Is the interior as cheap and plasticky as the earlier press photos of the blue/ black scheme suggested?

Hi Bob, if you’re still accepting applications for grey-removal...

Maybe I’ll get out of the greys under the Bob regime, so here’s my shot:

European country taxation based on displacement, not power.

Wild race... shame on me for half-paying-attention toward the end.  Byron and Truex had such a gap on the field that I lost sight of the cars that were on a different pit sequence.  Leave the room and come back to find Hamlin and Harvick out front... from seemingly nowhere.  It’s easy to drag NASCAR, but the new car…

Yeah really.  I get that “you get what you pay for,” but this place seems to have given up.  Hope David and Bradley shut the lights off on their way out.

Bruh, how ‘bout them coilovers and swaybars? Gotta be good for at least 100 additional hp, no?

So in the same post that you mention your interest in an airhead BMW, you deride the image of the weight/ power/ mechanics of HD?  I’m a BMW guy myself (1996 R1100R), but this Sportster is not the 883 of old.  Toto, we’re not in Kansas anymore.

Hey, there’s an opportunity. Imagine grabbing the Bizzaro-World Newman/ Letterman crowd... “I hate that Vanilla Ice co-opted the Fox body 5.0 image, so I’m swapping a SPA T6 engine into my 1989 GT.”

Translation on Hmiel: Old man shouts at clouds.

Really. The SPA V60 that this “auto-journalist” linked to has never been offered with a 5-pot, at least not in the US. Beyond that, this has nothing to do with Volvo’s plan to be all-electric by 2030. Short of offering ICE “Vawlvo” cars in Volvo showrooms, I don’t see the “cynical” part of this.

My recollection is that 80s-90s Pace Car editions of anything were used as showroom decorations, but weren’t really in demand.  Ever.  When I was a kid, a guy down the street was “collecting” a Pace Car turbo Trans Am (maybe ‘81 or so?)... he probably still has it and missed the opportunity to trade it for a Buick GNX.

Win-win, assuming the finances were right. Ganassi never seemed to be interested enough in NASCAR to truly compete with Penske/ Gibbs/ Hendrick.

Thanks for posting the photo as a reference point.  Comparing the two, I now think that the one piece grill is fine for the new one, but the key would be to otherwise find a way to add something to to distract from the tallness of the front.  On the 240, note how the headlight scoop is a bit lower than the…

But the Mazda has an 18 strip of black plastic around each wheel well.  That’s kinda funky, no?

You’d think that these guys would have hacked into the Ford Lightning reveal just to announce their own closing.  That would have left them with a bit more dignity.

Would attendance help end my 10-year run of being in the greys?

On the plus side, you didn’t use this non-review as the prelude to tomorrow’s slide show.  Yet.

Fair enough.  I skipped the P2 altogether, mainly because I couldn’t justify giving up my 945T and the wife temporarily veered into “German engineering” for a few painful years.  So my experience has been 745, 245T, 944SE, 945T, then into P3s with V70RD, S60RD, and V60RD.  Currently driving the last two.

Add to that, the interior materials/ style was not to Volvo standards.  Tough sell at the required price.  Really, MINI found the magic formula to offer nostalgia and “experience” and was the first maker to be able to pull premium prices for a subcompact/ hatch in the US market.  As 20+ year Volvo owners at the time,…