Scuderia Southwest                                                                                                            #20 
In This Issue
FUN with Cars!
Cars & Coffee
British GP Review
Porsche 911 Review
Name that Car!
FUN TIME!
Scuderia SW hosts C&C at Gainey Ranch as well as drives, track days and dinners.  The non-car club, car club... SSW.  No drama!  No meetings!  No egos!  Just fun with cars!
        

No Dues!  No Drama!  Just Fun with Cars!
The Exotic Car Club for Enthusiasts, by Enthusiasts
 
Scuderia SW                            7/4//13
Greetings!

We have a great many advantages living in Arizona, and we have some great public servants and first responders.  This time of year is very dry and many parts of the state are suffering from drought conditions. These, of course lead to fires.

As I am sure you are aware, earlier this week 19 brave firefighters lost their lives near one of the best driving roads in Arizona, near the town of Yarnell.  This tragedy has left many of us saddened.

In an effort to help the families, one of the 'usual suspect's' friends, Kevin Hayes, has suggested that we have a fund raiser to show our support. Your donations will go directly to the 100 Club to help the families.  Kevin has a Blue Lamborghini Diablo Roadster and I have a titanium Ferrari Challenge Stradale.  Donations can be placed with either one of us, or on the passenger seats of the cars.  Thank you for your support. 
 
See you soon.

Ciao...

Dino

 
Cars & Coffee 
  
 
SSW's Cars and Coffee brings out some of the best cars in the country. Here's a sampling from C&C past.   

 



 
 
Cars & Coffee Scottsdale
Date:  7/6/13
Time:  7:00 am
Location:  The Shops at Gainey Village
Honored Marque:  Viper

Don't forget to make a donation to the 100 Club to support the 19 firefighter's families that lost their lives in the Yarnell fires.

Formula 1
British GP
  

German Rosberg profits from others' misfortuneGerman Nico Rosberg landed a late birthday present on Sunday when he won the British Grand Prix after compatriot Sebastian Vettel dropped out with a rare mechanical failure.  

Rosberg  

World champion Vettel was poised for his fourth win of the season in his Red Bull before he was forced to drop out with only 10 laps of the 52-lap race left to complete at Silverstone.

 

"When Sebastian stopped, to be honest, I won't lie, I wasn't disappointed by that one," Rosberg, who celebrated his 28th birthday on Thursday, told reporters.

 

Rosberg also profited from the misfortune of British favourite Lewis Hamilton, his Mercedes team mate, who started on pole position and led in the early stages before a tyre blowout relegated him to last place. Hamilton finished fourth.

 

"With Lewis, definitely I feel sorry for all the British fans," added Rosberg, the son of former world champion Keke Rosberg.

 

Rosberg's win still had a local flavour because the Mercedes team is based close to Silverstone in central England.

 

It looked like he might be stripped of his victory on a technicality but race stewards opted only to reprimand him for failing to slow down for yellow warning flags in a race marred by a series of tyre blowouts.

 

Rosberg won in May in Monaco, where he lives, and is looking to repeat that on German soil next weekend.

 

"I'm very proud to be German, driving a Silver Arrow, going to the Nuerburgring," he said.

 

Vettel still leads the drivers' championship on 132 points, ahead of Spaniard Fernando Alonso on 111.

 

Alonso was pleased to finish third on Sunday and close the gap on Vettel but was worried about the sluggish showing of his Ferrari.

 

"The pace we saw this weekend is not good enough," Alonso said. "Today we recovered some points but we know there is a lot of work to do."

 

Australian Mark Webber, who is leaving Formula One at the end of the season, said farewell to Silverstone with second place behind Rosberg.

 

"It was a nice finish to the race," the Red Bull driver said. "It would have been about 100 cherries on top if I'd managed to get past him but I didn't."

 

Rosberg British GP win

 

Driver Standings

1.  Sebastion Vettel.....................................................................132 points

2.  Fernando Alonso...................................................................111 points

3.  Kimi Raikonnen.....................................................98 points

4. Lewis Hamilton......................................................89 points

5. Mark Webber.........................................................87 points

 

Team Standings

1. Red Bull..............................................................219 points

2. Mercedes............................................................171 points

3. Ferrari.................................................................168 points

4. Lotus...................................................................124 points

5. Force India............................................................59 points

 

Next Race: German Grand Prix July 7th

 

 

  Grid girl strut

 

 F1 has the best grid girls

Supercar Review
901 Porsche
      
 Porsche 911 Carrera manual review

So far, the fourth all-new Porsche 911, the 991, has failed to sweep all before it. Maybe the basic 3.4-litre Carrera with a manual gearbox can recapture the old magic

The junior and, on paper, purest member of the new Porsche 911 family. Question is, how many boxes do you tick on the extensive options list to create the optimum driving experience?

 Technical highlights?

With the 991, Porsche has made the 911 longer and, now, mostly from aluminium. So it's lighter, but the engines are slightly more powerful. It has a lower centre of gravity and a broader front track. And, perhaps, most significantly of all, it's been designed to extract full value from all the sexy technology that forms the backbone of the options list. It isn't that Porsche is particularly mean with its standard equipment these days, more the emergence of a carefully nurtured perception that the latest 911 isn't the complete ticket without the supporting (extra cost) technology - the idea that dynamic engine mounts, torque vectoring, PASM, PDCC et al are as much part of Porsche's core DNA as the 911 itself and you only get the Big Picture if you plug them all together. 


 Maybe so. Trouble is, apart from stumping up �71,449 for a notional zero option 3.4 manual, there's no way of telling if our view that the clearest window on the true nature of a new car is to start at the bottom - and that the sweetest 911 is usually a simple one - still holds water.  The nearest Porsche GB's Press fleet gets to slummin' it in the lower reaches of the 911 range is this Guard's Red 3.4 manual additionally equipped with 20-inch alloys, ceramic brakes, PASM adaptive damping with 20mm lower sports chassis, Porsche Torque Vectoring teamed with a mechanical limited slip diff, the Sport Chrono Package (which includes the dynamic engine mounts), a sports exhaust system and sports seats. But, perhaps crucially, no Porsche Dynamic Chassis Control (PDCC) active anti-roll system that stymied the Carrera S's chances of victory in issue 168's definitive group test. The thick end of �86k is rather a long way from where we started, but who's to say Porsche hasn't put together the optimum (pre-GT3/RS/Turbo) 991 package in this car? I was sceptical before I drove it, but now I can't honestly think of anything I'd leave out. Guess that's the hook.


 What's it like to drive?

Fundamentally, you want your 911 to go, steer, grip and stop in a properly stimulating manner. And in three out of four of these disciplines, Porsche GB's idea of an entry-level 3.4, manual 991 is simply a better car than the base level 997 it replaces. The acoustically-enhanced soundtrack is gruffer and more urgent, roll-on pace (massaged by an almost turbo-like kick in the power deliver at 4500rpm) slightly swifter, the front-end grip and conviction generated by the wider track notably stronger and the stoppers marginally more incredible. The 991 throws in some extras, too: a more comfortable ride, less road roar, better cruising refinement and a properly designed, exceptionally well built and finished cabin. 


 All right, the electric steering only just wings it. Perhaps think of it as an MP3 version of the 997's hydraulic set up. It gives the impression of having been tailored to snap-fit into the broader repertoire of the new car with its more nailed and composed front end and a torque vectoring system you can actually feel pointing you towards the apex when you're pushing on and haven't turned the stability and traction programmes off. But it is accurate and it does have a helpful degree of feedback - just not as much or as textured in nature as a 997 GT3's. It all adds to the hunch that the 911 has, once again, been 'normalised' for a more conventional definition of 'excellence'; that its iconoclastic past is no longer seen as being so relevant. 


 How does it compare?

So which Carrera, plain or S? Driving the 3.4 manual straight after a go in a 'showhome-spec' 3.8-litre Carrera S with PDK, PDCC and every other conceivable extra felt like a more direct path to whatever flavour of 911-ness the 991 is seeking to purvey, the mantra 'less is more' almost materialising before my very eyes as I gripped a steering wheel that was just that, pure and simple - no buttons at all. Although 50bhp down on the Carrera S, you don't feel short-changed in the 3.4. And even if the 7-speed 'box isn't the slickest ever to grace a 911, it does provide another layer of rewarding interaction. In a 911, that can only be a good thing. 


 Anything else I should know?

 It's early days for the 991, of course, and any final judgement should be deferred until more power and less weight is introduced to the mix. In the meantime, the 3.4 manual Carrera perhaps marks the sweet spot in the initial line up.



Courtesy of EVO
Can You Name that Car?
Back to the historic racers.  Can you name this one, the chassis,  drivers and the race?  If so, email me and coffees on me!

    GTO4153
We finally had a winner on the last one.  Well done Dave Evans!
Automotive Advances

Thanks to 'Usual Suspect' Todd Reeg who sent me this piece.  So you think that the internal combustion engine is at the end of its development cycle.  Well think again.  Christai
 
That's our newsletter for the week.  We will be putting these together several times per month.  Expect events like these, as well as socials.

I hope to see you at an event soon...
 
Ciao...

Dino