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One lap of the Web: $52 million Ferrari 250 GTO, Alfa Romeo Montreal for sale and more bizarro engines

-- Even as the hammer fell on Juan Manuel Fangio's $30 million Mercedes-Benz W196R, we knew that that car wasn't the most expensive one ever sold -- it was merely the most expensive car sold at auction. Other cars were reported to have traded for a bit more in private sales. But now we have word of a car that absolutely blows the sale price of Fangio's little Silver Arrow out of the water: a 1963 Ferrari 250 GTO that sold to an undisclosed buyer for $52 million.

Design Contest: LA Design Challenge 2008

The entrants for the fifth annual Design Challenge, part of the Design Los Angeles automobile designers' conference, have now been announced. Nine Southern California automotive design studios - including Audi, BMW, GM, Honda, Mazda, Mitsubishi, Mercedes-Benz, Toyota and Volkswagen - have been pitted against one another and asked to develop a concept which best answers a brief entitled 'Motorsports in 2025'. "Automotive designers have always been fascinated with motorsports and this year's Design Challenge has provided them with the opportunity to use their creative talent to look at these cars with new eyes, using innovative technologies and approaches," said Chuck Pelly, director of Design Los Angeles and partner in The Design Academy, Inc.

General Motors EN-V to be branded Chevrolet

Chevrolet was gifted a centennial birthday present today, with parent company GM announcing that its 2030 Vision concept would carry the bow-tie badge. The youthful orientation and entry level positioning of Chevrolet within the GM portfolio subtly earmarks the intended audience for the EN-V, with the device being billed as an inexpensive and attainable urban mobility vehicle. "The EN-V has the potential to reinvent transportation in key markets by creating a new vehicle DNA through the convergence of electrification and connectivity," said Chris Borroni-Bird, GM's director of Advanced Technology Vehicle Concepts.