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SEMA 2008 show report: Volkswagen Passat CC

By Ben Whitworth Motor Shows 07 November 2008 09:00 Volkswagen’s sobriety took a back seat at the SEMA show in Las Vegas this week – it pulled the covers off a pair of muscle-bound Passat CCs, a racy 295bhp Tiguan and a grunty diesel Jetta aimed at cajoling the American market into turning its back on gasoline. The unambiguously named Performance CC – designed by Volkswagen’s California-based design centre – gets a shot in the arm from a three-stage turbo boost to its 2.0-litre TSI engine. In Eco mode you get a modest 222bhp and 236 lb ft of torque, GT mode hikes those outputs to 252bhp and 268 lbs ft, while the Full Power stage unleashes 311bhp and 313 lb ft.

Alfa Romeo 4C hits the track (video)

The Alfa Romeo 4C (pictured) out on track – on video The Alfa Romeo 4C has been on its way for longer than it should have been. But Alfa Romeo finally got round to revealing the 4C in prodiction spec at the Geneva Motor Show in March, and visitors to this year’s Goodwood Festival of Speed later this month will get to see the 4C strutting its stuff up the hillclimb. But ahead of that dynamic debut, Alfa has released new video of the 4C out playing on the Balocco Racetrack in Italy, with a few wailing exhausts notes but far to much dramatic music as a soundtrack.

Who's Where: Pierre Leclercq is Great Wall's VP and design director

Pierre Leclercq has been appointed vice president and head of design at Great Wall Motors. Splitting his time between the company's studio in Baoding, China, and a Shanghai-based satellite studio, he reports directly to chairman Wei Jianjun. In his role he‘s responsible for the design of the brand globally and leads a team of 130 designers in Baoding as well as 25 in the Shanghai studio.