Cars

If you live anywhere near water or watch old Miami Vice reruns, you’ve seen go-fasts—those garish, arrogant, pencil-hulled runabouts, with their big V8s bellowing through open pipes. What you probably haven’t seen, and wouldn’t believe if it did blast past your porthole, is the 118 WallyPower. You haven’t seen it because there’s only one, and it’s in the Mediterranean.

“Around the world in 80 hours.” The happy marketing slogan affixed to Steve Fossett’s attempt to set a nonstop, around-the-world solo flight record makes it sound like something of a nostalgic lark: Hints of Jules Verne, the golden age of global adventure.

Admit it, after reading about Preston Lerner's tooth-jarring experience in a superkart, you're ready to strap yourself into one and go caroming around a track at 150mph with your butt mere inches from the ground. But you're not quite sure where to start. Fortunately, there are plenty of organizations, body shops, race tracks and superkarting driving schools out there to ramp you into superkart nirvana.



Not sure if you're going to like it?

Pyramid at Giza // This was grand even for the gods who ruled ancient Egypt. Around 2590 B.C., Pharaoh Khufu conceived the largest-ever pyramid. Archaeologists estimate that 20,000 to 30,000 workers spent 30 years quarrying more than 2 million limestone and granite blocks averaging over 2.5 tons each. Workers probably moved the stones along ramps that stretched from quarry to building site, muscling them into place with ropes, counterweights and levers. At 450 feet tall, the pyramid covers seven city blocks.

If you live anywhere near water or watch old Miami Vice reruns, you've seen go-fasts -- those garish, arrogant, pencil-hulled runabouts, with their big V8s bellowing through open pipes. What you probably haven't seen, and wouldn't believe if it did blast past your porthole, is the 118 WallyPower. You haven't seen it because there's only one, and it's in the Mediterranean.

This is a story of four charismatic engineers and one near-mythic number. First, the number: 1,000 horsepower. That is the power of the Bugatti EB 16.4 Veyron, an output that surpasses all road cars by such a margin that it looks like a misprint. But no, with the aid of four turbochargers, the Veyron's 16-cylinder, eight-liter engine manages the power of, say, two Dodge Vipers. Or nine base-model Honda Civics. The car seats two.

The National Air and Space Museum in downtown Washington, D.C., is the most visited museum in the U.S., but it long ago ran out of room and was forced to put many of its prized aviation artifacts -- the space shuttle Enterprise, the Enola Gay, the SR-71 Blackbird and scores of other airplanes and space vehicles -- in long-term storage, hidden in darkened hangars. Those historic airplanes are finally seeing the light of day.

The roadblock appears out of nowhere -- two Caprice Classics aligned nose to nose across three lanes of backcountry asphalt. I have two options: Ram through the cars (and risk wrecking my own in the process) or spin around and speed away. I decide on the latter, just in time to see a third Caprice pull up alongside me. Its driver grins wickedly from behind the barrel of a Glock 9mm. I slap the transmission into reverse, stand on the accelerator pedal, and turn the wheel hard to the right. Rubber burns and tires squeal as my car careens into a 180-degree spin.

My first truly modern car was an '85 Saab 900. I know it was modern because it had a shift-up indicator light, presumably designed to help me save gas -- a yellow gearshift symbol that glowed brightly every time the revs reached about 2,500. Had I obeyed it, I'd have been motoring around like a Freightliner looking for a Hoboken loading dock.

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA

The Subaru Impreza WRX STi and Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution, which hit dealerships earlier this year, offer more performance bang for the buck than any other cars sold in the U.S. Inspired by the half-million-dollar monsters
Subaru and Mitsubishi assemble for World Rally Championship races, the STi and Evo aim to prove?with turbocharged four-cylinder engines, four-wheel drive, sticky tires and monster brakes?that nothing succeeds like excess.

With its 13O miles of twisty mountain trails, the Hungry Valley State Vehicular Recreation Area is the promised land for southern California's off-roaders. On a crisp but cloudless spring morning, it is crawling with stumpy four-wheelers and spindly motocross bikes; the angry, annoying buzz of two-stroke engines -- think amplified mosquitoes -- fills the park. A ratty pickup truck with gigantic wheels and two audibly flat tires trundles to a stop in front of a service area that's been fashioned from a fleet of big rigs, a couple of E-Z UP portable shelters and some heavy-duty tarps.

Revolutionary technology may be endlessly fascinating, but often it's easier to take at a distance. Doubly so when it affects something central to the driving experience. Case in point, we were recently introduced to Active Front Steering on the new BMW 5 at its debut in Sardinia—a revolutionary (there's that word again) steer-by-wire system.

When the top eggheads at Bombardier (a Montreal-based company that designs ATVs and jet skis) were asked to envision commuter transportation 25 years from now, they rolled with it. The Embrio Advanced Concept, a hydrogen-fuel-cell-powered, gyro-stabilized vehicle, makes your neighbor's Segway look like something out of the Steam Age. At a stop, the Embrio relies on a wheeled â€landing gear†to stay upright. Above 12 miles per hour, the landing gear retracts, letting you one-wheel along at highway speeds.

In "Triple Caution! Loose Surface! Flying Finish!" (October 2003), Preston Lerner explores the thrills, dangers, and cool auto tech of rally racing, America's fastest-growing motor sport. There's no shortage of sites dedicated to rallying, but the following Web guide should at least get you started.



World Rally Championship events, photos, rankings, results:

Rally-Live.com

RallySport.com