Renault's future performance models

By Richard Yarrow Motor Industry 24 April 2008 10:20 There has never been a hot version of the Laguna from Renaultsport – the performance arm of the French car maker – and our advice is don’t hold your breath for one any time soon. With the MkIII Laguna launched last year, the timing would be perfect for the debut of a flagship model on the home turf of the Paris motor show in October 2008. But Patrick Pelata, Renault’s director of product planning, told CAR Online the quality of other super-saloons coupled with environmental concerns meant it wasn’t likely.

SoCal stuff you just have to see

If you live in Southern California or might visit anytime soon, here are a few things to do: Legends Of Riverside III Riverside International Raceway may have been closed for 22 years, but it has never left the memories of those who drove on it and the fans who sat in the brown dirt and scrub brush around the outside. For the last three years, the Riverside International Automotive Museum has honored those memories with a big reunion of great drivers, race cars and movies. In 2009, the featured hero was Southern California's own Dan Gurney.

Hyundai beefs up its WRC team

Hyundai revealed last year that they’re preparing to take on the World Rally Championship (WRC) from 2014 when a rally car based on the i20 will take to the world rally stage to cast some sport fairy dust on Hyundai’s showroom cars. At that time we had little information about the team, but in January we learnt that Hyundai had appointed Michel Nandan to head up their WRC efforts, a good move as Nandon was the technical director for the Peugeot WRC team until 2005, so he knows his stuff. Now we learn that Hyundai is beefing up its WRC team as it prepares for a full season of WRC in 2014.