Up in smoke: Smokey Yunick's garage burns

Legendary NASCAR mechanic Smokey Yunick closed the "Best Damn Garage In Town" long before he died in 2001. But the main concrete-block, tin-roofed building on Beach Street in Daytona Beach, Fla., remained a stop on the NASCAR history trail for visiting faithful until Monday night, when fire destroyed the building. The building housed Yunick's office and a medium-size garage and more recently served as office space for Carbon Press, the publishing company that Yunick's daughter, Trish, operates and which produces products that include Yunick's salty 1,100-page autobiography and biographies of other racing personalities.

Jaguar F-Type Coupe by SVO for Tour de France – JLR’s Special Vehicle Operations creates F-Type support car for Sky Team

Jaguar F-Type Coupe by SVO for Tour de France support on time trials We’ve already had two new cars from JLR’s new Special Operations division ion the guise of the new Range Rover Sport SVR and Jaguar F-Type Project 7, and now we get another – the Jaguar F-Type R Coupe support car for Jaguar’s Team SKY Tour de France exploits. The support car SVO has created is the standard F-Type R Coupe with the 542bhp supercharged V8, painted in the SKY Team’s usual blue colours and fitted with a clever roof rack to carry a couple of bikes. Other updates include tech in the car to allow team officials to communicate with the tour organisers – including radio, TV and a power supply – and are designed to be used on the individual time trial runs.

Mercedes signs joint venture to build carbonfibre parts

Not to be outdone by BMW’s joint venture with the SGL Group to manufacturer commercially viable carbonfibre-reinforced plastic (CFRP) for the electric Megacity Vehicle, Mercedes has announced a joint venture with Japanese company Toray Industries to manufacturer and market its on CFRP automotive parts. The deal was signed in Germany today, with Toray taking a 50.1% stake, Daimler holding 44.9% and the remaining 5% being taken by other shareholders. The two companies started working together in March 2010, and while Toray has been working on the materials and moulding processes, Merc has designed the automotive parts and the technologies to join the parts together.