Amelia Island concours celebrates birthday of fake sports car--46 years early

The fictional Italian grand marque 1958 Pignatelli sports car has joined the lineup for the 2012 Amelia Island Concours d'Elegance. The 17th-annual event will celebrate the cartoon vehicle's 100th anniversary, 46 years early, in March. "Because all but two people involved with the Amelia Island concours will be dead by 2058, we don't want to wait," concours chairman Bill Warner said.

Porsche big up the Panamera S E-Hybrid (video)

The Porsche Panamera S E-Hybrid (pictured) is a performance Porsche too We’ve long seen hybrids, and plug-in hybrids, as the perfect performance weapon for high-end cars, where the addition of an electric motor offers an unbeatable combination of power and economy. That’s the line that Porsche are taking with the new Panamera S E-Hybrid, and they demonstrated that recently by revealing that the new E-Hybrid managed to average 62mpg in the hands of a bunch of motoring journalists on a test day. Which is an impressive number for any car in the hands of a group of people with lead-lined right feet and clearly demonstrates that the Panamera Hybrid really can do silly mpg even in the real world.

Concept Car of the Week: Dodge Charger III (1968)

In 1968, at the dawn of the muscle car era, the performance-oriented Dodge brand offered a unique range of powerful and iconic models such as the Charger, the Dart and the Coronet. While working in parallel on the Mk II production Charger, designers and engineers created the third in a series of concept cars carrying the same name that aimed to showcase futuristic design and technological innovations to arouse the public and test its reaction. Dodge general manager Robert B.