Draco-REX

The high-quality glamor shots are epic.

Watching the first and then the third, you can see that he's a lot more accurate in placing the car. As for him vs. Pastrana, that's hard to judge without them racing head-to-head. Neither are top-5 WRC drivers however.

He's improved.

Going to try and make this one. Might bring the WRX.

I have a set of 225/50-16 Hankook R-S2 tires that have only one summer on them that I need to get rid of.

+1 Never thought he was exceptionally good. He stuffed his car quite a few times in Rally America. And the Gymkhana vids were edited like crazy from tons of failed attempts. Honestly, give me a 500awhp unrestricted rally car that I don't have to pay for if I wreck, an abandoned airfield, and a weekend, and I'll pull off most of the Gymkhana stunts. But his showmanship has brought a LOT of attention to Rally racing. For that, I can deal with him. As for his finish in yesterday's first stage, 16th is not all that bad for a first time out in a new car on a snow stage with loose snow. He went out early so the track wasn't as cleared as it was for some of the guys after. At least he didn't stuff it.

I can finally look at the vids now that I'm home. THe reveal is cool. That's one sick looking Fiesta. Too bad Ford only sells a 96lb weakling version. With all the visibility Block is going to be giving the Fiesta, you'd think they'd realize they could sell some AWD Turbo versions. Oh well. I want a "Hoonigan on Board" sticker!

Sexiest? My cars. Ugliest? My cars. I love being a Subaru owner.

The handcuffs are over the line, IMO. Here's another question though: Was she allowing him to go to school? Sounds like she wasn't. That's an issue.

The first rally, Rally Sweden, starts today and goes all weekend. Looking at a quick blurb from him about the car, it looks like he's trying to be a little more conservative. He talks about braking too early and taking time to get up to speed in the car. Hopefully he won't immediately crash out.

Boeing Assembly plant is a single building that's one square mile I believe.

As above, GPS systems are passive only. The reason why they're slow is because most navigational GPS devices only update once or twice per second (1-2Hz). This unit updates at 5Hz. There are GPS telemetry systems you can get for a track car that will update at 10-20Hz. These are accurate enough to do predictive lap times and plot individual lines through corners.

needs less mini-van.

Looking for the water pump pulley off a Jetta III (?) VR6. Hoping to get it cheap if possible. It's for a friend's project. Thanks

Shell or Sunoco. Even if Sunoco USA isn't on the list, I still trust their gas. The DD sometimes get Turkey Hill. BP is an odd company for me. I won't touch their gas, but I really like Castrol Oils which are a BP product.

That's a thought, but awkward for toting around and setting up, etc. Don't get me wrong, the touch tablet idea is a great one. Honestly, you can just watch Star Trek: TNG to see how useful something of that format can be. Get a wireless broadband link in one and you'll have a pretty useful gadget. Phones are already at that point. Now whether the future will run in iOS or Android, who knows? Apple has only about a 50% success ratio in promoting their proprietary formats against open platforms. For my purpose, however, an ultralight computer with an integrated physical keyboard was a better choice.

Watching some recorded TV. I'll catch the commercials on YouTube later.

a.k.a. "Home" I briefly played with an iPad at Best Buy, but I bought a netbook. The reason was, regardless of my feelings about macs, I do a lot of typing on the netbook and I didn't think I'd like the iPad's keyboard and squashed view for long periods. But I will say that the iPad's keyboard was a lot easier to use than I thought it would be. Though I was able to type faster than the display could keep up.

So THAT'S why his pace fell off. Wow, no wonder. I'm amazed he hid it from the press. This was the exact opposite but, remember when Alonso "injured" his left arm? He was flexing it all the time and acting like it hurt to grip the wheel for long periods of time. The press figured out it was a ploy to cover up Ferrari's f-duct activation. Usually stuff like this gets figured out pretty quick. I wonder how much Webber's doctor got paid to keep his injury hush-hush?

No Pats, so I wasn't even paying attention to the fact that today was the Super Bowl. No wonder Kroger's was packed. Hmm, I guess I'll root for the Packers. What's not to like about a team where the fans put huge wedges of cheese on their heads? Or the fact that the town is so fanatical about their team that someone has to DIE before you can get a good seat at the stadium?

They're talking about having teams curtail their drivers from dangerous pursuts in their off time. I can see why that's even considered since each driver represents a huge investment in time and money. But I don't think it's right. They NEED to blow off steam. When the season is on, being a F1 driver is NOT a fun or relaxing job. It's work, it's stress, it's a fucked-up sleep schedule, it's crappy diets, it's political BS with the media, and endless data analyzing. And THEN there's the competition, not just with the other drivers, but with yoru teammate as well. It really says something when Stage Rally is a way to unwind.

I hope he keeps the hand. Extremity injuries can be overcome in a racing environment. He was a very good driver. Put him on one of the top three teams and he'd be a champion. No one was as consistent as Kubica last year; his car just didn't have the pace. I was really looking forward to seeing him tangle with the top teams again, this time in Renault/Lotus gold and black. It would have been like watching the Grand Prix races of the past. Now, Renault/Lotus is stuck with Petrov who seems to park his car more than race it, and an unproven rookie. Here's hoping Kubica makes a full recovery and gets that Ferrari deal everyone was sure he had.

There's no place like 127.0.0.1

Yeah, that's the stuff.

Considering all the love, and drool, for the GTC in this thread, I'll probably be banned for this, but: I'd rather have the Aston Martin DBS. Lighter, a bit more cornering performance, and frankly, I think it looks better. But that's just my opinion.