Wrenches Hans 1166m/15 on 2040-parts.com

Fifth Gear Tonight: Audi RS4, Used Sports Cars, Hot Hatch Showdown & F1 science

Fifth Gear tonight has Tiff Needell & Kris Meeke testing Hot Hatches, Vicki in the Audi RS4, Jonny in an F1 simulator & Jason on used sports cars. The weekend saw a Top Gear adventure to Africa in cheap estate cars, so tonight’s episode of Fifth Gear should give some proper car insight for those missing Top Gear’s views on cars this week. Jason Plato gets to play at the other end of the sports car scale than the one he’s used to this week with a look at the best used sports cars you can buy for just £5,000.

Who's Where: Christopher Reitz appointed Director of Design at Alfa Romeo

Christopher Reitz has been appointed to the top job at Alfa Romeo, replacing Frank Stephenson as Director of Design. A relative of Wolfgang Porsche, Christopher Reitz graduated from Art Center Europe in Switzerland and began his career at Volkswagen in Wolfsburg in 1993. Reitz joined Audi in Ingolstadt from 1996 to 1998, where he was in charge of Advance Design.

2013 Nissan LEAF updated

Nissan has updated the LEAF EV in Japan for 2013 with better range, less weight and a new LEAF S entry-level model. Revealed in Japan – but likely to come to the UK from 2013 when the LEAF starts rolling out of Nissan’s Sunderland factory – there are significant upgrades to the powertrain which result in both less weight and better range. Nissan has had a play with the electric powertrain and made it both smaller and lighter with a new motor that uses 40 per cent less dysprosium (a rare earth metal) than before, and comes in 30 per cent smaller and 10 per cent lighter, and a new streamline battery case and a few other tweaks drops the LEAF’s weight by 80kg.