IT WAS EASY, FROM the outside, to believe that peak MOTOR magazine just winged it and lucked in to some of its most memorable features and adventures. It was easy, even, for MOTOR’s publishers to believe that, but it was never true. The harder you wo

FOUND MYSELF SITTING at the Porsche table at the Australian Motoring Awards in 2018. As my predecessor, Dylan Campbell, walked onto the stage to announce the winner of Performance Car of the Year, at my table cuffs were being shot and ties straighten

THREE INCREDIBLE CARS, the likes of which, sadly, we’re unlikely to ever see again. The 458 Speciale is Ferrari at the absolute peak of its powers; we would not be at all surprised if it joins the Daytona, F40 et al as a marker in the company’s illus

SIX DAYS, 16 HOURS and 27 minutes, to be exact – that’s how long it took us to drive around this vast country in our marathon Ford Falcon XD.” These exact words appeared in Modern Motor, June 1979, when Matt Whelan and Evan Green reset the quarter-ce

Rating 4.5 ENGINE 6162cc V8, OHV, 16v, supercharger POWER 474kW @ 6500rpm TORQUE 815Nm @ 3900rpm 0-100KM/H 4.16sec WEIGHT 1895kg • PRICE $169,900 LIKE: Huge lungs; fantastic soundtrack; meaty controls; charisma; collectability DISLIKE: Rare; expensiv

POWER PACT. THE screaming headline from MOTOR’s February 1996 was superimposed above six of the year’s best performance cars. This would represent the first introduction for readers to what would become MOTOR’s blue riband event, Performance Car of t

OF COURSE it should never have come to pass. Airforce jet fighters simply do not match-race motor vehicles along landing strips. Not until now anyway. Credit or blame (take your pick)forthis unusual confrontation goes to our respected columnist Jim S

BREATHE DEEPLY, LET your lungs drink. Assuming you’re reading this somewhere near sea level, your nostrils are flooding with 14.7psi of nitrogen marbled with blissful oxygen, 12 litres of it. This is the stuff naturally aspirated engines have survive

THIS RAGING BULL is all about pure, unadulterated power. Other manufacturers have strong 12-cylinder heritages, but none have been as committed to the cause as Lamborghini. It’s dabbled in V8s over the years, and the Gallardo and new Huracán show the

Rating 5.0 ENGINE 6064cc V12, DOHC, 48v POWER 461kW @ 7400rpm TORQUE 650Nm @ 5600rpm 0-100KM/H 3.2sec WEIGHT 1575kg • PRICE $1.2 million LIKE: Staying power; clever tech and packaging; V12 soundtrack to die for DISLIKE: Prohibitively expensive; woode

THIS AUTOMOTIVE BANSHEE took 10 years to perfect – it was time well spent. Each Lexus LFA buyer, a global total of just 500, received with their car a special book detailing the incredible decade-long development process. The first sentence of the bo

BRISK LITTLE SHIP, BMW’s CSL, no question. Light, quick, agile, built for road or track and one of the most impressive production pieces to come from the Bavaria Motor Works house. But equally sharp is Porsche’s 911 GT3 Clubsport, the latest in a fas

ASSOCIATE EDITOR NEWMAN tumbles out of the Speciale looking like he’s just won lotto and got Scarlett Johansson’s phone number in the last 15 minutes. He says nothing, just laughs. “It’s the best car I’ve ever driven,” he finally stutters. I know, I

THE BELOVED ANNUAL Bang For Your Bucks title holds a special place in MOTOR’s history, predating Performance Car of the Year by fully two years, with the first running held back in 1994. Indeed such was BFYB’s popularity that we relaunched a version

SURPRISING AS IT may be, the team that works on MOTOR rarely find ourselves debating each other on who would be the quickest behind the wheel. You’d be forgiven for thinking there’d be plenty of egotistical chest-beating over who is most blessed with

Rating 5.0 ENGINE: 2849cc F6, DOHC, 24v, TT POWER: 331kW @ 6600rpm TORQUE: 500Nm @ 5500rpm 0-100KM/H: 4.3sec (claimed) WEIGHT: 1450kg • PRICE $480,000 LIKE: Technological powerhouse; doesn’t want to kill you; accessible power DISLIKE: Prolonged devel

400 CARS Rated TERRIBLE TOLERABLE NOT BAD BRILLIANT BLIMEY • All performance figures are manufacturer claims, those in italics are as-tested by MOTOR. • Figures for an automatic variant have an asterisk. • Prices listed are manufacturer RRP, exclusiv