Street Scene Speed Grille Insert 950-77605 on 2040-parts.com

Kia preparing a range of sporting models

Kia is quietly readying a string of sportier models to pep up its humdrum image, CAR has learned. The burgeoning sports car plan is likely to sire everything from hot hatches to standalone sports cars. On our trip to Korea this week, sources at Kia HQ confirmed a range of performance models, designed to mix some excitement into a brand that now commands respect from mainstream buyers after its crawl upmarket to the volume market alongside Europe's mass-market brands.

Autos to overtake manuals

By Jack Carfrae Motor Industry 28 February 2007 07:39 Automatic transmissions will finally overtake manuals as the top-selling gearbox choice in 2007. Autos have been long established as the more popular option Stateside and in Japan, but it seems that Europe has now finally caught the two-pedal bug. With the ever-increasing popularity of semi-automatic gearboxes (Tiptronic, DSG, CVT and a whole flood of other acronyms), it isn’t hard to see why.

Audi TTS Competition celebrates 500k TTs sold

The Audi TTS Competition (pictured) celebrates 500k TTs built It started off as something of a hairdressers car, but over the course of its 15 year history – and two iterations – the Audi TT has grown to be a credible sport car and a decent seller for Audi. That’s meant a total of 500,000 TTs have been solid since the TT first hit showrooms back in 1998, so Audi are celebrating with a new limited edition model – the Audi TTS Competition. The TTS Competition will be limited to just 500 units and will come in a choice of either Imola Yellow and Nimbus Grey, as a coupe or a roadster.