's like,
it's a good value.
But he fucking loves it.
And he just said like, and the thing that he loves about it
is just, it's just how usable it is.
And I mean, he talks about it in kind of very similar terms,
you know, and just, it's, you know, very, very,
you know, it's a really great car to drive.
It also is, you know, refreshingly because it,
because it's, you know, several years old at this point,
it's refreshingly free of a lot of the kind of burdensome
shit that I mean, especially in England, you know,
there's like in the UK now, there's all these, you know,
like every car has to have like, you know,
speed limit alarms and just like every time,
like literally every time you get in the car,
you have to go through this whole fucking thing
of just turning off all this shit
that you don't want to have to listen to.
And some manufacturers make it really easy.
Some make it like just ridiculously
just deal-breakingly difficult.
And, but, you know, obviously with a car
that's a few years older,
you don't have to worry about that any of that shit at all.
Yeah.
But yeah, I mean, just like the user, you know,
like he, I was just watching a thing
where he just took it on a longer road trip
and he just said that it's like, you know,
look at how much shit I can fit in this trunk.
You know, it's like enormous front trunk.
And, you know, it's him and his wife
and they've got like a really big,
just kind of giant duffel bag full of all their stuff
and that goes in there.
And then like a couple of smaller,
just kind of like day bags and then shoes and, you know,
and your first aid kit and flares and all that kind of,
you know, all the kind of road trip shit that you,
and he just says like, I would never be able to do this
in like the, you know, Ferrari 296
that, you know, that he just had into test or whatever.
But like, you know, any number of just kind of like
current supercars that just
have like no allowance for any kind of, you know,
and it really, and like for him,
and I would think like for most people
who are buying those cars to use them, you know,
as opposed to just fucking showboat or whatever,
like that's, that's a huge thing, yeah.
Yeah, it's like, what do you, you know,
I guess I can't take this on a road trip.
Well, fuck it.
Yeah, like or have someone follow me
or I can mail my shit in advance.
Like people, people do do that.
They do pay people to follow them
or they mail their shit to a hotel in advance
or more likely they have someone mail their shit
to a hotel for them in advance of this stuff.
How do I get a job being like a chase car
for some rich guy in his, for our 296, for example?
My guess would be you have to have been in Blackwater
at some point.
Oh.
Dammit.
Because I can do that.
My guess would be a lot of those guys, yeah.
Do I'm Blackwater or do the, okay.
No, no, no, no, just do the actual job.
I think you could actually probably try
in Blackwater.
If any of our McLaren driving or for,
no, if you're driving a McLaren,
I mean, I don't know about the current ones.
I don't know how much luggage you can fit
in a whatever that ugly new hypercar thing is,
but yeah, let's say if you're driving it for our 296,
which I finally saw one on the road recently,
I've been seeing the race cars for years, obviously,
but still a rare sight in these parts.
But man, what a fucking great looking car that is.
I don't care how little luggage it holds.
It's a good looking car.
I was so excited he said an AMIata at my local Acme.
That was very cool.
I was like, ooh.
Ooh.
Dude, it's funny.
And it was rusting in all the same spots
that mine was when I got rid of it.
And it reminded me though, just seeing that.
The only car I've never been,
I've never been a car name guy.
Some people like to name their cars,
and I've never, but the Miata, my old Miata,
that was the one car that got a name.
And his name was Little Buddy.
Go in little buddy mode, let's go.
That's great.
Because he was just, he was just,
he was the little buddy.
He was just your little buddy, you know?
We love a little buddy.
Fuck, I need another Miata.
I know, I was just thinking about it.
I saw that guy had the new tag on it,
I was like, that's smart, you get it.
Just got it.
What do you buy in 2025?
Ah, an AMIata.
That's the one.
Pop-up headlights I call it.
Rusty.
Yeah.
Dysinocrating, I mean, I hope you didn't pay
more than a few thousand dollars for that, but.
I probably did.
Pay more, you think?
In this, in this economy, who knows?
With crazy rust?
Yeah, I don't know, it just feels like nothing is.
It's like everything is, is $10,000.
Just do billers.
Yeah.
It's weird.
He hasn't been in the news much lately,
for which I think we can all be grateful,
but I do think that it's worth mentioning
that as of three days ago, Elon Musk predicts
Tesla will have autonomous ride hailing
and probably half the population of the U.S.
by the end of the year.
Oh, I'm sure.
God.
And this is from Yahoo Finance in a bold
and potentially transformative statement
during Tesla's Q2 2025 earnings call.
Elon Musk revealed the company is actively gaining
regulatory approvals for its long-promised
autonomous ride hailing service
with several states already preparing for launch.
Tesla is now targeting coverage for nearly half
of the U.S. population by the end of the year.
So that's pretty exciting.
It marks a significant milestone
in Tesla's full self-driving ambitions.
As we get the approvals and prove out safety,
we'll be launching the autonomous ride hailing
across most of the country.
While I hear you, I'm not even,
I'm looking at this screen, I'm not looking at it,
but I can hear you guys shaking your heads.
And it says, while previous autonomous vehicle
timelines from Tesla have often drawn skepticism
due to repeated delays, this time around,
the company appears to be proceeding
with a measured approach.
Oh my God.
Musk emphasized safety and regulatory compliance
as top priorities even while projecting aggressive scaling.
That's at least our goal.
Subject to regulatory approvals,
I think we'll technically be able to do it.
Assuming we have regulatory approvals,
it's probably addressing half the population of the U.S.
by the end of the year.
We are being very cautious.
We do not want to take any chances
so we're going to go cautiously,
but the service areas and the number of vehicles
in operation would increase at a hyper-exponential rate.
Fell for it again, award.
It's just like-
But this time!
It's like, damn, dude.
So this is something, this is called,
there's a disclaimer on the bottom,
so this was originally published on barchart.com.
So it looks like they are,
they identify as aggregate a lot, yeah.
From barchart, which is, is that a real?
Let's look it up.
Oh, yeah, I see that.
Originally published on barchart, yeah.
Barchart News.
Caleb Naysmith.
Barchart News.
Oh, this is a, wow, look at this.
Okay, so this is like speculation,
a stock speculating site.
It seems like aggregate's a lot of it.
Yeah, but it's like a news site, right?
I mean, every article they post literally just has
all the companies mentioned with their stock tickers
like on the front underneath.
I think that's the purpose of their reporting
is about like what affects stock prices.
Kind of boosts the company, yeah.
Yeah, like if you, I guess a little,
beep, literally it just has stock tickers
under all the headlines for all the companies.
That's cool.
Yeah, so I imagine this is some kind of pay for play
scheme to pump Tesla stock through a site
that looks like it is designed for stock pumping.
And then Yahoo Finance picks it up
like a bunch of fucking rubes.
I haven't, have you guys noticed like just like
a recent kind of uptick in just like bubble talk?
Like, I mean, it's like, look, I mean, it's fucking,
it's obvious that like, you know, that we're,
I mean, you know, as, you know, Rory, you've pointed out,
you know, at infinite, like, you know, the AI
is just like, you know, completely ridiculous
and impossible to monetize or make profitable
outside of defense contracting, you know, thing.
But I feel like, like I'm seeing a lot more
just kind of mainstream or semi-mainstream stuff
where it's like guys going, I think we might be in,
we might be in a little bit of a bubble.
Love that, love that for us.
And it's like, and then you look at it and it's like,
oh yeah, no, the last time that like, you know,
the ratios of, you know, debt to, you know,
earnings or whatever, you know, thing they're using
was like, you know, was this high, was like in 19,
like 28, you know, or whatever it was like.
And the only other time it got anywhere close to that
was like in 2000, you know, it's just funny to me.
Yeah, it's just funny to me.
And there's a lot of talk about like, like treasuries
and like, you know, 10 year yields and stuff.
And like stuff that like, I don't, I don't know,
like that's not my, you know, my view.
Like I like to like look at that stuff
and just kind of like, I don't fully understand,
you know, how the mechanics of all of it.
But it does seem like, like it feels like everybody's
just kind of waiting for the other shoe to drop.
I need a Liz Franczak, Alex Skaggs episode
about what's going on right now, new.
The only time I ever understand anything about
treasuries when Liz and Alex are talking about it.
I will say, I, you know, listen to that stuff
as much as anybody does.
And I will say like, there have been like dark portents
in the economy for like the last decade where it's like,
oh, durable goods orders have never been this low before.
Like all these like, and it's like kind of keeps hanging
on in some respects.
And I think like, you know, I think like the big lesson
of like maybe 2008, 2009 is that just like,
just keep the bubble inflated and don't let it
take the economy down.
It's like, there's, we've had a bunch of bubbles pop
in the last few years, but it's like, you know,
it's like do whatever it takes to keep this ball
in the air because like, if you let it,
like we may not, we may never come back.
Like the conditions, you know, might not be there
to recover, but it's, yeah, I do, it is very consuming.
It is very consuming.
I think that the mechanism that keeps that in place
is the fact that like, that the entire world
is tied to our markets and to the US economy specifically
and to our, you know, to the fucking NASDAQ
and to the Dow Jones and, you know, and I just wonder
with the fucking, with the shit that like,
that Trump is doing and with like really just like,
making it impossible for fucking anybody
to do business with us and forcing just like other countries
to just, you know, I mean, like you can only sanction,
I mean, I mean, this is like another thing
that's been going on for years and that, you know,
I've kind of wondered and just like, it's like,
how can you just keep sanctioning everybody?
You know, it's like when you're sanctioning
like literally a third of the fucking world
in terms of just like a number of countries,
in terms of number of people, it's way fucking more
than that.
It's like, those are the most populist countries
in the world.
It's like, at some point they're just gonna dip out,
you know, and I think like we're starting
to see the beginnings of that happen.
And well, and it's like, and I just wonder like
when the rest of the world is no longer invested
in keeping our bubbles afloat,
that's I think when maybe the consequences happen.
Well, I hear you saying that, but as we know,
you can just get rid of the people who report
on the bad numbers and replace them
with people who give you good numbers and problem solved.
So it's like, as we saw today,
the new, what was the jobs report guy?
It's gonna be like the head economist
from the Heritage Foundation.
So it's like, a lot of being, problem solved.
Get a bad jobs report, guess what?
Well, I mean, it's basically, it's the same play
with, you know, that they did with COVID numbers.
It's just like, yeah, well,
we're just not gonna count them anymore.
Yeah, problem solved.
Exactly, it's like.
Someone tapping his brain in the meeting,
like, you know, we could do, what if we,
what if we just pretended this was over?
Mission accomplished.
Sold.
So hopefully that'll be fine.
Maybe there'll be a debt jubilee,
maybe I won't have to pay any of my mortgage
and bills and we'll just keep on rolling.
That'd be great.
That'd be cool.
Yeah.
Yeah.
All right.
Jubilee.
Jubilee, baby.
That'd be great.
That'd be sick.
That'd be really cool.
All right.
Well, Rory, have a great time in Monterey.
Yeah.
Yeah, come report back.
Watch out for the pedos.
Be safe.
Get, try and get some seat time
in that, that Lotus Etna, man.
Yeah.
Yeah, well.
That's my shit.
At least, at least try to sit in it.
Yeah.
Good stuff.
Yeah.
Ask him what the tape player.
Hey, did you guys ever put a,
he used to put a belt in here.
He used to ever put a.
I feel like.
Are there cap stands in there?
Rory.
I am actually very curious about that,
that little, the digital panel that is pretty clearly
just like somebody took, took like a highlighter
and just drew on a piece of paper
and just stuck it in there.
We'll take a look through some,
some, some rectangles or something.
I'll get some eyeballs on it.
I am, it'll be good when Hagerty invites me
to Monterey for the first time in 20 years
and I immediately break one of their auction cars
by fucking with the tape player.
Yeah.
Why do we stop bringing this guy out?
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's right.
Oh, awesome, man.
You'll have a good time.
All right.
Well then.
Stay tired.
Tired.
See you, Wes.
All right.
Peace.
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