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This weekend there will be nine English visitors to the 24 Hours of Spa endurance race, all of them with the surname MP4-12C GT3. The nine cars are being fielded by six teams, one of which has already been victorious in GT races with its McLaren racer.

Have a look at the video below to watch, and more importantly, listen to some highlights of the MP4-12C GT3 so far in its first year of racing. You'll also see the company's chief test driver lay out some of the challenges of the Spa-Francorchamps circuit.

Cody Loveland, owner of LoveFab in Traverse City, Michigan, is joining the ranks of drivers for the 90th Pikes Peak International Hill Climb on August 12. Known especially for his work packing monstrous power into the Acura NSX, it's no surprise that he's whipped up his own unlimited-class chassis based on the legendary Japanese car that we'll dub the FrankeNSX and that rides on HRE wheels – the same rim-maker who will be supporting Rhys Millen and Nobuhiro "Monster" Tajima.

The 850-horsepower, twin-turbo C96S LoveFab NSX is said to throw down 600 hp at the wheels. To see what it should look like running up the mountain, below are some short clips of it testing in the Michigan backwoods with just 500 hp at the wheels. And below that is a press release with more info.

We've had some close calls while towing, though we've been fortunate enought to never have to deal with a calamity like the one you see above. From what we can tell, the driver of the truck in the video below was calmly driving along when his boat and trailer decided to blaze their own trail. We don't know if the trailer or the hitch failed, or if the rig simply wasn't secured properly, but the result is properly dramatic.

Fortunately, it doesn't look as if anyone was hurt in the chaos, though we're guessing both boat and trailer will need some substantial work. Let the video below serve as a reminder to check your hardware before hitching up. Scroll down to check it out for yourself.

Volkswagen is recalling a few 2012 Beetles for wearing the wrong tires. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says the summer tires "fail to comply with federal motor vehicle safety standards." The out-of-season shoes "may lead to the tires being over-loaded and/or under-inflated, increasing the risk of a vehicle crash," the NHTSA recall states.

Volkswagen says only 83 Beetles are affected and the company will replace the offending tires free of charge.

Scroll down to read the official NHTSA report.

Honda has made good on its promise to deliver its first Fit EV, and that delivery took place in California on Friday. Matt and Becky Walton, of Ventura County, can now claim they have the first example of Honda's all-electric car, which costs $389 a month. The Waltons got the first Fit EV because they were the first ones to sign up for a lease at the car's website. They've owned at least four other Hondas, the automaker says, going back to the 1970s.

In a statement, Matt said, "It's truly an honor to take delivery of the first Honda Fit EV and participate in the advancement of all-electric vehicles in the real world," but he didn't mention the fact that Honda's "real-world" EV push is, in this case at least, available for a limited time only, and in limited areas. Leases start in California and Oregon now and will expand to the East Coast early next year.

The EPA rated the Fit EV at 118 MPGe and gives it an official range of 82 miles. The car's highly efficient energy consumption is 29 kWh per 100 miles. Read our First Drive review of the Fit EV here.

We record Episode #292 of the Autoblog Podcast tonight and you can drop us your questions via our Q&A module below and chime in to direct our conversation. Subscribe to the Autoblog Podcast in iTunes if you haven't already done so, and if you want to take it all in live, tune in to our UStream (audio only) channel at 10:00 PM Eastern tonight.

Discussion Topics for Autoblog Podcast Episode #292

• 2013 Cadillac ATS
• Nurburgring going broke
• 2013 Mercedes-Benz GL Class
• 2013 Ford Escape last-place comparo finish

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How important is the launch of the redesigned Escape to Ford? Apparently enough that Dearborn is throwing money at dealers to try and make the new model's teething problems go away, and fast.

According to The Detroit Free Press, Ford is giving dealers a $300 spiff for each recalled 2013 Ford Escape they repair for a customer, with a goal of having all 11,500 Escapes that have been recalled for potentially leaky fuel lines fixed within two weeks. The recall is a particularly serious one, as it could lead to an engine fire.

Some simple math says that Ford could pay out as much as $3.45 million in extra compensation to its dealers. Clearly the company wants to avoid the problems it had launching the original Escape in 2000, which was recalled multiple times soon after going on sale.

Ford is recommending 2013 Escapes subject to the recall not be driven until repaired, and customers are being issued loaner vehicles in the meantime, according to the report. Dealers have also been instructed to top off the tanks and wash and vacuum the vehicles they service under the recall.

The coming Bond film Skyfall has gathered a monumental cast behind the camera, with American Beauty and Road to Peridition director Sam Mendes at the helm and Jarhead and No Country for Old Men cinematographer Roger Deakins at the cameras. In the latest videoblog for the production, Medes and producer Michael Wilson discuss the reappearance of legendary on-camera talent in the form of the Aston Martin DB5.

The DB5 has been seen as recently as Casino Royale, but that spent barely a moment on screen and belonged to a villain. In Skyfall, the DB5 has a fuller role, and it has the same plate number as it did in its first appearance in Goldfinger: BMT 216A. It isn't the original car, though – which has a meandering history and was stolen in Boca Raton, Florida in 1997. Not that we care; we're just waiting for the movie's release on October 26. In the meantime, you can watch the videoblog below.

Chevrolet has announced the availability of a new Dusk Edition package for the 2013 Camaro coupe and convertible. It is specifically available for 2LT and 2SS trims and incorporates features from the RS Appearance Package as well as a handful of other unique touches.

For starters, the Dusk Edition gets coated in Blue Ray Metallic paint, a new color for 2013. The Dusk also gets halo HID headlights, 21-inch Bright Silver painted aluminum wheels, and summer performance tires. Convertible models come equipped with a blue cloth top.

Inside the Dusk Edition, the cabin is outfitted in Mojave leather interior and yellow stitching on the seats, shift knob, steering wheel and arm rests. The soft-touch instrument panel is delivered in the same Mojave color as the seats, and the interior is capped off with Blue Ray Metallic door inserts.

The Dusk Edition package fetches an MSRP of $5995 and will be available through December of this year.

If you thought that the addition of a turbocharged 2.0-liter inline-four would suffice as a mid-cycle refresh for the charming BMW Z4 roadster, think again. We've driven – and enjoyed – the new four-pot mill that speaks to both performance and efficiency, but as evidenced by this latest set of spy shots, some minimal tweaks are indeed in store for Bavaria's little droptop.

And minimal they are. The only camouflage to be found on this prototype are on the headlamps, taillamps, and spaces where the side indicators would normally reside. For its mid-cycle enhancement, BMW will be incorporating the side indicators into the mirrors, and the camouflage at the fore and aft light clusters suggests that some new lamps will be incorporated into the design. Don't expect too much to change at the rear, but up front, BMW's "angel eyes" will likely take on a similar (read: squarer) shape akin to what's available on the new 3 Series, trimmed with LED eyeliner.

We won't rule out the possibility of some powertrain tweaks or perhaps even some massaging to the front fascia, but until we have any sort of hard evidence, rest assured this German roadster won't be changing too much in its current lifecycle.

Only one fifth of Chrysler Group dealers will have the chance to sell 2013 SRT Viper, according to an Automotive News report. To qualify for the V10 beast, a hopeful dealer will have to train staff and purchase special tools, as well as improve their facilities. This does not guarantee the ability to sell the Viper. It merely keeps the dealer on the list of potential suitors.

SRT CEO Ralph Gilles spoke with journalists in a broadcast interview in Detroit this month, lining out the plan for dealers intent on selling the 8.4-liter snake: "We're going to open it up to any dealer who can put up the money ... you've got to have the training, the facilities, and some history of selling Vipers and SRTs in general."

While Chrysler has not yet announced the number of Vipers to be built each year, it will certainly be a limited run, and not every dealer will have the opportunity to put one in their showroom. According to Gilles, they want only the best dealers carrying their 640-horsepower super car.

"There's going to be a new breed of customer coming, so we want to make sure they have a great experience," said Gilles.

One might reasonably assume that people who work in automotive design or engineering are automatically car guys and gals, but in our experience, that isn't always the case. The best way to tell isn't by looking at what they are working on – it's by looking at what they have parked in their own garages. And judging by Ford's annual internal Product Development Center Employee Truck & Car Show in Dearborn, the Blue Oval isn't just overrun with serious car nuts; the company's ranks not only have lots of respect for the fast and beautiful, they have a surprisingly deep appreciation for the off-the-wall, the misunderstood, the maligned and the orphaned.

While technically open to the entire company, Ford officials tell us this annual PDC show is primarily composed of designers' and engineers' vehicles, both present and retired. As one might reasonably expect, this year's crop of about 400 cars included a superabundance of Mustang models, but the thing that surprised us about the show was the sheer variety of vehicles displayed – both in era and manufacturer. Ford as a company was obviously well represented, but employees clearly maintain a love for all marques from all countries. Plenty of General Motors and Chrysler cars were parked on the lawn, along with small-volume oddities from companies like DKW, Citroën, Lancia, Triumph and so on. There were even a few bikes and farm implements on display. Condition ran the gamut, from low-mileage timewarp cars to rough and ready daily drivers, and we saw everything from barn finds to drag cars, hot rods and off-road rigs.

Friday's event was the show's 12th annual installment, and this year's featured class centered on station wagons, of which about 50 were included. Everything from real classic woody wagons to humdrum 1980s kinshleppers, disco-era barges and shooting brakes made the scene.

What were we most impressed by? An absence of trailers. While there were a few lurking around the show's periphery, it looked like the handful of vehicles that arrived on them weren't street legal. The vast majority of the cars and trucks on display weren't the sort of collectible that gets trailered to and from shows, only to be hermetically sealed and sparingly driven upon its return home. Owners told us over and over that they drove their cars to the show. That, as much as anything else we saw, is cause for celebration.

Chinese automakers are once again hard at work copying other automakers' designs. CarNewsChina.com recently spotted these renderings of the Shaanxi Victory S102, and it doesn't take a student of design to recognize the four-door pickup truck's front fascia as heavily influenced by the Cadillac Escalade EXT.

CarNewsChina.com reports Shaanxi Victory is a state-owned conglomerate with its hands in a range of manufacturing and mining industries. While the company had cranked out a few anonymous trucks and minivans in the past, the S102 appears to be the first to blatantly borrow design from another manufacturer.

So far, Shaanxi Victory has only served up these renderings, though the company's website makes the model seem real enough. The site lists plenty of specifications, including engine options. Buyers looking to sink their teeth into the EXT knock-off will be able to outfit their rig with one of two four-cylinder gasoline engines with either 91 or 100 horsepower. Both are paired to a five-speed manual transmission. We desperately want to drive one of these.

Eight General Motors dealers are being sued by the automaker, which is seeking to revoke their franchises and purchase the dealerships assets in the wake of poor 2011 sales. According to Automotive News, the dealers are among the 700 who filed for arbitration when GM targeted them for closure during its 2009 bankruptcy.

Other GM dealers who were initially among the 2,064 the company sought to eliminate have met sales targets and their franchises are no longer at risk, according to the report. GM had directed troubled franchises to create new business plans for 2011.