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Post by Eff One on Aug 6, 2020 9:21:33 GMT
That is incredible value retention given that a new GT4 starts at £76k!
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Post by Eff One on Aug 5, 2020 15:47:40 GMT
Got all of them except the Brazilian one, which I confess I've never heard of.
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Post by Eff One on Aug 5, 2020 12:26:20 GMT
The shape and proportions are lovely but I'm not sold on the lights at either end, or the two-tone effect of the red one. The grey one in Evo looks better to my eye.
A proper GT based on Portofino underpinnings seemed like a no-brainer to me and I'm glad Ferrari have done it. It sounds like a great ownership proposition.
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Post by Eff One on Aug 5, 2020 11:16:05 GMT
Bought the MK2 Focus in July 2013 at 56k, just about to pass 111k. It wasn't driven at all for about 10 weeks during lockdown. I remember filling it up on the way home from work in late February, already feeling under the weather in the early stages of flu/you-know-what - and that tank of fuel lasted until a week ago.
We bought the MK3 Focus in July 2018 with 62k and it's now at 82k. That has only been filled up twice since early March, both in the last six weeks or so.
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Post by Eff One on Aug 3, 2020 12:18:44 GMT
A disappointing race made worse by the tyre failures which effectively took Bottas out of the title fight and denied Sainz his hard-earned P4. I was really looking forward to seeing how Hulkenberg got on, too - how gutting was that?
It was enlivened by the Mclaren/Renault battle - it looks like 2018-spec Ocon has returned - and Gasly, who beat three faster cars on merit.
And fuck me, what a waste of a seat Lance Stroll is. That car should have qualified on the second row and finished on the podium.
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Post by Eff One on Aug 2, 2020 9:41:00 GMT
Pretty remarkable job by all concerned to get Hulkenberg in the car. He only got the call at 4.30pm on Thursday, in Germany - less than 20 hours before rolling out of the pits in FP1.
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Post by Eff One on Jul 28, 2020 9:12:57 GMT
Martin, I had a Cayman T for 24 hours at the beginning of January when the GT4 was in for its 4-year service. I didn't do a full write up. The Cayman T also has the 20mm PASM drop. It's a nice car to drive, the 300 horsepower is fast enough and the turbo engine delivers its power effortlessly. It's nice enough, but not joyful in the way that a 4 litre flat-six with another 100 horsepower is. I enjoyed having a go in it but was glad to hand it back and would not hanker after a four-cylinder replacement as I have been spoiled by what I have. What I really like about the Cayman T spec is the lack of infotainment gubbins and consequent slight drop in weight. Unspoiled as I am by flat six goodness, it would probably be my first choice. Sounds like you have more or less made your mind up about the GTS? Exciting times!
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Post by Eff One on Jul 13, 2020 11:28:22 GMT
Lewis has a habit of bouncing back from poor weekends, doesn't he? That pole lap will surely stand as one of the greats. Bottas and Verstappen both had issues which disguised their ultimate Q3 pace and exaggerated the deficit, but nobody was going to get within half a second of that.
Albon was really slow in the first half of the race and really quick - quicker than Verstappen at times - in the second half. He did well to hold off Perez and probably finished as high as he could have, but the overall deficit to Verstappen needs working on. Perez drove a 99.9% brilliant race and was lucky to lose just the one place.
Mclaren - love it. Norris stole the show again but I think Sainz deserves a lot of credit for a brilliant qualy lap. The slow pitstop cost him dearly - without it he would have been ahead of Stroll and Ricciardo.
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Post by Eff One on Jul 7, 2020 13:48:48 GMT
Almost slap bang in the middle. One up, one left in the pink square.
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Post by Eff One on Jul 6, 2020 15:33:58 GMT
What a joy to have F1 back, even if the C4 highlights continue to frustrate due to their Sky-mandated limits on track action.
Top effort from Bottas, aside from his Q3 lawnmowing excursion. With reliability concerns and multiple safety cars, that would have been an easy race to lose. Hamilton was unlucky - I thought the 5 second penalty was harsh - but nevertheless didn't look to be quite at Bottas' level this weekend. Leclerc had no business being anywhere near the podium in that Ferrari - those passes on Norris and Perez were mega.
As for Norris - all hail Lando. What really impresses me about him, like Leclerc, is his capacity for self-criticism. Five minutes after sealing his first F1 podium, he was berating himself for mid-race errors which cost him time.
Albon - a little impatient, maybe, and not entirely blameless in the clash with Hamilton - but the team were pushing him to get the pass done asap before the Mercs could warm their hard tyres up. He looks on top of the Red Bull in a way that Gasly never did.
Gasly's a new man though, and despite hardly featuring in the highlights it turns out he did a mighty job to finish 7th in an ailing car - one of only 3 drivers to earn a perfect score in Autosport's driver ratings (the others were Leclerc and Norris).
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Post by Eff One on Jul 4, 2020 17:05:36 GMT
I followed qualy via Autosport and the live timing feed, which gives some interesting insights - no visuals obviously, but every split in real time. A couple of things stood out. Lando's final lap in Q3 was mighty - he was the only driver in the field to string his fastest three sectors together for a 'perfect' lap. Secondly, the Racing Point teammates. I was expecting the speed of the 'pink Mercedes' to show Lance Stroll up immediately. He isn't useless by any means, but is probably the slowest F1 driver over a single lap. Yet he managed to beat Perez in Q1 and made it into Q3, ending up just a tenth and a half adrift. The stats show that although he was slower, he was more consistent over a lap than Perez, who set faster individual sectors but, for whatever reason, struggled to string them together in the same lap. Perez's ideal lap (his fastest three sectors added together) was a full 0.198 seconds faster than his actual best lap, worse than all bar Kvyat (0.247). By comparison, Stroll's fastest three sectors would have put him just 0.036 seconds up, which is right at the sharp end.
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Post by Eff One on Jul 4, 2020 7:53:35 GMT
A couple of days ago, bloody odd looking thing, black is probably the best colour as it hides alot of the "styling" Looks like a McLaren Senna to me.
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Post by Eff One on Jul 3, 2020 11:15:44 GMT
If I had to get a 4x4 then I think I'd make it a proper one like a Landcruiser. This. Or possibly the Volvo, which at least isn't trying to be something it's not. You'd have to hold a gun to my head, mind. I couldn't bear the thought of being in a Lamborghini or Porsche that wasn't a Huracan or Cayman/911. Same for Maserati and Alfa.
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Watches
Jun 8, 2020 12:46:07 GMT
via mobile
Post by Eff One on Jun 8, 2020 12:46:07 GMT
Has anyone been wearing a watch during lockdown? I haven't except very occasionally. Yes. I wear a Garmin Forerunner which tracks steps, heart rate, distance, pace etc. It's become a crucial tool for maintaining fitness (and sanity) during lockdown. I'm averaging 11-12,000 steps per day which is actually slightly more than usual.
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Post by Eff One on Jun 3, 2020 8:51:39 GMT
Can you imagine Monaco in reverse? Downhill into Ste Devote, no runoff, with the pitlane entry on the left
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Post by Eff One on Jun 2, 2020 21:51:34 GMT
If it were my £30k it would almost certainly go into a 981 Cayman but I'd have a long hard look at early Vantages and Evoras too.
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Post by Eff One on Jun 2, 2020 21:45:09 GMT
I'm sure I read somewhere that Silverstone could be run in reverse with minimal modification but most circuits would require major changes to the barriers at least.
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Post by Eff One on Jun 2, 2020 9:51:18 GMT
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Post by Eff One on May 18, 2020 14:52:56 GMT
We also took advantage of the new rules to get in the car today and go somewhere other than simply the supermarket. Aside from a ten minute drive followed by a short walk a couple of weekends ago, I haven't been anywhere in the car since 19 March. We're lucky to live within easy walking distance of open farmland, so I have been out walking or running daily. But such extended isolation has left me simultaneously bored out of my skull and terrified of leaving the house.
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Post by Eff One on May 14, 2020 9:16:38 GMT
Mclaren have just announced Ricciardo. I imagine we'll hear from Ferrari imminently.
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Post by Eff One on May 14, 2020 8:45:40 GMT
Yes, it's easy to focus on those who are enjoying furlough, there are people who do want to work. I've been furloughed since 9 April and although it makes looking after Mini Eff immeasurably easier (Mrs Eff is working from home and busier than ever), I'd be back at work in a heartbeat given the chance. I love my job, hate being off-grid, and the remaining members of my team are having a rough time - Google 'Carnival UK' and you'll see what I mean.
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Post by Eff One on May 12, 2020 8:44:45 GMT
Sainz is bloody good and would push Leclerc hard without question. But Ricciardo is surely a no-brainer for Ferrari, and vice-versa.
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Post by Eff One on May 10, 2020 9:23:17 GMT
Darkest Hour last night. Great performance from Oldman (and one or two others), but too much music (curse of many films) and felt a little shallow, stylistically-speaking. Agreed, Oldman was mesmerising but I was surprised at how rushed and superficial it felt. Enjoyable enough, but a wasted opportunity.
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Post by Eff One on May 9, 2020 17:18:47 GMT
I think a 14% contraction is an underestimation given how many people work in the retail, hospitality, tourism and leisure industries or operate as suppliers to them. These are all areas of our economy that will not quickly recover, if at all... The airlines are predicting that it will be 2023 before passenger numbers return to anything approaching normality and most, if not all, of the travel industry is in the same boat.
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Post by Eff One on Apr 29, 2020 8:20:31 GMT
I drove manual and PDK back-to-back on the Porsche test track a couple of years ago and the PDK is the one to have. You can override the auto shifts and whatever you think you're doing with a manual the electronics are far better to a level that is off the scale. Don't mistake PDK for a slush-box - it's doing all the stuff a manual does without ever missing a bite point and if you use it on a track it won't ever be in the wrong gear if all the systems are in place. Also I was gritting my teeth doing launch-control with the PDK: massive revs and a clutch dump. Then the instructor told me that the car I was in had done several hundred of them and never failed. There's a reason that PDK was a costly option. Ask people like Mansell and his generation that swapped from manual boxes to flappy paddles in F1 what was better. I don't dispute for a second that PDK is faster and if I were racing, I'd want it or something like it. For ease of use and point to point speed, a manual can't compete. But that's missing the point for me. Driving enjoyment is about using and improving the various skills, and changing my own gears is intrinsic to that. So for as long as it's on offer, I'll always choose a manual, especially in a sports car.
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Post by Eff One on Apr 28, 2020 16:24:30 GMT
Bloody hell, we're all getting old aren't we?
Spending this sort of money on a Porsche and then removing one of the primary connections between driver and car makes no sense to me.
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Post by Eff One on Apr 27, 2020 21:44:51 GMT
Austria is now the planned start. The logistics of this are interesting. Obviously social distancing won't be possible. So they'll have to cut attending personnel to the bare minimum, test them all and then quarantine them from that moment onwards - chartered aircraft, secure accommodation etc.
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Post by Eff One on Apr 25, 2020 11:16:45 GMT
Sounds lovely and has got me looking longingly at used Caymans on Autotrader - always a Cayman over a Boxster for me. I'd be interested to try a standard 718, though, just to feel and hear for myself what the fuss is about - rather than trying to read between the whinging journos' lines.
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Post by Eff One on Apr 18, 2020 9:03:25 GMT
What a difference a few weeks makes...
Anyone care to hazard a guess as to when - or if - we'll get any racing in 2020?
Belgium currently has a ban on mass gatherings until 31 August, which is the Monday after Spa.
But I think we might see a race or two behind closed doors in August. Silverstone is an obvious venue because seven of the teams have bases in the UK.
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Post by Eff One on Mar 29, 2020 19:13:55 GMT
Spare time? Err, no. Two full time jobs, one full time child. Weekdays are a 16 hour scramble to fit everything in. Weekends fractionally more sedate but still focused on keeping a not quite 4-year-old sane within current limitations.
Having said that I count us extremely lucky in many ways.
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