The North American International Auto Show press days have come and gone.  That means journalists no longer need to get dressed every morning, and can return to clipping their toenails while blogging in their bathrobes.  OEM staffers get to return home – unless, of course, home is Detroit.  Then they’re counting down the days until New York.

For those who missed the show, never fear: I’ve rounded up everything important and summarized it in one highly useful story.  It’s almost like you ate the food yourself. Read More >

It’s a new tradition at the storied Mini brand: Each car show gets its own dedicated Mini. Swatch tried it with the Swatch car, but could not pull it off.  Now, BMW’s Mini is doing it with great success: At the inside, the same movement. At the outside, ever changing designs. Collect all colors!. Of course, Mini won’t break tradition at the Detroit Auto Show, and it will bring you: The John Cooper Works Paceman.
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TTAC readers, like TTAC writers, go everywhere. On Day One of the Detroit Auto Show, I happened to run into one such fellow, accompanied by his lovely wife. This reader had been invited to attend “The Gallery” and had also received passes to the media days at the “regular” show. I asked him to write up his impressions and share them with all of you… so without further ado, let’s hear what he has to say.

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With all of the leaks, it’s not so easy to be surprised at NAIAS. But I managed to learn a thing or two by attending. My top dozen takeaways:

1. Compared to a Lamborghini, a Ferrari seems…normal. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Read More >

TTAC may have the most outstanding writers around, but we can’t make the same claim when it comes to photography. Even though the infamous Vodka McBigbra pitched in to take a few shots of the Prius c, in general we didn’t have time or manpower to get the shots we wanted.

Luckily for us, Zerin Dube of SpeedSportLife was there to take his usual meticulously color-corrected set of photographs from the show, and he’s agreed to share them with TTAC readers who have an eye for that sort of thing.

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Photo Credit: United States Department of Transportation

There’s a bit of a brouhaha brewing about Ford bringing about 150 “social media influencers” to Detroit and then Las Vegas for the big North American International Auto Show and the Consumer Electronics Show. While there may be some ethical issues concerning transparency and disclosure, I doubt that anyone begrudges Ford the ability to spend Ford stockholders’ money promoting Ford Motor Company and its products. Ford is acting in the fiduciary interests of those stockholders. Whether or not cabinet members and other Washington officials are acting in the fiduciary interest of taxpayers by flying to car shows is another question. Read More >

Jamie LaReau is the journalist about whom everyone is talking nowadays. It all started when international taste-maker and notorious recluse Michael Banovsky alerted his following to a fascinating August, 2011 article entitled A Porsche From The Passenger Seat Is Still A Porsche. Banovsky is a known talent-spotter, and this time he had spotted someone whose Hemingway-esque economy of words genuinely stood out:

The Porsche I rode in was a 1999 model. I don’t recall which style, but let’s just say it was one of the good ones. (As if there are any bad ones.)

Indeed. I happened to see Ms. LaReau examining the new Buick Encore with considerable interest after the press conference, but before I could untether my Droid from my laptop and talk to her, she disappeared. Now, it appears that she has applied her unique style to a strong defense of the Encore. Let’s check it out.

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Here’s another SEMA refugee: the Mazda MX-5 “Spyder”. The current Miata’s choice of normal fabric roof or what-the-f***-are-you-thinking power retractable hardtop is neatly avoided in favor of the kind of stretchy, do-it-yourself job that ensures Porsche 911 “Speedster” owners never actually drive their cars anywhere.

We’ve seen a better Miata Spyder, though… click the jump for a blast into the wacky kit-car past.

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The Roush RS3 Focus debuted at SEMA, but unfortunately TTAC was unable to obtain press passes for said SEMA due to an inability to find any photos of our staffers wearing super-cool sideways baseball caps. We are, therefore, seeing it here for the first time. We also saw a Mustang that just might have to be your humble author’s next ride, assuming my attempt at becoming one of the first 86 Scion FR-S owners fails…

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The most ridiculous, but oddly exciting, exercise in brand extension since Jennie Garth’s “Body In Progress” video made a public debut today. Zerin and Byron from Speed:Sport:Life were there to shoot and talk trucks upscale activity vehicles.

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TTAC is lately to the party with the MKZ, and it’s my fault; I was delayed looking for parking outside Cobo this morning. Luckily, the Speed:Sport:Life crew was there to make up the gap. Zerin Dube took the photos, and the snark is courtesy of Byron Hurd:

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TTAC readers asked us, “How small is the Encore?” This six-foot-two talking head should offer some scale. It’s a very small vehicle. For more on-floor photos, and a few tidbits from the press conference, click the jump.

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The Toyota NS4 is said to preview a future Prius – but not really. Although the family resemblance is there, and the NS4 is unequivocally a plug-in hybrid, the NS4 is the same size as a Prius, but is explicitly separate from the rest of the Prius range, according to Toyota corporate mouthpieces.

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Get this straight: with the exception of perpetual NSX foreplay, Honda doesn’t do “concepts”. Their concept cars are usually production vehicles with tinted windows. So it is with the new Accord Coupe “Concept”. The current Accord has come in for more criticism than any Accord in history… so what’s changed?

Edited to include more shots that show the evolutionary link between the current Coupe and the new one.

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We all ran by them this morning on the way to the Fusion introduction. Two signs. One sign said, “FORD PRESS EVENT”. The sign below it said “SOCIAL MEDIA INFLUENCERS”. The arrow pointed a different way. Who are “social media influencers”, anyway?

What was the “Volt Lounge”, and why were so many prominent auto-related Twitterati spending time there today instead of walking the NAIAS show floor?

The photo above is a plane that reportedly left Detroit tonight. Why did Audi reportedly feel the need to fly dozens of bloggers from NAIAS to CES, at their expense?

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