McLaren to bring F1 GTR, LM and Longtail to Goodwood

McLaren is taking the 24 Hours of Le Mans off this year -- actually, it has taken the last 14 years off -- and is instead concentrating on a British tradition: the Goodwood Festival of Speed. The company confirmed it would bring the 1995 Le Mans-winning McLaren F1 GTR to take on the hill this year. It will be joined by the one-off prototype McLaren F1 LM, as well as the Gulf-liveried McLaren F1 GTR Longtail, which claimed second place in 1997.

Aston Martin V8 Vantage S: The Video

Aston Martin V8 Vantage S on track at the Ascari Circuit in Spain We’re always up for a bit of Aston Martin goodness, so we were more than happy to report in January that Aston Martin has added a bit of extra oomph to the V8 to create the Aston Martin V8 Vantage S. To be honest, there’s not a huge amount of extra power on the Vantage V8 S – just 10bhp – but there are a chunk of tweaks that make it very appealing, including a new seven speed Sportshift ‘box, sharper steering, better braking and a bit of suspension tweaking to make the V8S that bit more aggressive. All this new V8 S goodness was served up at the Geneva Motor Show last week, but we got a bit sidetracked with the new Aston Martin Virage – or DB9 Ghia – in a marmite shade of orange hogging AM’s Geneva stand.

Ford sales show move away from diesel

NEW CAR buyers are moving back towards petrol engines after years of diesel domination, if Ford’s latest sales figures are any guide. The company has revealed that its multi-award-winning 1.0-litre Ecoboost turbocharged petrol engine now powers one in every five cars sold in Europe, totalling 120,000 vehicles from January to the end of June. That figure is an increase from 104,000 1.0-litre Ecoboost-powered cars sold in the same period in 2013.