Sirius Connect Vehicle Tuner on 2040-parts.com

Richard Petty Driving Experience says you can skip the clutch pedal

With manual transmissions being phased out of everything from Fords to Ferraris, it's no surprise that beginning on Thursday, the Richard Petty Driving Experience will no longer require the use of a clutch pedal to learn how to drive a stock car. With the company's "Can't Drive a Manual? No Problem" campaign, the driving school will allow students to get behind the wheel of a stocker and be push-started so no shifting will be required.

Jaguar F-Type: Comparable to the Aston Martin Vantage?

Should we be thinking of the new Jaguar F-Type as a bargain alternative to an Aston Martin V8 & V12 Vantage rather than a pricey Porsche Cayman? With a starting point of £58.5k for the F-Type with the 340PS V6 Supercharged engine, rising to £80k for the F-Type V8 S, we thought prices were strong. But actually, after a week of cogitation and argument at Cars UK Towers, we wonder if they’re actually something of a bargain?

New Mercedes A Class #YOUDRIVE advert plugs in to X Factor

Mercedes are continuing some innovative marketing for the new A Class with the #YOUDRIVE campaign launching during X Factor. That must have worked to a degree – certainly as far as the Twitter aspect goes – as Mercedes is having another outing with another hashtag – #YouDrive – and a new marketing campaign for the A Class where viewers ’control’ the advert they’re seeing. Mercedes is kicking off the #YouDrive campaign during X Factor next Saturday (5th October) with a three part story featuring the tale of a young music star trying to get to a secret gig the authorities want to close down (Germans advocating the defying of authority?