Page 30 - Motoring World (January 2020)

CLEAR HEAD

With EVs flooding news feeds, it felt really nice to see
Lexus continue to indulge the naturally aspirated
amongst us. The heart-achingly beautiful LC500 coupe
just got arguably more desirable, with a Convertible
version being unveiled. The canvas roof looks gorgeous
and doesn’t ruin the silhouette as soft tops tend to.
And it still gets the naturally aspirated V8 engine that
makes 470 bhp and revs to 7300 rpm- something you
will thoroughly enjoy with the top down. Enjoy it while
it lasts, for the end has begun. Thank you Lexus.

NO WINGS HERE

We don’t know who makes the marketing
decisions at Red Bull, but we suspect it’s the
effect of something a lot more potent than
the energy drink. Red Bull Racing got a little
carried away and decided to pull off a pit-stop
in zero gravity. Yup, really. And there’s a video
to prove it. An Ilyushin II-76 MDK cosmonaut
training plane was used, which climbs to high
altitude and then completes a number of arcs
that simulate zero-g for 22 seconds at a time.
And it was during these moments that the tyre
change was carried out. You know what? Just
watch the video. It is mesmerising.

SMOKEY FUN

Ken Block is back! This time, a new video
from his Climbkhana series sees him taking
on the famed Tianmen Mountain road in
China. It’s known as one of the country’s
most dangerous, with 99 hairpins and not
a wide berth for mistakes. Which makes it
awesome to watch Ken decimate a whole lot
of tyres as he powers his 914 bhp Hooni-
truck (an extremely un-standard Ford
F-150) up, yanking that handbrake every-
where as he gets very sideways. It’s pure
voyeurism, if we’re being honest. Long live
Ken Block.

30 MOTORING WORLD | JANUARY 2020