The Perfect Car Day, Irrational V-8 Love, Fun Car That Can Toddler | Episode 1,028

Welcome back to the podcast Paul and I were just this minute discussing should we open the podcast with cheers everyone?

And then you'll think it's over. I just like good night. Good night everybody. No, actually. Hello. Happy Tuesday

We're glad to have you back with us

We have a huge podcast of an interesting topic kind of related to the one we just did but a little bit off-kilter from that and

Two good car debates two good car conclusions. You guys have got a bunch of questions

We're gonna dive right in because there is a lot. There's not a lot of news up front

Not a lot of worthy news. Yeah, that's actually fair. There's not worthy to be really discussed. Yeah, that's fair

Toyota had a bit of news here. There's the Japanese

Mobility show happening right now and they were saying for a couple of days. Hey, we've got a new mid-engine

We're gonna release on Friday and you thought what we thought what everyone thought

Which is mr. Two they've teased it. Yes building a prototype with the chair Corolla

They've got patents and drawings and they've saved the name

extrapolate and they've saved the name gr mr. Two as well just in case well, I'll show you the mid-engine they released

I don't know if you've seen this already the mid-engine they released

Is this?

K truck they got with Daihatsu. They released a K truck and I resoundingly do not care. I mean

It's kind of cool

It's just not cool under the banner of we're releasing a mid-engine something. Yes, that is the key

The world that is the key in

But if it were just like a sideline, okay, yeah, that is cool. Yeah, nice

You got a ranch fine. They and Daihatsu apparently had a competition for who could make the best one of these and of course

They own a lot of Daihatsu and so that was a thing that they did at the Japanese mobility show great

I actually in and of itself fine. It's just we were all expecting one thing. We got another thing

It's a little bit of a bait and switch. We wanted to talk about the fact that it happened

But I only bring it up

Legitimately I'm bringing it up because I still have hope that an MR2 is coming

I mean, I think it will but they've done damage

Because now they're crying wolf. Well, I'll think okay. You're just gonna pull this kind of stuff again next time

Are we going to pay as much as a good question? And then they'll real maybe they'll really drop it. We'll be like, oh, wait

Wait, no, no, no, sorry. I'm excited. That's the one I'm excited about. Yeah, for sure. We'll see

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We've got a topic Tuesday

From Justin D who wrote to us back in October 2025

About putting together the perfect car day. Hmm. Okay. He said a spring day windows down drive through the country

Stopping for ice cream somewhere in there is a car wash in the driveway perhaps a beer

Okay, all right diving to certain cars for certain perfect days and I like that you just left it really loose

Justin because it really got me thinking about what would a perfect car day look like what?

Your perfect car day look like and you know what the cool thing is it can look like anything it can be anything

We're inventing our own categories. Okay, we're using our own whatever cars we come up with

I've got two well actually three different scenarios three well two hotels a

Locate well

Two locations three locations Wow cars two hotels it kind of grew it grew

Of course you did you like you like lists

I will also say the other thing that happened here is the fact that we did not give ourselves any more parameters than we

Just mentioned so that gives you and I the ability to wonder far afield and away from each other

I have six different days. I picked a couple of cars for each of those days and I here's here's the rules

I gave myself

all of my cars are

Modern you could go get them. Okay. Okay. They're not I

Because I thought about I could do this with classics

Like when's the e-type and then I'm going to the e-type then I have to get this car

So I just stayed everything I've got is like within 10 years old. I just stayed fairly modern cars

You could go get these are my rules. These are your rules. These are my rules

So I stayed fairly modern cars and and I want you to go first, but my my days I picked were

the wedding day oh

Like events like a day are the perfect car for the wedding day

The perfect weather day on Pacific Coast Highway. Okay, like like it's it's like 70 out and sunny

That's pretty perfect like like that Pacific Coast Highway all of the road is open because that doesn't happen a lot anymore

There's that what's your tight technical Canyon car?

This is interesting. What's your cross-country with back roads car like a road trip like we would take okay?

What's your track time car? That's its purpose is track

Like that's all you're doing with it. This is good and what's your blizzard car?

Really these are my these are my list and the other thing that I did that I tried to do and it's it's not I didn't do it

Perfectly the other thing I tried to do is a price spectrum

Like something that really is everyday driver money like you could probably go get one with any kind of budget

Probably all the way up to what's the money? No object first

Okay, like two or three cars per because I went crazy, but I also just thought I'm not gonna just shoot for the moon

I'm gonna get a car that's like somewhat accessible that does this same thing

So those are my categories and these are my rules you and I do different rules

What are one of the things I love about fun? We just do our different rules. So where'd you go?

I did shoot for the moon. I shot for the moon. I'm not surprised. No one actually listening

I'm kind of crazy. Okay, good gonna jump right in with the car

So what I did was start with the car and then I'll describe the experience to you. Ooh starting with a 1961

Ferrari 250 short wheelbase, California spider. I really like this car

If you have the means I highly recommend picking one up 13 million. I think is the something like that. Yes

I've heard of some auctioning for more. I've heard of some auction for in the six to eight range

It depends on the year. He never drives it. He just rubs it with a diaper. I could do the first ten minutes of that

It's so funny every line. Anyway, yeah, I really like this car. Here's in blue. Here's a front shot and then

actually

GTO I think it's GTO engineering actually does some

continuation cars or I guess some some one-off engineered cars, but it's just

It's one of those cars where I just go

It's just so beautiful and that's very much part of the experience and I think Justin, that's what you mean

So you know perfect car day perfect car meant to be driven and it's so blindingly expensive

It's sort of like caution to the wind. You know what?

It's so crazy expensive and it's good. It sets it up to be the perfect day

Yeah, yeah, it's not going to be perfect if something goes wrong or but I'm I'm not thinking that way

Yeah, gonna live in perfect land over here imaginary perfect land

Because I got thinking and my first experience is actually tied to a favorite recent film

The equalizer three with Denzel Washington. Okay. All right really cool move

I mean the guy is incredible actor and you know, you enjoy those films a lot

I really really like those just because of the the subtlety and what he can do and just

Mm-hmm on in equalizer three. I'm gonna ruin it if you haven't seen equalizer three. The bad guys just get

They just get crushed you like carnage

You do you like when action when the action hits you want it to be carnage and those movies are all about that. Yeah

so in the movie

Denzel

Finds himself in Italy and I looked up the town

Where most of the movie was shot

The fake fictional name of the town in the movie is Altamante

Mm-hmm that doesn't exist the actual town exists and the real name of the town is a tranny

ATR a and I a tranny Italy it is down the coast about three hours from Rome on the west coast of Italy

It's about an hour and a half from from Napoli Naples

Okay, and yeah about three hours down the coast and so I just thought all of his experiences

I just I wanted to take a 61 California spider down to a tranny

I love it, and I just got on Google Earth on Street view. Yeah. Yeah, and just took some screenshots

Here they are of a tranny Italy. This is the square

Hmm, where some of it was shot as well. Just hang out having espresso. I want to eat some pasta

You know what I kept thinking when I watched this movie. I kept thinking that dead cell Washington and Antoine Fuqua the director

Argentinian friends, okay, and just like to do stuff together, which is why they've done these movies

Right, and they just decided let's vacation here and while we're there shoot a movie that probably happened probably what happened

Yeah, and then the bad guy was just so satisfying

Just yes takes him out. So here's a tranny and along the coast just driving

I mean the gorgeous it just imagined so a big part of this of course is

The car yeah a tranny Italy and a beautiful woman sitting next to me

So I get it that is absolutely part of the equation and we're we're setting out to explore

We just fly into Rome and we pick up the car and it's just waiting for us

And we just meander down the coast and I do want to eat at the ristorante Savo where Denzel has his

Breakfast and his his cup right there look at you. That's good. And yeah, just Google Earth

screenshots right here

So I'm you know meandering through on down the coast and I thought I could keep going

But I'll just leave you with that

But the perfect day and then we just find ourselves a wonderful seaside hotel and park the car out front and just have an evening

And I love it. That's cool. That's just sounds

Perfection to me. It's really good, but I didn't stop there because me and this whoever this sure beautiful woman

We're gonna go do Switzerland

And we are going to drive a singer DLS or one of the new singer turbos

Because I figured with with a classic Ferrari in Italy if it breaks down

The locals will just come out of the woodwork to help you and there's there's Ferrari old Ferrari parts

It's laying around the closet. They're totally do. Yes for sure. It won't be a problem, but here's a little bit more modern

I mean, it's newer. It's gonna run but yeah, okay, your California spider breaks down

I think people would just be happy to help you have an espresso will work on the car

We'll talk about whatever and here I think this cars is gonna run because we're gonna be in Switzerland

We're going to be going to a specific place. It's a hotel

I do want to go to it is the Chedi the Chedi Endermatt in Switzerland. Hmm. This place is right in the valley. I

Yes, I just want to go experience this hotel

Look at CHED I the Chedi and it's just spectacular gorgeous. Yeah, I put in some dates and it's only like 1300 a night

I

Want to park this singer right out here

I'm gonna drive through and I want to park it right up there and you know have a lovely evening at the Chedi

I may need to stop the podcast and start again. I was not expecting that curveball Bravo. Keep going

I mean, I'm rolling heavy in a singer or whatever

I got to stay at a nice place

Okay, we're gonna have a lovely dinner and a great breakfast and we're gonna go exploring Switzerland

I want to geek out on watches speaking of which the second part of that trip

Maybe it's a separate trip, but maybe it's still the still going here is to a hotel the hotel de Orlajeu in

Valley de jus

This is the Audemars Piguet Hotel

It contains actually right next door the Audemars Piguet Museum

designed in conjunction with Bjarke Ingles the architect Bjarke Ingles group and he designed this

It's a 50-room property. So each room is afforded

Unobstructed views of the sweeping valley located in the Swiss canton of Vaud just outside of Geneva

The location the write-up says I love it when marketers. Oh, yeah, do they're oh, yeah

They don't just tell you the location. Oh, they have to sell it too. So I'm gonna sell to you, right? Okay, please

So this location holds great historical significance for the Swiss watchmaking industry

But the setting was also chosen as it's the same location as the other ambitious

Bjarke Ingles project. It is that Audemars Piguet Museum and then very close is Jager LeCoultre Museum

And sure I want to go there and I'm having that white noise moment over here

Keep going. Yeah, totally geek out on on watchmaking there in the valley

So this the musée atelier Audemars Piguet Museum

the building consists of zig-zagging slabs descending towards the valley and

Tilting slightly to embrace the topography while continuing a continuous creating a ten continuous path in nature on the

Interior, so here's the exterior that hotel. It's crazy looking. It's very cool. It's crazy. It's modern. It's very nice

Yeah, like I said that zig-zagging kind of architecture. I think it's a really unique unique hotel

really beautiful and so the interior here the

Continuous ramping concrete corridor connects all the rooms to facilitate both visitor and service

amenities are tucked under the

Incline slabs and oriented towards light and views of the landscape grief. I want to stay there knowing my singer is out

This place at night. I didn't check. I'm sure it's got a healthy comma in it as well

Yeah, sure. Yeah, then all the watchmaking stuff is right there. We're in Switzerland. We can just I want to go

Just check it all out. I'm gonna check it all out, but doing it in a singer DLS. Yes, sounds like that is the way to do it

Yes, perfect

That's way up there. So those my two trips Italy may be separate and then I don't know if we ship the car home

Do we ship the car back home or do I leave it in Rome because I haven't done Southern Italy?

Think through logistics here

Maybe I leave it in Rome because it'll need some service see what's what's happened here

Everyone that you don't realize is that Paul and I have spent most of our time before this podcast talking about actual logistics for actual trips

We're going to take and so it's leaked its way into his brain

And now he's got a singer DLS

He has to figure out if he wants to ship or leave in Rome, which is a fantastic

That's the California spider to leave in Rome. Oh, I'm so sorry. Oh, I'm sorry. So leave that in Switzerland

Yes, or bring that home. I am sorry about the stressful day you're having but maybe both this

Woman and I I don't know who it is, but she and I could trade off driving and we'd have both cars at the

Bond film or large a I see

That's a good idea. Oh my gosh. Okay. Alright, and we're experiencing both because you know

We're rolling up in these cars like we're we're heavy rollers here and they're gonna roll the red carpet and you know

This is super money will fall from the sky and I don't know super relatable

But we're talking about I do love it. I do love a day here

So I want to just I mean what a great looking room and the doors open and look at the valley out there

I see it watchmaking industry for Switzerland. It's just the home of their clocks in the rooms. I don't see it actually

Well, it's because it's all watchmaking when you're the watch capital of the world

Do you put a clock at the room? This is my actual question about a hotel because everybody's wearing watches

Everybody has some sort of cool watch and you discover and you have all these cool conversations be allowed to stay there

I just walk it there with my bare wrist like somebody and or fall right, you know, it's just what is that guy doing?

He has a ponytail and no watch on his wrist. He cannot stay here. I don't care what he's got for money

Maybe they would offer you like sir

Would you consider it's like when you go to the restaurant that requires a jacket?

You don't have one they have like the get the exact the loner watch because you got to wear a watch at this hotel

Oh, that is ridiculous, but it's not close to Geneva. So it wouldn't be a it would be an AP watch

I'm very worried. Yeah, or a Jaguar LaColter which also builds their own movements

And I those are really those are nice dressy pieces. Sure

So we're in the $12,000 to start and then you know, okay going from there, but so four of my son's car got it

Okay, yeah

What do you put in that perspective?

Yeah, anyway, go on. So this is this is my big trip. These are my two trips

You know, I get my filipasta you've done well in Italy and and espresso and then here all the great

You know food of Switzerland, there's all kinds of cuisine there and driving great cars great roads gorgeous scenery awesome hotels, of course

All the things so you know my trip

This is my perfect honestly

I have to give you kudos because you consistently and all of you listening and watching should know this

Paul is a fantastic big idea guy

He very often has really big ideas that have come true for the show in some cases and also for hooked on driving

He has these like weird moonshot ideas that are so far out of where my head is

Because I'm thinking, you know real budgets real logistic and problems. What about we go to the moon

I'm like, what are you talking about? And then six months later? We're doing like a variation of his great idea

So I have to applaud you because you do that much much better than I do

Oh, I have the much more grounded version of this for better and for worse. So that's where I'm gonna go

I just want to stay like it's very cool. Look at this place. I cannot imagine him right there the comma in that nightly stay

I can't imagine either. Yeah, it just looks lovely and different a different experience. It does look really cool

All right, I'm gonna jump through mine here. We have to start with the wedding day

And let's talk about the wedding day real quick

Because if you're gonna go and you're gonna have a car for your wedding day

I know what you're all thinking and I actually had this experience with one of my friends weddings

Where one of my buddies got married

His wife looked great. It was a wonderful ceremony all that kind of thing

Then they had the car they're leaving in and I'm gonna tell you the pitfall here

The pitfall is this especially if you're a car person, you want to get a cool car to leave to leave in

Yeah, which means you either rented it or you borrowed it or whatever, but

When that happens, it's not a car you've driven before. All right, and in the case of my friend

They found put it here. They found a C2 Corvette

Which was very very nice

It was wonderfully restored and they had a friend loan it to them

But my friend so friend of the family loans him this really nice car my friend had not driven stick in a while

Yikes, see where this is going. Yeah, and the car is on the car before the wedding day

No, look because you didn't have access to it

The car was parked on the slightest incline. Sorry about your clutch be able to roll back

Oh, no, if you put the clutch in oh, no, and my problem here with this

We think as car people I should get like an event car for me to drive away in but

You've had a long day

Okay, you and and and your significant other. I don't care who is on which side of the equation here

You've had a long day. You're an uncomfortable flashy clothing. Okay

She is wearing a dress that I'm gonna put tell you right now was not designed for automobiles

Okay, it was designed for one thing

It was not designed to sit into a car either getting into the car or figuring it all out and I remember my buddy

He and his wife brand new wife got into this C2 Corvette and we had to help his wife get all of her dress in the car

So now she's sitting in like pool of dress, right?

You know, it's up to her like clavicle, right?

And he's trying to find the gear shift, which he can't see and he hasn't driven before oh and because you're leaving your wedding

Everyone's watching you now imagine well the phones are going the cameras are going everyone you know is watching you leave a venue

Forget your wedding for a second

You don't want to screw that up now put yourself in a car that you've never driven before

In a situation where no one's not paying attention and you're worried about the car all of I'm saying here is don't do any of this

What you need for your leave the wedding car is

The largest executive backseat you can get that's what you want. Yes, you just want access

That's nice. I have a Genesis g90 on screen. That is my my more affordable option

Look, I know you can just rent the limo and here's anything I'm gonna say to you

If you want to rent the limo because the other thing I say this is a deep deeply infected car guy

You don't need to drive away from your wedding. It's been a big day

It's been stressful lots of stuff has happened

Okay, I know so many people that they got to their wedding day and got sick because it's been like months and months and months of

High stress and now somebody gets sick on the day of because the whole body just like goes. Oh

Or the day if your honeymoon is really common. Oh

The honeymoon the first day after the stressful wedding day, but he's like I am so sick that is very common

so my point is just

The dress is gonna be difficult to get in whatever car so I have executive options here

I have the g90 wedding dress. Seriously. It was a pool of dress and then he tried to not kill the car

Trying to leave and not roll back into the curb and wreck the pipes. I felt bad for him

It fixed me. He was okay. It worked out. Nothing happened to the car. It was fine

But it but I felt was he rolling backwards push a little bit and a little bit. Where's the gear and never driven this before my new

Wife, I'm gonna embarrass everybody's watching people taking pictures. This is bad. Anyway, there's the Friday night dress rehearsal

There should be the car practice drive. Here's how we're gonna

I also have an Audi a8l. That's not executive sedan. I also have these pictures getting smaller. Sorry about that

I also have the Porsche executive the executive

Panamera is an extended wheelbase Panamera. You don't see him very often. I've never seen a very cool. Yeah, not weird

So yeah, so there is an executive and if you see him in profile

They look really long because of the the rake of the Panamera you make the executive version of that looks really long

And then of course I have to end with this

This is the Rolls-Royce with the star ceiling if you're gonna go throw down

You want the Rolls-Royce with the executive back seats and the starlight ceiling?

That is your leave your wedding. Okay, so I've started there. That's pretty good. I started there

I'm moving on the next event that we're doing is the perfect day on Pacific Coast Highway

The light it's 70 degrees. Okay, sunny light breeze. Okay, all of the road is open

I actually tried to find photos that matched the occasion I'm talking about here

And of course we've got the MX-5 Miata and I actually think that photo might be on PCH

But anyway, MX-5 Miata has to be the option here, of course

That is the affordable option here, but there's other options again. I did price points. Okay, all right with the Miata

The Boxster spider specifically the spider sweet car. This is fantastic

You get to hear the engine you don't need the top because it's the perfect day

Convertible I'm not a huge convertible guy, but the PCH is the place for it

So Boxster spider is another one here and the Lotus Elise

Beautiful that is a fantastic car for this scenario. It's just gonna be and it has the open top

Now the I tried I failed a little bit

I tried to not duplicate cars on my list, but I will admit the Elise works for a few of these

So anyway, so there's that one. I'm now moving on to cars for a canyon road

Okay, good cars for a perfect canyon had the locations and I actually say it took a lot of girl locations

I went through yeah, there was a lot of Google searching for this to try to find photos

It looked like the location we're talking about the obvious Canyon Carver like this is perfect for this is the the 86

Chassis the GR86 of the BRZ

I have it shown here in the Hakone green which I really really like this spec with the bronze wheels and the tan accents on the interior

This is the right spec of this car

But it's just about the dynamics and I you'd be hard-pressed for a canyon driving day to do better than the GR86

I'm not saying you can't but you can start watch our price of fun piece. You start going up in price point

The cars get more rare and exotic

But does the driving get more fun?

If you're just driving a canyon, this is about as much fun as any car you can think of but there are other options here

your GT4

The Cayman GT4 sexy is I can't imagine why you like it the Cayman GT4 is a fantastic car

And it would be a fantastic Canyon runner. I can make no arguments zero notes here

You're gonna have a great day on your favorite Canyon

I'm imagining something like tight like the walls are tight sure Canyon sure and it's you know

Let there's consequence, but the road is tight and technical. Yes. I just love that for all these

Now I have to move on to road trip cars

This is drive-cross country and find some good roads. You need to take luggage

The C8 Corvette the C8 Corvette is is one of the very best

It really just imagine starting on one coast and going to the other coast and finding all the cool squiggly roads along the way

But also knowing you have to take your significant other and you have to take a bunch of stuff with you

And you're gonna have times when you know what we're doing right now interstate for the next four hours

Very few cars modern cars can touch the C8 Corvette for all of what you're talking about and I've picked

I think the only other one and that is the 9-11. Yeah, these are your long-term road trip cars

You do the 9-11 or the C8 either one of those pick your continent and drive from one end to the other

And when the road gets really tight and technical like the canyons I was talking about for they're still great

That's the thing you don't get because the problem is with some GT cars

Which is what you typically think of for something like this. I certainly do when you get to the road getting tight

You're impressed with how well that car is doing and how much fun you're having

Mm-hmm, but you're still aware. It's a GT car. Yeah, the 9-11 in the C8. It's just like and we're just doing this now

It's true. Here we go moving on to the next scenario

We're talking tracking the g86 is back. I like it. It's actually a track photo. I chased photos in that's great

That's great. You're going to have a dedicated track car. Its entire purpose is to take to the track

The 86 is great for that. Yeah, it is by your BRZ for your Canyon by your your GR86 for your track

I don't know. I'm being ridiculous, but but these are affordable and super fun

I mean, I know you could say Miata here again, too

But this car out of the box

I submit to you that the 86 is better out of the box for track than the Miata the Miata

You can build into a giant killer

But the the good tires and the way the suspension is set up right off the lot

I'd rather have the 86 so there's that. Yeah, the GT for RS the Cayman GT for us

I had this over the GT 3rs because I actually prefer this car and the chassis and the other thing about this is that

I don't want to drive this car on the street. Yeah, the engine is so loud

That if you're on track windows up or windows down and it hooked on driving

We allow you to run windows up. It doesn't matter all you're going to hear is engine

Your passenger could be screaming for their life in the passenger seat. You will have no idea

It lets you see their arms waving did it as a joke in our review of the car. It's ridiculous. Just engine noise. Yes doing that

We're just here is engine. There's nothing else, but when you're on track

That's brilliant and I love that the balance of the chassis of the Cayman GT for us

So that's my dedicated track car at the higher price point. Oh, but I also brought a Lotus back

This is the late model exige

This is the 410 that we didn't get with the revised front end. I would like to drive this car

This is the engine that I have in my Amira. This is the 400 horsepower of Camry supercharged

D6 filling the entire back so you have no storage space left

But that means this becomes a 400 horsepower dedicated track car

Yeah, and me being the crazy person I and I would probably pick this over the GT for us

Even though the GT for us is brilliant, but this is the exige the late model final exiges that were really really awesome

So that's tracking moving on again

To Blizzard car what car do you want the Blizzard? Well, I'll tell you right now

You want the Subaru WX drifty Mcdrift for all of the pros and cons that we have spoken about the WX over the years

Yeah, if you told me it's a monsoon blizzard

It's going to be as bad as you've ever seen it and I have the opportunity for any truck of choice

Or a WX on winter tires. I'm picking the WX. I love how the wheels are straight

It's fully sideways wheels are straight wheels straight. We're just some point. It's

Come back around anyway, so just wait for it

WX is one of them

But I have one more here for the blizzard the perfect blizzard the more expensive car is the Carrera 4 911 Carrera 4

That's another car winter tires on that. I don't care how bad the weather is

Let's just keep driving totally the only time you have a problem is it be somehow got so deep on the plowed roads that you

Can't clear it now, but it's gonna take a while you've got a real

I mean, it's gonna be a lot of snow fast

So I would take either of those sports cars. These are my perfect cars for scenarios

Kind of interesting exercise, but I tried to pick high and low and all over the map. That's excellent

We love your topic Tuesdays pick your perfect car day come up with your own

parameters the cars the locations on the planet

Whatever that is we'd love to hear those everyday driver TV at gmail.com and topic Tuesdays and you're seeing that you know

This is it's just a fun thought exercise and that's a lot of the topic Tuesdays that we've been doing lately

But it's great. It just kind of gets us thinking about you know, what do I want out of my driving experience my life my trips

We are here to spend your money

Come with us on these trips. Yes, but yeah, right to us and we're looking forward to hearing from you

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Hooked-on driving announcements the

2026 pre-grid pass is still available for two more days after this podcast drops through January 15th

2026 that is like I said only two more days to get the best discounts of the season and those those are good nationwide

So definitely go to hooked-on driving comm to find pre-grid pass and then buy for the location that you are located in and

That is a great way to save money on your track days in 2026

Also coming up our big trip to circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas

Kota is May 30th and 31st

2026 that is a Saturday Sunday two days at Kota also hooked-on driving comm to register there and we're excited to have you

It's going to be an incredible adventure

2025 turned out. I think even better. Yes, then we thought it was pretty amazing now

I will a little track. We are not driving down there this year. That was last year. We're not driving down there

We're gonna fly down. We're gonna run a track car

But if you've ever thought about going to circuit of the Americas, this is your year

We're hearing they're going to do some sort of member model in 27

We actually don't know that the consequences of that but we know that this year. We're going you can get on track with us

It's gonna be low car count run with the hooked-on driving way

We're gonna have places for you to hang out in air conditioning and also you can drive windows up and you can get whatever car

And it's gonna be set up by all of our normal groups

So you can drive slow and be a newbie with a one-on-one instructor or go super fast in the upper group

I'm so excited to be back. That is I

Mean, I'm not claiming to be the best track driver or to have driven every track

But Kota is in my top five. I love that. It's such a good

Yeah, you might think that the formula one track isn't good for lower-power cars or just street cars

That's kind of what I thought and it is still superb. It's just there's great technical parts

There's of course lots of speed almost three-quarters of a mile in the back straight away

Yes, 11 to 12 is is I mean, whatever however fast your car will go. You'll see that crazy

It's the only it's one of the only tracks where I've driven on the back straight

And you have time to think about how fast you're going because normally what if you're driving correctly

You're getting as fast as you can before you need to break for the next corner and it's not about what's my speed?

You're not know your eyes are up. You're like the the back straight on Kota is like

How fast am I going? I've just got time to like pay. I mean where the braking marker? They're still I can't even see them yet

Okay, I'm going that fast really exactly you never pay attention to the speedo if you're driving on a track

And this one is the one that lets you give you time. So yeah come to that

We also have our pilgrimage trip if it isn't open yet

It will be this week before the next podcast you'll be able to register for pilgrimage that is August 2nd through 9th

It is a very cool trip this year two days to drive on spa Franco champs

One day to drive on the ring on a track day

Not a public day, but we've also got some like tourist days mixed in we've got a really cool tourist day up front

We've got a road tour in the middle. We've got a tourist day on the back. It's gonna be an incredibly fun trip

We've done this for a decade. I can't believe how excited I am about this year's trip these little extras that we put in

I'm like, this is gonna be fun

And you'll notice that we added actually a day from last podcast

We actually added a day with a cool event that will be described at registration

So that is on the very back of the trip

So the trip is now the second to the ninth and we're excited to have you if you have truly if you've been thinking about this

We get a lot of emails from listeners. I love viewers. I've been thinking about this

Is this the year to come every year is the year to come, right? Yes

Bucket list trip you should do every year that we didn't coin that but it's right

It didn't but this trip is going to be really special. We'd love to have you and we'll

Share everything that we've learned and we'll go have an adventure together and we'll go see cool things and eat great food and

Learn how to be better drivers and have a great time on two incredible tracks

And it's and it's Europe and it's spouse-friendly much more so than it's ever been which is really cool

This trip typically has been like very hardcore driving

We're kind of giving it some room to breathe which makes it spouse-friendly, but I keep forgetting

I keep forgetting to say this and I think about it after the podcast is over. So I'm gonna rant right now do it do it

This trip is Europe

First off just Europe, which is expensive Europe

Cars provided tracks provided instruction provided helmets meals overnights events all

Inclusive I mean except for airfare

It's all inclusive. Okay

The base price now you can decide to rent the most fire-breathing car there and it adds a lot of cost to your trip

Of course, yeah, but you're not you know included cars at the base level of the trip are very fun cars

For newbies to do these tracks will have an amazing time in the base car

You could come with us

for that whole trip

Seven days in Europe with everything. I've just described or you could spend that same amount of money in

The u.s. Where you have to bring your own car pay your own gas and you and a significant other

Get to have four or five days of driving and lead follow on a racetrack for a few hours

That's what others offer. This is what we're offering and I I forget it

Because we're worried about we got our heads down we're worried about our own trip

And then I see what those trips are like really so come I'm not saying it's cheap. It's an expensive trip. Yes

but comparatively

Value I'm just saying

It's just this is a trip you'll talk about

Agreed because we talk about it agreed last thing for you to be aware of our hooked on driving northeast owners

Santi and Cody are putting on an incredible july 4th event called stars stripes and speed

They're going to have an incredible event because they proved it in 2025

It was fireworks camping. There was drifting. There was a car show three days on track at Watkins Glen

This is a very special event and it's becoming a tradition already

Go to hooked on driving calm and you can find that july 3rd through 5th event right there

You can register already start making plans bring everybody tell everybody, you know, it's going to be huge really cool crazy event and

Watkins Glen is quite a superb track. It's up there. It's up there for sure

Everything that we've heard we've now been there a couple of times and truly it's a great place to come

So hooked on driving calm for all of those and watch

Everyday driver comm slash adventures for the pilgrimage trip and then our two u.s. Adventures this year

We're doing uh, we're going the Laguna seca area

We're going to do Pacific coast highway and tracking at Laguna seca

So that's going to be in mid may and then we are going to do a utah meet-up trip

And there's a question coming up and the questions later that i want to clarify some stuff about that

That trip is going to be in mid september. So those are still pending as well. It's going to be so much this year

Yeah, when are you and i going to be home? I think i think like a choke of our podcast this year

Are going to be video from a cool location. They are excited about it's gonna be awesome

Since you're listening to us you'll end up shopping for your next car very soon

And when you do you need autotempest.com

Any car anywhere at any price autotempest searches all the major car listing sites on the web local or nationwide

An autotempest has recently added price history for every car listed

So you can see how prices are trending and know if you found a good deal

You can also create search alerts and lists of saved searches so you can find your perfect spec even easier next time

Search on any device in your browser or as an app for apple ios and android

New used or unexpected autotempest is how we search for cars

Go to autotempest.com slash every day. So they know we sent you autotempest all the cars one search

For our first car debate ben is writing in saying please help us he and his wife are writing in from virginia

They need an engaging v8 car. This has twists and turns. It's a long email too

Pretty impressed ben. You've put a lot of thought into this really appreciate you ben was thank you

Thank you for being with us and for watching a long time viewer listener

His perspective ben did buy a few years ago a gr86 base the manual to replace his previous monster 3 hatchback

He took that to 245,000 miles was running great

Which replaced a modified 97 volkswagen jedda that he took to well over 200,000 miles

There's a trend here in this whole email. He's had an 86 fiero a few cars before that

But he labored over all of these choices that he could have had for fun cars

A lot of our videos pushed him over the edge and you and I have heard from so many people at various track days

wherever we're at

I bought a gr86 because of you guys. I feel like we're like

Selling the heck out of these sold those here's the thing

I know I know in many cases you folks are sick of hearing about that car

But I will tell you the thing that makes me happiest when I hear those stories

Is what we don't hear is I bought one of those and they're terrible

Right, and you were wrong because thank god at least even and I will also admit

There's been people that have bought 86's and since sold them because they found out it didn't work for their life because of x

Which finally get that and we all have that in our life, but at least

Everybody to a person has been like that was a cool fun car. I'm not saying it's perfect

But thank god when they buy them, they don't go. Well, what are those guys talking about that always makes me happy. Yeah

Ben also replaced his 2001 dodge 1500 5.2 manual with a 2017 ram

1500 5.7 8 speed auto so they've got the fun car

They've got the utility truck so the ram does the double duty for

For life and they do take it to the dump

Apparently they take it on modest off-road trails. They do all they do pick up things with it

Which is good. I do like that

He acknowledges that they actually go to the dump with it because of course you do you have a pickup, huh?

His wife came out of a 1997 Pontiac firebird with a v6

To get a 2013 Kia soul

They have taken the Kia soul to

Well a lot of miles on that

Everything on here has got over 200,000 miles. They just keep driving everything. They've driven this car

Cannot believe how long they've had everything on this list. Oh 160. Okay 160 thousand the car still runs great

This is the particular car that ben is writing about that we need to get rid of but see soul

I was talking about souls for

So long ago

And I was loving souls and they had a soul and they took at least a lot of it

But the reality is of course he wants to replace this Kia soul with something else

His wife will love and that's always the hard part and very important for her. It must be automatic

She actually loves riding with him in the 86 and loves that it's a manual

But she doesn't want to learn to drive manual. She wants it to be an automatic

And even though again at the top of this email it was there looking for an engaging v8

Even though we are about to create a bunch of parameters that don't work for this car

Her first car choice

Is a dodge challenger and I say it doesn't work because she wants a four door

In case you're following along the challenger is quite big

But is only two doors her

Perfect car is a purple obnoxious

Loud v8 dodge challenger and I can't argue that if that's the car you'd really like

But it doesn't really meet their life or their budget because she would actually like four doors

She said she doesn't even need the hell cat. They just like get us into v8 and she'd be happy

I think that's still compelling for you. I'm gonna say the thing we always say and that is if there's one car

You've always wanted

Maybe you should just get that car

But we're gonna go other places there that that component does exist. You're right. It does

She's open to anything then and his wife are open to anything except

They want a challenger. She wants a challenger. She wants to challenge so funny

Yep, and then they have their budget and then she has a bunch of other things

She'd like which kind of take the the challenger back out

But I understand there's just irrational love for a purple challenger. That'd be cool on the driveway admit

All right, I've got some suggestions. So it's not really fun car. It's not really utility

It's somewhere in between for road trips for comfort

Unless it's a challenger and I suppose that could fill that need too

The budget is 26 to 35 thousand dollars used

They cannot push the budget anymore without taking away from their limited fun and travel budget

They don't mind going as far back as a 2015 model, but it needs to be compelling

So his wife's requirements must be automatic prefer lighter weight because everything's getting cumbersome

But they also said challenger so anyway, but then there's a challenger

Yeah, going on prefer four doors except for challengers. Exactly. It's the exception. I get exceptions

We all have our soft spot. We do. We all have the hardened fast rule. Well

Unless it's one of those

Totally understand so it can't be too tall as a height as a car a vehicle

Uh, so respecting the vehicle's height. They're no mustangs. They're not a fan of ford

For over 20 years. They've watched in horror the stories that his wife's parents have as many as 34 recalls on just one of their fords

Wow, that is um, not a typical story. That's not everybody's experience. But okay that uh, everybody's got their thing

Everybody has their brand not that yes or no and it's so different for everybody

A decent sound system with a subwoofer. All right

And last but not least it has to have a relatively smooth ride

So not too rough for city roads on the highway. It doesn't have to be too severe because again

They've got this GR86 already and they and they just don't like that. I mean, there's one of their cars

He actually mentioned they put the smaller wheels on it so they get a bigger sidewall

They just don't like having a stiff riding car

Ben wants something that he can maintain and repair himself. He's willing to do just about anything except rebuild transmission. Okay

I think i'm with you on that

Yeah, I want to avoid that as well for sure. He says he can do oil changes

It needs to have not crazy prices for replacement parts

And uh, while he's looking at me apparently

What?

He assures his wife would like a mcconne

But they're not sure that they're ready to have a Porsche replacement part price cutting into their fun and travel budget

All right, I understand. I've uh, I've got good choices for you. Don't worry

They typically buy cars at the end of the model run before the new refresh or the new redesign happens

Which is smart. Absolutely. That's good. That's very good. That's serving them well

They prefer non hybrid. They prefer to stay away from Nissan and infinity again

Everybody has their thing, right? Well, they also say they really don't want a CVT

Which takes all of the Nissan portfolio on its own that we solved that two ways. Yeah

And it's just the two of them. It's uh, two of them and a small boss interior

Uh, his wife picks up a friend or two when she runs errands

She uses the ram for everyday outings

And she needs an engaging car doesn't necessarily need to be the full fun car as mentioned

Unless it's a challenger one other random thing he mentions here is they would really prefer naturally aspirated

He doesn't like turbos and he realizes in the current market. That's difficult

But that's mentioned here as well, which is very which affected my choices quite a bit

If they really want true fun cars, they've got options

They can borrow from family members like a 2015 GT 500 an 87 9 11 turbo

68 Mustang coupe also a year 2000 Corvette

So all of these are available if they truly want to go kind of get after it do some canyon running

They've got fun kind of covered. Yeah, and he's got the 86 himself

So they they aren't having to chase and duplicate any of those plus it takes some of those out of consideration

So this is fascinating, uh, and then what I found really bizarre is after all of that

The main things in consideration are not the challenger and they're all small suvs

Based on what we learned before feel like they ride too high and are going to wind up with little tiny four cylinder turbo engines

So i'm now confused they kind of are and I think that's I think that's acceptable

I'm just starting out with a photo of a purple challenger

This just happens to be the helcat red ISRT and you know if we're gonna do it if we're gonna get one

I mean, that's a pretty cool car and I then went shopping

The lighting from the photo that I found is not exactly flattering to the car

It doesn't quite look crazy plumb anymore, but if you do get a challenger may I please?

beg you plead with you

to take the

Take it off take the thing off the safety strip. It's it's not a thing. It's not cool

It looks dumb. It's there for shipping and protection purposes. I don't know why it became a thing

It's like

You remember that the for the time period that actually looks painted on anyway

Yeah, I think well, I think it is actually the the rubberized strip. I don't know

For a little while it was a big thing about i'm wearing a baseball cap that's still got plastic on it and the stickers

That was a thing. Yeah, it's it's like fresh from the factory and

There's a whole like subculture in owning dodge cars where it's a big deal that you keep these on it

I cannot tell you and I haven't done this, but I cannot tell you I'm not I'm not a vandal

I am a respectful person of other people's equipment and gear and however you want to live your life, but

I have never struggled

To not do something as bad as I do when I see these cars with the rubberized stuff still on the lower lip

I want to walk over there so badly. I want to peel it off and lay it on the hood and walk away

And I'm sure I'd wind up arrested so I haven't done it

But please please take that stuff. It's it's not designed to be on there and here here's the thing

People we know that have worked at dodge built these cars and designed these cars

It pains them to know that people do this. Yeah years later. Are we not still over this? Are we are we past this culturally?

Ah

Yeah, moving on to the choices here. You had investigated a hornet. I think and a tonale. Yep, which are

Maybe initially good choices, but I'm going to steer you completely over to Acura

because an rdx or the adx

Which is really just a gussied up Honda hrv

But if you want to keep the price down and save a little bit of money and it looks a whole lot better than an hrv

So the two of these I went shopping. I actually found you ben a 2022 with technology package for $29,900

Plaza motors az it's not this one, but very similar and you can go find rdx's

Easy in the $30,000 range. There there's a ton of them out there and they ride great

And they're stylish and it's always like if you're looking for the lexus kind of thing

I always want to steer you to Acura because they're a little bit sportier a little bit more fun to drive

Still great cars to own and drive and they're just a little bit cheaper

And people don't think of them and they have no second buyer

Yeah, so as a result the resale on them is great if you're buying a user. That's a fantastic choice

So both of those adx is a little bit smaller. So I recommend rdx

But you could even consider the mdx, but if you're going to go to mdx. I'm going to suggest a

Really fire-breathing mdx type s for you and I know that's now out of your price range

So we're keeping it down to these two. I think you mentioned Mazda cx 5 and I'm going to wholeheartedly

Agree with you on this and cx 5. I particularly never really liked the cx 50

It's a different configuration. It's just a completely different vehicle. It just rides differently to me never worked for you

I actually kind of like it, but you and I disagree on that. We'll keep going. So this cx 5 stylish excellent

It's still compact and every time we drive it. It's just fun

It's just engaging and it's one of those rare suvs that is more fun to drive than

Than it would let on then then you would think so those are my top choices for you

but I do have this wild card that I'm going to do my best to sell you on

because

You've got fun covered. You've got utility covered and you just want something

relaxing you just want it to be kind of a respite the the egg the

Respite from from daily anything and that is the volvo xc 60. I'm showing a 20 25

Actually 24 25

So this the one I found for you was a b5 core for about 30 to 35,000 dollars

Which is a little bit at the top end of your budget, but with only 15 to 20,000 miles

You've got your choice on auto tempest.com

Just put an xc 60 from about

2021 all the way to current and you've got so much choice

I'm surprised how the prices have dropped on these

But they're so great to be in and they do have that extra step of luxury the seats are fantastic

They're quiet smooth riding

Great place to be. I think it could be a nice place for your fun adventure

It could be that that sweet spot for for you guys

So the xc 60 is something I think you should not only go search for but

Definitely go drive one of those and fall in love with the seats the cabin the materials everything about it

Yes, it is the turbo or supercharged depending on what you find depending on the the configuration

Hard to get away from and this is also shown as a ph e v. So there's a ton of different options there

Yeah, go find one and I think you'll really fall in love with them. These are absolutely superb. That's very good

It's good stuff guys. I'm gonna I'm gonna follow a rabbit trail that leads me to my first sniper shot in a while

I haven't had a sniper shot in a long time. You're calling it. I just I kept

I kept thinking of other things that worked here and realizing that I already thought of the right one

And before that I am going to go through your list here because I want to retread this just for a second ben because

I understand your wife is coming out of a kia soul. So that kind of establishes

She likes the four door boxy midsize suv thing and I understand that that's back in there

But you've said you don't really want a lot of ride heights and that's the reason most people buy suvs

You don't want a turbo four cylinder

You want it to be slightly engaging and the car she really wants and can't afford as a purple

Let's I'm just going to go hell cat the purple hell cat. You should it's really what she wants

I think so. Yes the purple challenger. So I mean and that's not my sniper shot

I'm just saying that's what she really wants. Yeah, your budget is 35 grand on the high side

Look dodge hornet. You talked about that the mazda cx 5 cx 50 the kona in the lexus x ux 200

Maybe a genesis suv. There's there's nothing fundamentally wrong with any of those

I just want to examine right about them either. I mean, I like your rdx. Actually, it's more sporting interesting than all of these

It's a little bit off-kilter. It's kind of I see lexus and I always go to accurate and the volva would be an amazing place to be

Yeah, but you want this to be four doors?

Engaging you'd like it to have a v8 benon turbo

She might actually enjoy driving it and your reference car is the challenger

Oh, and by the way, could it be easy to work on and cheap to maintain and I just have your car

Do you know i'm just done at chevy ss

It starts and ends with chevy ss. This is you want a four door check

The challenger is not a four door. You want a v8 naturally aspirated check. Yeah, you want it to ride well check

You want it to be auto those are the ones in your budget the autos are the ones below 35 grand and there's tons of them

2015 and newer this car started in 2014 and ended in 2017

Okay, that's still in the decade. They're they're still there shop for it. It's a chevy

Just maintain it. Yeah, you get your big burbly v8 power

You get an and this is very engaging to drive and here's what's crazy

One of the notes you said in all of your challenger comments

We didn't make it one of the notes you said in your challenger comments is you were a little worried about is it too big

And that could be argued the challenger is a big vehicle. It's huge. This is a four door that is shorter than the challenger

And every time i thought about an old to the chevy ss

I was just like ben and his wife needed a chevy ss. They've got the big truck

They've got his little car. She needs the engaging car in the middle and wouldn't a v8 be cool

$30,000

Which color would you like?

Real auto tempester and the automatics the automatic fall into that here's the crazy thing

There's people selling manuals for between 40 and 60 grand and i'm sorry. I love this but no what but for an auto

Get the magna ride get the automatic get the chevy ss check every box and i'm done i'm out i'm finished

This brings up the next series that we need to think about because I think it's only a matter of time before you have a chevy ss

So I think we need to get you

That or a quadrifoglio

Alfa male quadrifoglio or a chevy ss probably just because I won't will not shut up

Should wind up in my car. That's kind of i'm thinking like one or two

Yep, we get you that. Yep. I don't quite know yet what to put alongside that for a

We almost have to put you in another maserati product just to to close

Because you haven't had a grand teresmo

Yeah, yeah, those cars don't really go together, but I mean that's they do match our kind of interest for sure

Yeah, that could be interesting because I think it's a like at this point. I think you the audience

is kind of saying Todd

Yeah, we're kind of saying that you're right

But here's here's as I continue to sell this idea to you and you sell it to me

I actually it could be alpha and maserati because then at least it's italians

And it's kind of the same company, right? So there's connective tissue there. Would you do you'd do a quad?

I'd do a quadrifoglio cheap quad and cheap gt

Mm-hmm. This is getting interesting

Here's the only problem with the current youtube model is

Because I love this idea just money money's the problem. It's just money. Yeah, exactly be one of our patrons help us buy stupid cars

No, but really the problem with the current youtube model is

It seems like the audience at large not necessarily you guys but just in general

Are interested in two videos

When you have a new car in the stable the I bought a this and i'm selling a this

Nothing in the middle

I want to buy a car and do like six or eight videos on it at about three videos in a lot of the audience

It's like, yeah, we've seen you have one. Thanks so much

And I want to have adventures and do stuff and share all that but literally the videos that do the best on all of these cars

Is I bought one and forget it. I sold it. We have to have a rev battle

We have to have a which one sounds better and are a rev battle

The which would sound okay? I'm going to say this and I'm going to copyright it because I said it right here

The rev battle is decided by a bunch of middle schoolers

Yes, you can't decide it yourself. You can't leave it the all you get it and here's the problem

A lot of middle schoolers actually don't want to hear a car engine. They just like they're electric whatever

So it might be a challenge get a bunch of middle schoolers around and go which sounds better to you

And I think some of them are going to be like the tesla and I'm like well that one's parked over there

It's not even involved

And half will be like i'm hungry. Yeah, well, there will be that one of them won't even show up

That's elementary school the elementary school to be hungry the the the middle schoolers will be very excited about being asked

And if they can look up from their phone long enough

To you know and take off their headphones like please could you just put it down and help us decide?

I know he's in high school now, but this is the struggle that we're having my son right now

Is the number of times that it's like he's got his headphones on again

My wife could say something like she's got like volume when she was there the cans. They're not just the cans

He can't just over here

He's just he's right over there. He has no idea we're speaking loudly to him

I have noticed that he keeps one he tries

When he realizes that we are actually trying to have a conversation monitoring

Yes, he is living in a world of a constant soundtrack

Constantly amazing. I mean, I felt like I did it a lot. I I was

Elementary level although I will applaud him because I don't think

His peers know genres of music

Like he does he has a it is very broad musical interest. Yeah from what you're telling me from what I hear

He knows everything. I mean metallica to elton john to

You name it to whatever is modern. He's listening to now

It's pretty incredible. Here's the thing. I would say and then I don't know who he likes right now

But like he went through an acdc phase. I think you're 70s rock band. He knows them all that's amazing

90s rock bands. He's a big rock guy 90s rock bands knows them all you get him beyond about

Like into pop music beyond about 2010. He's like i'm out. I don't care anymore, which is very interesting

But he has country stuff. He likes he has yeah, you're right broad stuff like elton john and that kind of thing

There's an amazing breadth of musical interest in this kid, but it's all older stuff

And what's funny is so fascinating the number of teachers that have made some sort of like I like this or some sort of musical reference

That's beyond bodys era and he's like, oh, yeah, that song's great

And then suddenly the teacher's like, wait, what just happened?

Right, that's happened a million times. I think more so than his peers. I mean he's he's totally into it. So

All right. Well ben and his wife you have got deciding to do

Please let us know what you land on right to us a car conclusion and we're looking forward to hearing from you

For car debate number two keith v writes to us asking for a fun car that can toddler

He's a long time. Listen to the podcast viewer of the channel keys. Thank you. Thank you so much

He's got the car swap disease. I know there's the car. It's just it's just you it's car disease car swap disease

I guess the same thing same thing exactly

It's how it manifests just manifests differently and some people some people buy a car never get rid of it

I want to maintain it and build it into a monster other people like well, I've had that for a month

It's time to move on which is more like you and I exactly

So keith grew up in his family's auto repair business

He was introduced to not only watching racing, but his dad's passion for time trials and autocross very cool

Now he's had the project car around ranging from his third generation

Transam gutted and caged with a healthy small block built from a junkyard truck engine up to a finicky portion 914

That got a rotary swap after the air cooled for meditz maker at lime rock

That sounds like an over rev event

It does but I also question the logic of going from a non rotary

To a rotary at your engine swap choosing a rotary in a car that wasn't built goes the other way

You had the rotary and the rotary blew and you went what other engine goes in this car

This was well, we had a normal engine. Why not go rotary while we're here. Okay, great. Also. I think that's amazing

As soon as keith had his permit

He was at an autocross and his dad's daily Honda Civic and in the 24 years since his list of cars includes things like three

Miata's and a ncnd

Of course because you're an autocrosser. It's perfect. Yeah, that's 2000. Ooh a crossfire. Yeah, you never see those

z4 3.0 focus st integras 1989 and a 2024

WRX gti version 7.5 a gen 2 brz a lot of dull other cars

He's autocrossed at the national level in several cars

And that stopped in 2015 because he got heavily into cycling road and mountain

Which took up a lot of his time and then his daughter was born late 2022

He had to let go of the brz

She only had for six months and so it does not baby too well

That's I mean, that's the reality. It really isn't it's you can I did

But it is one of those cars where you know what actually I did not baby with that car. It was it was

Young elementary school years

That was afterwards. It was it was post car seated that comes back around here in a minute

fast forward

Keith's finally had enough of juggling his boring daily cars

To trying to find something that doesn't make him hate life after six months of owning it

Okay, he tried the new integra a spec

Hoping it would solve that problem

But the 1.5 liter engine was nothing but trouble throwing a vtech

controller malfunction code

Multiple times in 6000 miles of ownership and every time it would go into limp mode

And then reset itself by the time the dealer looked at it because of course it did

You get near the dealer of the car. No, no, no, please don't take me there. I'm fine now always always last month

Keith got rid of his mazda cx 50 and leased an ionic six single motor for dad duty and family erin's

Keith works from home. He would like to spend around 12,000 with a Paul limiter of $15,000

requirements are a backseat large enough for a forward facing car seat

That's not too difficult and a manual transmission

Okay, he's looked at bmw one in three series both the e46 and e90 gens

The s197 forward Mustang gts are roughly in the ballpark of that price range for something decent

And then of course the ever-present fiesta st

Excellent. Yes, he stumbled across the g g 37 coop in manual that's intriguing

And he doesn't like sitting down in the bunker that is later gen kameros

You're not wrong exactly what they are rear wheel drive preferred but not mandatory

But a manual transmission is non-negotiable. Okay, love it

He is asking us to help him figure out if he's missing anything in the greater market

If not for the backseat requirement, he would be looking at boxers and meadas and z4s and all that stuff

The reality is that his daughter is probably going to be tiny

He thinks she's going to be in a full car seat for years because his wife is only four 10

He says i'm six one, but it looks like my daughter takes after my wife

So we're going to be in a car seat for a while with her

The car will be used for fun days and weekend trips again. He has the ionic for a daily

So that's solved

So since he works from home and the ionic probably only gets 12,000 miles a year for its lease

This car is going to get less than 5,000 a year maybe closer to 3,000

So it's not even going to get used a ton. He's hoping that we can pull off something for him

The fiesta st is huge on the list here. It's I think you've driven one if you haven't he says it's ever present

I get the sense. He's at least aware of it. Yeah. Yeah, just such a superb car

And this car is the reason we shot that under $12,000 piece

Because this is right in your sweet spot. Yeah, it is. It's great. Absolutely 12 to $15,000 go get yourself like a 2014

fiesta st

I think you would love it. I love your suggestion. I am wholeheartedly behind this idea. Yes

I do have a few other suggestions for you though, and that is the second car in our under $12,000 piece

Mini cooper s from 2005 that's what I'm showing here. I mean

I'm not seeing as many high miles as the one that you've got

Which means they're charging a lot more for them

But for 12 even $15,000 we get the nicest one out there for 12

Most of them are seven and under what I'm seeing. Yeah, they're like seven to 10

And I'm seeing about a hundred like 70 to 100,000 miles

But okay, go get one of these and they're just so much fun to drive. They're excellent. That's great

Also on my list is the 500 abart

So showing a brand new one here, but you'd go back to uh, yeah a little bit a little bit older on these

But still I think you had to have a lot of fun with these and look it's having fun

It's jumping

And then of course the gti is on my list too

I thought what if you go it went way back and looked at r32s

Of course, uh, the gti is uh, ever present just like you mentioned the fiesta st

But I think all of these are the choice now

And they're great because none of these keith are going to be a forever car for you

They're all going to be a right now in the in the growing up years

useful

inexpensive

decent on mileage and maintenance and all that stuff

I think it's they're all going to treat you just fine

And they're easy to find easy to to own and that's what I want for you because again

I would love to go down the road of boxers and meatas and the z4s and going to find some of those cars

But I don't want it to you to try to force it to work. You just need something fun easy easy to live with

That's all of these cars right now. So that's what I want. You've got some driving homework to do my friend

That that's good stuff keith

I'm going to I'm going to push the boundaries of this a little further

And I'm going to start by saying something that I've talked about before

But I have to land on it again

And I I know what I'm about to say is somewhat controversial

But I'm just going to I'm just going to put this out there

And you're probably going to play this for your wife and she's going to shake her head at me

but I'm going to put it out there anyway and that is

When we all become parents because I went through this this fight as well

My wife and I bought way too much car. I don't know what 15 kids we thought we were going to have

But we bought a GMC Acadia and then why do we have this of what's going on?

What it was actually for is we were like we knew we were going to haul all the grandparents

It was the grandparents, right?

Because we have the child and hold them up like lion king. We have the they all come

So that's why we actually bought that car

But we realized we're never going to have the kids that match this car or the monster dogs that match it

So we got rid of it

The other thing that happens is

Most of us when we are car enthusiasts with a sports car. We love you had your BRZ

We hear I'm pregnant and we go must sell that car

And I'm going to I'm going to put it out there

There is nothing legally

That states you cannot put your child in the passenger seat of a two-seater

You might not like that. It might make you uncomfortable. You might feel like that is unsafe

But if your passenger airbag turns off and most sports cars have that capability, that's the only requirement

Because they cannot require you they whoever you want to put they in the big bad they

They cannot require you to get a different car because you are now a parent

Yes, so while I understand your desire is you say must have a back seat

I it instantly hits this nerve in me where I'm like, no, it doesn't

I understand

You want it to well, there's also the nine-month gestation period. There is that but we're way past that

But but yeah, so my point here Keith is you could get the z4s the boxers that you could get any one of those

This isn't a daily

It's not like you're running your daughter around in this car all the time

You could put her in a front-facing child seat in a two-seat car

You are well within the law and it is fine as long as that airbag turns off

So I'm just I'm I'm putting that out there because it's a thing it really is it's like truth. I'm speaking truth here

I know you may not like it, but that is a thing. I'm now going to move on

I'm just off of that topic fair into cars that are there that are two plus twos mainly is where I'm going with you

I mean, I do agree fiesta st is on this list, but

Let's talk two plus twos

And the first one that you brought up is the obvious one and is a great one and that is the bmw one series

These are overlooked. I'm not talking 1m. Those aren't in your budget, but the bmw one series

That looks great. It's the color that they made the one the 1m in

That's really cool orange right right, but this is a 135 and the 135 and when I first drove it

It was like

09 when I first drove this car drove it a

journalist track day and it struck me as

The m3's little brother like the m3 is the boxing champion and his 18 year old brother'd like to be like his big brother

It's that car. You know, it's really really fun. So these are overlooked. Be sure you get and I forget what they called it at the time

somebody will know but

This whatever the sport suspension handling package was

You have to make sure if you give a 128 or 135 or the very rare 135 is

Make sure it has whatever that package was at the era because that makes all the difference in these. These are wonderful

I totally agree with that the g37 coupe. This is the nissan z car of the era with small back seats

This is a phenomenal choice. I really like this choice now

You've said your your daughter is in a front-facing child seat. So we've gotten rid of the trash can rear-facing monster. Okay

But you've also said this is the key thing about 2 plus 2 is that your wife is short and your daughter is small

The reason that we had issues with our cars and I'm going to go to the next one

Of the fiesta st. We already talked about so I can go past it to the actual first gen brz

You've had the second gen. I'm showing a first gen brz. You've had a gr 86, which is the update

I had an frs. I had a 2013 frs the very first year for the 86

And that worked great for when my son was about five and was in like a booster until he was about 10 and was out of car seats

Because that was the span of which he grew that level

My wife is five six

up until the last maybe year

Of his growth cycle

She was able to easily sit in the front seat and he could sit behind her

You're talking about your wife's even smaller

Which means she can go at least a notch or two further up and your daughter is in a

And you have to shop car seats to match the car

You can't buy the one that was built for the suburban and be like why doesn't it fit?

You have to shop the latches are there, but seriously you can shop smaller diameter or just girth if you will car seats

So get a smaller car seat, but you could you could actually rock one of these it's within your budget

Yes, it doesn't have the power bump that is really nice for the second gen

But you I feel like the beginning of this pod at the beginning of this right up

You kind of left the g86 too soon

You feel I feel like that's that tension from you. So you could get one of these. It's your fun car

The car seat works in it like crazy, but while we're here. I'm landing on the Pontiac gto

what

manual transmission

Corvette engine

Good sized rear seat two plus two

I I don't know why but it's like australia day for my brain

I had the chevy ss for the earlier and now i'm at the gto

Maybe you get a gto and i'll get a maserati gt. Maybe I don't know but

These are overlooked. They have kind of bland styling

These were the whole manaro elsewhere and and and also called. I think the opal was also the same thing anyway

These are overlooked. They they aren't worth much money

They're within your budget v8 power good rear wheel drive dynamics an enormous rear seat two plus two in space

That drives very well. I didn't expect to wind up here, but as I was thinking I was like here's your car

Pontiac gto and I'm just i'm in australia land today. I don't even know why it's so funny. I don't know why

Keith thank you so much for writing. Thank you so much for watching for listening

You've got some driving homework to do let us know what you get everyday driver tv at gmail.com for all your topic

Tuesday's car car debates and car conclusions. We'd love to hear from you. Yeah for sure

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We're covering car conclusions today. Yep

James from episode 839 james m

That was entitled preserve your best memories. Thank you for writing in james dad had passed away a week prior to him hitting send

On this email that he had sent to us initially that was an emotional podcast for all of us. It was crazy. Yeah, really was

Go back and listen to that. That's episode

839

And from that episode james has sold the corvette as of late november 2025

For the past two years. He's mostly been passively attempting to take offers on it

Initially trying to you know find some way somebody in the family or or a neighbor close by

As car guys are prone to do what ended up happening is that even though james did sell the corvette

The reason he's sending in a car conclusion here is because he bought his next car before he'd actually sold the corvette

Because that's what car people do

So he did actually I'm going to jump forward on just the story of this corvette because he sold it to a great guy who said

He's going to keep james's father's memory alive with it and he's thrilled that it went to the right person

But I have to land on what james bought

Because what you bought I will admit is one of those cars that always turned my head

He bought I you I never see these things, but this was the rare

Pontiac firebird. I just really wanted a 1998 Pontiac firebird formula w s6

This is the one with the nostrils on the hood

Check this thing out and it's got the the actual pop-up headlights. This is such a cool car a vetter

This is by far my favorite

Look, oh my gosh photos of this cool car. Yeah, he found a great example

Even the interior look at this interior it's spotless. I mean it's it's gm bubble era, but it is spotless

That is so cool. And I love james that you that you love it

And you're actually taking it out actually driving it that is super cool to hear

And I love that you sent those photos because those are I don't remember the last time I saw one

They look kind of bulbous and angry, but they are angry

And with the pop-up headlights and everything that is a rare beast and you love it and the your kids love it

And so I'm just thrilled that you have it and I'm glad that that was that conclusion

And the corvette did go away to the right owner. So that's good, too

James, thank you for writing really appreciate it car conclusion number two is from dave b

He came to us from episode

916 9 6 9 16

He said a few things have changed since he wrote his retirement has been delayed to june of 2026

He's still racking up the miles. So he doesn't want to go into any big purchases yet

But as he mentioned in his car debate though a corvette has always been a want

The getting in and out of his car was always a concern especially for his wife

Over the past summer he and his wife were sitting by the pool at their shore condo

He was reading one of his corvette magazines

When one of the residents stopped by one of the local residents happens to be a vietnam vet

Who lost a leg in the war and so he uses a wheelchair or forearm crutches

But he sees him he sees dave reading this corvette magazine and starts asking

Oh, do you have a corvette and dave's like now? I've had a lot of other things but never a corvette

I'm worried about getting in and out and this guy starts laughing

Because he has a corvette and he gets in and out of it. He goes buddy. If I can do it you can do it

Which meant dave's corvette search was instantly on again. So eventually yes, I'll pass forward to

This past september he found an original owner 2001 c5 coop with manual and only

18,000 miles. Wow. This car has sat. It is ready to be driven. I mean

18,000 miles on an 01 this thing's practically brand new 25 year old car with 18,000 miles on it

Please please please drive this car a lot. He says the car rides great

He never thought the ride would be this good. The best part is his wife loves going for the rides

She will ask are we taking the corvette?

A lot of the answer

What else he said the first week he drove it his 89 year old mother insisted that he bring it and when he took it to breakfast

Because of course everybody wants the ride. Yep. He has to lower her and pull her out lower into the car pull her out of the car

But that's expected, but the reality is they're still doing it. They're getting in this car, which I think is fantastic

Here is a practically brand new 2001 c5 18,000 miles crazy good looking. I can't believe how clean that is

I mean, I look I would love to color, but I'm just being obnoxious when I say that that is so clean

Dave this is awesome. Yeah, all the receipts. He got the big binder of receipts. The car is mint all original

He's loving it. I am hoping that it didn't come with

25 year old tires on it. So if it did you must change them immediately

Please change them immediately for sure. I'm all track pros on the on the car clearly somebody

Had it but didn't really enjoy it and now it it's kind of your obligation. I think you need to

Drive this a lot. Well, I'm gonna stop where you were on tires for just a second

I'm going to say this this has happened and it's actually in other car debates as well

And car conclusions folks if your tires are more than about five years old

You need to consider changing them if you buy somebody's unused like these cars

Unused car and you think wow the tires still have lots of tread on them

And they're like more than five years old 10 20 years old

That is not the metric carefully drive that car to a place for new tires because this I hate to just

Beat on the point here, but this is what killed paul walker

Is old tires on a powerful car? So please please please the last thing for you, Dave

Though as you said you you're about an hour from new jersey motorsports park

And you're considering bringing this corvette to hooked on driving track day and I cannot say yes fast enough

You've got to come to one of those events go to hooked on driving calm. Look at our northeast region

They've got events at njmp happening this year. I've got a few and you should totally try that corvette on the track

It'd be great

Jumping to questions. I'm going to start here with aniswar's question

He asked a question actually he kind of gets ahead of himself and gets ahead of all of us on our utah meet-up

Our utah meet-up is going to happen in september of this year and that's where we're going to be

It's essentially a four-day trip. We're going to do great drives around park city

And then our favorite roads through central utah and it is a spectacular time of year to do those roads

And every time we do them which is pretty much annually. We're a boggle to new they're just great great roads

But he's asking questions because he said he's never come to one of these trips. He's going to fly in from dc

He's asking about where to get an air bnb and all that kind of stuff. I'm going to stop you right there. Whoa, hang on

Some people that did their first adventure with us ever for the coda trip last year

Got the impression that the way that was run is how these are run

That was an exception because we were filming and moving and lots of crazy stuff was happening

If you come on one of our trips, they're all inclusive

So aniswar if you want to sign up for this and it's not up and posted yet, but it will be soon

When you pay for that trip

All of your lodging is taken care of all of your meals are taken care of you have to

On the domestic trips you have to bring a car so either rent one here or you drive in or people do all of the above

But except for having the car and the gas for the domestic trips. It's all handled

And it's it's always just at most a few thousand dollars versus the the really expensive trips that you do elsewhere

So all of that will be already established for you. You won't have to worry about finding lodging

So don't get an air bnb. Don't worry about any of that

Wait until the trip is launched again

It's going to be like the 20th through the 23rd of september wait till the trip is launched and see what the itinerary is

Because I bet 90% of your concerns will be solved except for you finding a car

Which is probably a turro, but there's some good stuff in salt lake to turro actually

I've got a question here on facebook from kirk meyer asking what iconic decal

Would you design to put on the caiman emira cayenne and forerunner?

Like the poniac firebird the fire chicken and the raptor splash

I hate these so much

I know that i'm alone in that. I know a lot of people like I just I dislike decals so very much

Yeah, i'm not a huge fan and I wouldn't do anything on the caiman

I i'm not surprised

Plus you have your really yellow wheels if you want to make a statement. Yes, you got gold wheels on them

Super like i searing yellow wheels. Hey, it's a complimentary color. I know I know all your reasons

Anyway, half the people like them half the people hate them

It's a complimentary you nailed it. You nailed the target half and half other side of the color wheel

And I think it looks great. Anyway, I'm the only person that has to like it, right? Yes, you do

On the emira. I'm toying with the john player special livery

Oh, sure

But i'm not sure if it would look good on the emira or not. I I want it to look good

But I think something

The registration green or the green the calling Chapman sort of lotus with the yellow kind of look might look better

I mean as a matter of fact lotus actually came out with an addition. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah already

You said they've kind of beat me to it, but something that is tasteful. It's more about color than necessarily graphics

I mean, okay, I see graphics in the car anymore on any car trucks anything and it's just sort of like

Not a fan not the biggest fan

I will say that the rubikayan is the thing that needs graphics now put the rubikayan words on it

But it almost deserves like a stupid graphical mud splash or something ridiculous

But anyway, yeah the trans-siberia thing that they did with those the orange mirrors trans-siberia in the car and

That's where we got that color. Yeah, totally. Yeah instead. I think that would look pretty cool

My wife who doesn't really like a lot of gaudy things on cars

She keeps going we should get orange wheels for that car like really

She was to totally get orange wheels and the orange mirrors and I'm like I think that's a bridge too far for me

She's like come on. So I don't know that that apparently is our is our play around car

I don't know what that's about the forerunner. I guess I mean I'm toying with options on the forerunner

I'm looking into doing a little bit of a build with the forerunner and I found a company that makes a carbon fiber hood

Things you don't need things. I don't mean cool. It's really cool looking and I mean, I I don't know

We'll see weight savings on your four by four. I don't think anybody's ever thought about that. But there you go

Carbon fiber. It's gonna look great. They do carbon fiber fender flares too. Of course they do. I thought that could be

Kind of interesting so that when you crack one, it's really expensive

Yeah

Maybe that's not such a guy. I will say that the next time that you go to moab

You're gonna have to at least temporarily take your mudflaps off because what you discovered the last time

Is that the mudflaps scrape before anything else because they're kind of like

Silly hard plastic. I'm sure I'm sure there's a there's a

A key form on the back. I'm sure it would work. Maybe take those off

But then yeah, I like the kinds of graphics that are sort of all the uh,

The companies who made the product for the truck and they're tastefully done kind of like the

backdrop when you see celebrities

doing the uh

The walkthrough through a premiere, you know, it's just tasteful logos everywhere. I kind of like that stuff, but

Then it's too. I don't know. I I have a very slow low tolerance for graphics, but nobody said I had good style

Anyway, uh, bruce b said do we have a story about taking one of our friends or neighbors out

And talking them out of a boring car and a reliable choice into something fun. They now thoroughly enjoy

That's interesting. Well, I did get my parents finally into a corvette. That was a victory

I mean he wanted one forever, but he did actually buy a corvette. I still can't believe he did that

Which i'm very excited about and they had that experience

We just had from a car debate where it was like are we taking the vet and my mom ended up liking it more than my dad

Which i'm astonished by but the one I really thought of when bruce posted this question is

I'm involved in a coffee club here in park city

And it's a lot of people that are very unlike paul and I like captains of industry with in tech

Which is not what I am

But it's an interesting group to be involved in and talk to folks and one day one of the guys in there was talking about

He needed a little kind of run about car

And he's listing off his budget, which was below 15 grand

And all of these kind of boring

SUV hatchback things that he thought up that would all fit that and of course

He had a couple of subarus on there because it's park city and everybody has a subaru if you don't have a range rover

So he's listing all these things

But he but he's talking about these cars and bemoaning the fact that he can't get something fun

And there's a part of him that like misses manual transmission

It wouldn't be cool to get something fun

But he's listed all of this stuff off and of course this is what we do for a living right

So i'm listening to this whole story and he gets done and I said, uh, you know what you should look at

And I thought of it like moonshot like he'll never consider this

I was like you really really ought to look at the fee at 500 apart

Just something about his story. I was like that's a car fee look at I said it's it's fun to drive

It's atypical. It's got a great little exhaust. It's a fun little throwable hatchback next time. I saw him bought one

What yes, he was like, I got a great deal. I can't believe it. I got it for like $9,000. It's amazing

I love it. He didn't have it long. He had it for like eight months or so

But he loved it

He was like I was gonna buy something kind of stupid and boring

For this this time period that he needed this car and he was like I bought in a barn. I loved it

So that was really cool. I will just bring up quickly the adventures

People have noted that it can kind of get expensive

I love that you're sharing this. This is a great. Have you seen this? I love this. This is good

We were surprised chance hails found this and the other todd that was with us on our bare tooth adventure in september

2025 brought

This particular car on the trip. It can be seen in the line of cars in the video

I do not want to inquire now. We've actually seen that car. I've driven that car. It's very good

You've driven this it was great drove it on here

It is listed on elfer spot and even part of the write-up includes right down here

The provenance of the car was included in the everyday driver bare tooth adventure trip and chance came across the listing

We don't know we haven't talked to Todd and found out what he has gotten next or replaced

But here is this car and we were both

We were amazed looking at this car. It was like

There is not a cleaner one of these targets out there

He told me the amount of maintenance when he acquired it

He had he took it to a dealer and said pretty much do everything and

Dumped money into this car to make it perfectly sorted and here it is for sale and it's that's the car

I don't need it. It's amazing $62,000 on the list

Which is actually for that car is actually really good price, but I don't need one

But you could not find a target

I talked about it and waxed lyrical about it in that bare tooth piece because I got to drive it on camera

It is really really nice

But I am laughing that he he talks about he went to pebble beach in carmel and he went on the everyday driver trip

And he was like and now it's perfect and i'm selling it. I had the adventure with it. I love that

Wonder what's next for him. That's crazy. Sure. So just saying yep, you're gonna drive things and that's really bruce where

The selling and the convincing happens is on these trips because you see oh, can I drive that and keys swap and then

Phones come out and you start looking looking at auto tempest calm and

thinking about your budget back home and what could I do what could I sell and that's when it

All comes together always it happens to us

You'd think we'd get immune, but we're not we're still doing it

Thank you guys for watching for listening really appreciate it

2026 is a huge year for us for filming. We've got so many cool plans

But you know where to go for all the adventures and the hooked on driving track days

So everyday driver.com slash adventures and hooked on driving calm

We would love to see you at a track day or an adventure this year until next time. Cheers everyone

The Perfect Car Day, Irrational V-8 Love, Fun Car That Can Toddler | Episode 1,028

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