Sam Abuelsamid  0:00  
Coming up on episode 199 of wheel bearings. We talk about the Infiniti QX 55 the new Mitsubishi Outlander Nicole goes to Texas for the Toyota Lexus Palooza and share some thoughts on the new Corolla cross the Bz 4x Evie the gr 86 as well as well as the Toyota Highlander bronze edition and Robbie went to Southern California to check out the new BMW II four and i x e V's that are coming later this year. The Nicole and I both drove the new 2022 Nissan Pathfinder, and Ford has unveiled its new compact pickup truck, the maverick starting at just $20,000. All coming up next on episode 199 a wheel bearings. Did you know you can support wheel bearings directly? Head to patreon.com slash wheel bearings media and you can become a patron today. Your contributions will help fund the platforms and tools we use to bring the podcast to you. And exclusives improvements are already on the way thanks to your generosity. So if you want to be part of an automotive podcast, like no other head to patreon.com slash wheel bearings, media.

Alright, this is Episode 199 of the wheel bearings podcast. I'm Sam of wall savage from guidehouse insights.

Nicole Wakelin  1:32  
I am Nicole wakelin from autobytel

Roberto Baldwin  1:34  
lam Roberto Baldwin from let's say debugger this week.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:39  
All right. Well, gang, we are back again. What have you been driving?

Roberto Baldwin  1:45  
I haven't been driving anything Who wants to go first? Okay,

Sam Abuelsamid  1:48  
then we'll go with Nicole.

Roberto Baldwin  1:50  
I'll go first. Since I didn't drive anything. Sylvia. It'll be super quick. I don't have much to tell you. I didn't drive anything this week. I did go down and see the BMW four and i x for the very odd unveiling. Since we've kind of seen pictures of it before it was mostly just kind of telling us about, you know, the specs and letting us sit inside and touch it and do that sort of thing. And I will I will say just from sitting inside and touching things. And looking at it in real life. It's BMW i think they're you know, they're they're trying to steer away from the i three of the past which again, I love the i three. I think it's goofy and fun. And it's a concept car that someone decided just to put on the road. With the iPhone, the

Sam Abuelsamid  2:35  
i x is the cheapest the cheapest carbon fiber car

Roberto Baldwin  2:38  
you can buy ugly and you can just cruise around town it's horrible for the highway you shouldn't you know, everyone's while she's someone like on I five in the middle of nowhere driving, and I'm like, Oh, you've made a mistake. But if you're just cruising around town, it's a great little card. It's all quirky inside. And but yeah, the i x di four, they're, they're they're essentially, you know, it's a four series. It's a it's an X 3x five, and it's very, they're very nice. They the i X has this like wood, like center console with like, the buttons kind of underneath it. And you know, that little that little, that little twist wheel that they have in there. It's like, you know, Crystal Li anyway, it's it's they're very fancy. They're very nice inside, they're very much just BMWs it happened to be electric and are just slightly fancier. And with with a little bit of flair to let you know, it's electric, but not too much.

Sam Abuelsamid  3:33  
Well, I know one of the variances the fives are going to offer is going to be the first electric m badged model. And that, you know, that we can tell us about the performance of that one.

Roberto Baldwin  3:47  
So well actually, both the AI x will have the model first. I'm sorry, I forgot the M model first. Sorry. reminder that I it's early for me when I do the podcast. So the VI for m 50. With 536 horsepower, it'll be all wheel drive. And it'll it'll be pricey starting at $65,900. So that's

Sam Abuelsamid  4:15  
actually not bad for an ATM.

Roberto Baldwin  4:16  
Yeah, you know, it's you know, it has a range of 240 miles so you losing some range the the regular Ifor will have a range of about 300 miles but you know what, you're losing the range you gain and fun so that's that's sort of a trade off you have to you know, if you want something that's that's, that's fast and quick and fun, and you're gonna lose some range. I mean, that's the same thing with with with gas vehicles. If you

Nicole Wakelin  4:38  
use a 249 mile range, how often do you need more than a 249 mile range? You know, yeah, you're just pretty Yeah, you're

Roberto Baldwin  4:45  
not. I'm sorry everyone, but you're not going anywhere. The sort of downer was both all the vehicles only have support DC fast charging to 200 kilowatts, which is I mean Hyundai is doing 350 everyone else's, you know, Tai Chi is doing, you know, three, something, everyone's up there, and the three hundreds and the BMWs are down at 200. And, you know, they said that, you know, they've been working on these for a while. Until, yeah. But the, but yeah,

Sam Abuelsamid  5:13  
but really, you know, these are the first BMWs to offer, you know, a lot of greater than 200 mile range, you know, which I think, was one of the reasons why they opted not to watch the IX, three here in North America, because its range would have been under 200 miles, you know, on the EPA test, and I think that's, you know, that's why they said, Okay, well, we'll sell it in China, and we'll sell it in Europe, you know, we're, you know, there's more, there's not as much demand and not necessarily as much of a market demand for longer range TVs.

Roberto Baldwin  5:47  
Yeah, no, it's they're pulling, you know, a lot of these companies are sort of putting the smaller, lower range vehicles in other countries, Europe, China, just because in those in those markets, people are like, Oh, yeah, that's fine. But the United States, we were a big country. So we need a big battery. Yep. That's a honeycomb reference for all the Gen X and boomers out there. But yeah, so you're, you know, you're looking at these larger cars, you know, 240 to 300 miles. And, you know, again, there's, these are, these are definitely set up for the BMW driver who wants to go Eevee, but doesn't want that weird quirkiness that the i three was and, and, and so you know, they'll they'll both be out in the first quarter of 2022. There'll be a an M, i x, the M 60. That'll have 600 horsepower. So if you want a 600 horsepower, electric SUV that's coming from, from BMW, because people love fast SUVs, Nicole, and

Nicole Wakelin  6:55  
you're talking about like, what do you no idea what you're talking to? What are you talking about?

Roberto Baldwin  7:02  
Yeah, and they're doing that same thing that almost the same thing that Mercedes is doing, they have that big giant will single piece of glass with multiple displays underneath, which everyone's very excited about, and you get in, you're like, Oh, it's three displays wonder one piece of glass or it's to just, you know, in the BMW, two displays under one piece of glass, and you're like, Okay, fine.

Nicole Wakelin  7:22  
giant piece of glass gets you all excited. You're like, Oh, wow.

Roberto Baldwin  7:26  
Yeah, it's not one giant display. And either the BMW or Mercedes, it's one giant piece of glass with multiple, multiple displays underneath it. So just like, oh, okay,

Sam Abuelsamid  7:39  
and, you know, we're sitting Mercedes did that on the previous generation II class, or I guess, maybe it's still the current generation, whenever they launched, when they launched the latest class, like five or six years ago, they that, you know, that was the first one they did that did that with two large displays under a single pane of glass. And, you know, that's starting to become more common. You know, when it's off, it just looks like a solid sheet.

Roberto Baldwin  8:03  
giant black mirror?

Sam Abuelsamid  8:05  
Yeah. But you know, to what you're saying about the pricing is what I think 68 $69,000 that's actually cheaper than an M for the the new m four, which starts at 72. And you've got more power, although, obviously more weight as well, for the the battery, but you know, the MDM for is 473 horsepower, you've got 563 and the I four m 50, whatever, which, you know, and I suspect that the acceleration, I think the acceleration is probably like in the mid three second range with that one,

Roberto Baldwin  8:40  
I don't think they actually, they told us the numbers for the i x. Okay, the i x zero to 60. And about 4.24, I'm sorry, 4.6 seconds. But I don't think they gave us range numbers for the iPhone, or I'm sorry, zero to 16 numbers for the iPhone four. But it's, you know, and you also get, you know, you get the federal tax incentive, then any sort of local and state tax incentives. So you're, you know, you're pushing this 60 you know, it's just says $1,000, destination $67,000, you know, thing down to 60,000. And then whatever, you know, random extra taxes, you get off in your local, you know, 58,000 So, yeah, you're, it's, it's kind of a deal.

Sam Abuelsamid  9:24  
Yeah, you know, what we're starting to see now finally, is ease that, you know, compared to their gasoline equivalents, at least in the the mid to high end of the market, not so much at the the entry level part of the market yet, but at least in the mid to high end of the market. They're being priced equivalently to, you know, or in some cases, even a little bit less than their gasoline equivalents. You know, which is the first the first time we've seen that So, clearly, you know, these manufacturers are starting to get more aggressive about this, you know, they've found ways to cut costs on these things and get more aggressive about trying to sell them Yeah,

Roberto Baldwin  10:00  
and it's battery technology as they get as it gets denser, and they can keep that 250 300 mile range out there with, you know, as their, their, their their slurry gets that well, they're using the little batteries in the in the BMW anyway but their as their their their chemistry gets denser and more energy efficient, you know, the batteries get cheaper. And so as the batteries get cheaper those prices continue to go down. So, you know, I think we're a few more years till parity to pricing parity, like equivalent to equivalent without any sort of federal tax incentive and then if you know, and then we'll have the federal tax and stuff and then it'll just seem to be a no brainer to buy an Eevee because it'll be so much cheaper than a regular you know, gas car for most people again, if you're that guy who drives 500 miles every day Don't yell at me on Twitter that do every day I drive 773 miles I'm like, Okay, then it's not for you leave me alone.

Sam Abuelsamid  10:56  
Right. Yeah, as long as long as it fits your lifestyle. Yeah, yeah. It's it's now really becoming becoming a viable option from you know, from from a capability standpoint and a pricing stamp. Yeah,

Roberto Baldwin  11:09  
yeah. No, it's it's, it's it's pretty crazy. But I didn't drive any What do you think?

Sam Abuelsamid  11:14  
What do you think of the design of the foreign person and the

Roberto Baldwin  11:18  
you know, it still has that you know, other than the giant grill I like them I think the eye for just like a nice traditional sleek, you know, four door sedan the eye x is a little bit you know, it seems a little bit more I don't want to say sleek again, but more sleek than then you know the the the the x three of the x five I think as the roofline has been sort of adjusted. But that giant grill those giant kidney grills you know, BMW came out with it and everyone's all boob he was like, you know, we're gonna do we want we're BMW. So you know, and love them or hate them, those giant kidney girls are still there.

Sam Abuelsamid  11:57  
They're they're not really there even though they're even less necessary now than they were great. Let's

Nicole Wakelin  12:02  
make them bigger and more aggressive and more in your face even though we don't need that

Roberto Baldwin  12:06  
they're not necessary they have they have actually air vents underneath it on both vehicles that open in shot to adjust you know, airflow and to you know, to get some nice drag coefficient. So they don't really I mean, they said that they will they behind these are, you know, they're there. We need you know, these are these are important because we can put the radar and all these other sensors behind them and like, you know, you can put the radar and sensors behind literally anything. It doesn't have to look like Bugs Bunny.

Nicole Wakelin  12:32  
But you know, as soon as you like when you see easy's where they you know, there is no grill on the front. And people like I don't like that. Oh, it's all flat. It's all just a piece of metal itself. So I guess what do you take it off and have everybody complain and moan that you know? Oh, it doesn't look like a BMW. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin  12:49  
And that's what happened with the Kona electric. I like to Kona electric a lot, right? I like the Kona a lot. The Kona looks better because it has like a grill and the Kona electric is just sort of looks weird, because you're just like, well, what's going on? And I'm here that

Nicole Wakelin  13:01  
guy looks weird, because it does not enough, right?

Roberto Baldwin  13:04  
I'm the guy was like, Oh, well, maybe you should have thought of something else to put up there. I don't know, like a, like a lightning bolt. Or,

Sam Abuelsamid  13:10  
I mean, you've got these two extremes. You've got Tesla that just does a flat front with no adornment at all, which I also don't like the look up. And then you've got BMW with these massive pho grills. You know, there's got to be something somewhere in between more shot there that Porsche has. Yes. Yeah. Yeah, the icon i think is a great solution. Yeah, you know, even even the Maki, you know, it's a little you know, it's more bold. It's not as it's not as ridiculous as the BMW you know, in the way they've done it. But you know, I think it's, it's got some character to it.

Roberto Baldwin  13:43  
Some someone asked me how come the Maki looks like a salamander. And now I cannot stop thinking about that. So now that's an everyone else's head. I apologize. The machi nice I am. By the way, I'm seeing a lot of monkeys in my neighborhood. I've seen five in the last week.

Nicole Wakelin  13:59  
And I've seen have not seen a single one in the real world except for one time when I was in Detroit.

Roberto Baldwin  14:05  
I've seen three ID fours. So in my anecdotal unscientific the machi which I think has been released quicker than the ID for because of software issues with Volkswagen is outselling the ID for what I say five to three.

Sam Abuelsamid  14:21  
Yeah, well and and they another interesting tidbit of information about the Maki that came out the other day through the beginning through the end of May. They've actually produced more Maki's this year than they have gas Mustangs, because they've they've been prioritizing, trying to prioritize production because of the chip shortages for newer models like the Maki and the F 150. At least to the extent they can for that one. But and the bronco sport, trying to prioritize those newer models rather than the ones that have been around for a while so they've actually built more electric Mustang badged vehicles than gas

Roberto Baldwin  14:58  
powered ones. Hmm. Wow. Crazy. At times crazy but yeah I'm seeing him around the people seem happy I guess you know their drive you know they take

Nicole Wakelin  15:07  
they're not crying behind the wheel

Roberto Baldwin  15:09  
you can tell they're using that Evie torque or still having fun taken off you know at that stoplight there I don't know. No parts falling off all they go down the road they're

Sam Abuelsamid  15:17  
not running into the jersey barrier. Yeah,

Roberto Baldwin  15:19  
they're not Yeah, there's that this bumper is not falling off, you know, none of the other cars. Just the Tesla Model three.

Sam Abuelsamid  15:27  
I can't imagine that could be

Roberto Baldwin  15:29  
well, three, the model three had a problem with it bumpers coming off if you didn't know. And then Tesla smile. It's just that Tesla admitted that there was an issue. That was just, you know, but it was just when you're going through puddles just don't drive through water. Come on. Just avoid

Nicole Wakelin  15:42  
the water. Well, I

Sam Abuelsamid  15:42  
mean that Well, I mean, it's not like it ever rains in California. So you know, and that's where they sell most of the Tesla's Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin  15:48  
It's not popular in anything from Tony, Tony. Tony. It's it never rains in Southern California. Yeah, that's a deep cut from Roberto. Thank you, Mark for Gen X. Millennials look up Tony, Tony, Tony, and then enjoy the rest of the day because they're an amazing new jack swing group from the 90s and 80s, I guess. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid  16:12  
All right. The call What about you? What do you been up to? Yeah,

Nicole Wakelin  16:15  
bringing it back to this year. The 2022 Mitsubishi Outlander, I had and still in my driveway right now covered with pollen. It was really pretty white. Now. It's like this white, yellow gross mess because you know, spring in New England. I like this. And I almost feel like people are like their jaws are dropping because Mitsubishi gets a lot of criticism for their cars not being as fancy as nice as quiet like and they've deserved some of it, but this is good. I really like the Outlander, this is the FCL, which is technically their top trim, they have three trims, like essc, Sal, and they have launched edition versions of the top two that add extra goodies you must in 2020, as you must or you even making cars. So I don't have the launch edition. But I still have like the top normal trim, I guess. It's beautiful inside. In fact, I sat down and did a test I said, because my family's in luxury cars and cheap cars and all these things all the time. So they see a pretty you know, they're in the same revolving door cars that I am. They all bet that this cost about $15,000 more than it does.

Sam Abuelsamid  17:22  
That's impressive for for Mitsubishi because they usually right feel like they cost about $15,000 less than

Nicole Wakelin  17:29  
this one as I have right and see that's the thing, not like the fact that I'm seeing I like this. I feel like everyone is like what did she put in her morning coffee, there's no way right. But this is $38,590. So it's not super cheap, but it's like it looks beautiful inside it has like these quilted leather trims and it has a captain's chairs in the second row. And it's it just it looks like what it costs like it doesn't look like a cheap car and it doesn't feel like a cheap car like that was one of the things that like older versions of mitsubishis they always kind of felt a little bit like a tin can they were sort of ratalie everything felt like it was kind of held together with like a little bit of you know, chewing gum, maybe some scotch tape duct tape, like behind the scenes, you wonder what was keeping it in one piece. You don't with this. It's very solid. And I like driving it. It's got a 2.5 liter four cylinder 181 horsepower, 181 pound feet of torque, and it's got a CVT the I hate cvts I'm just gonna say like, but like, like, every time I hate a CVT, but I feel like this one is fairly well muted, you know you're not getting that you're not hearing like the engine noise suddenly sounding like intrusive and is my you know, engine going to explode through the hood of my car if you mash the gas to get on the highway. So it moves out of its way and like this, this thing seats, seven up to seven people if you get that bench seat in the second row. So it's not tiny. It's not like a crossover. It's it's a proper SUV size vehicle. And I enjoy driving it. Yeah, on record. I enjoy driving a Mitsubishi that might be the first time I've ever said that in my whole life ever.

Sam Abuelsamid  19:11  
Well, you know, I think one of the problems for Mitsubishi, at least particularly in North America has been most of the vehicles that they've been selling here recently except for the eclipse cross, which is relatively new. I think it's about three years old now. Most of them were actually pretty old. Yeah, pretty old platforms. They haven't really fundamentally changed you know, in many, like in the case of the Outlander. I think that goes back to like about 2007

Nicole Wakelin  19:35  
Yeah, I think it's about a decade since they at least a decade since they've redone I

Sam Abuelsamid  19:38  
mean they've they've refreshed the, you know, the facia and things like that over time and that's a minor interior updates, but it's basically an old platform now the the new Outlander is actually one of the first products produced since Mitsubishi became part of the Renault Nissan Mitsubishi Alliance, right. So

Nicole Wakelin  19:58  
it's essentially like A Nissan Rogue. Yeah underneath it's Nissan Rogue out the skin is like Mitsubishi, the innards are a Nissan Rogue. So like if you compare it to the road, like a lots the same has the same engine, same horsepower, same, you know, CVT and stuff, the rogue is a little more well mannered, a little bit more upscale, feel a little bit quieter, I think riding on the inside and has a little bit more get up and go but it weighs a little bit less than the Outlander. So you know, you kind of would expect that it doesn't feel like Oh, they they messed up the outlet or no, it's just bigger, so it's not gonna move as fast and as sprightly with the same powertrain in there. But yeah, it's it's basically like a re skinned Nissan Rogue. And I like the rogue. So I guess it's not a surprise that I like this one, too.

Sam Abuelsamid  20:43  
And it's, I like the design, I think, I think it's a good looking vehicle. And, you know, the part of it, you know, you mentioned that you can see up to seven in this, you can't get a third row option in the row right anymore. They used to offer one for a few years, but they can't they don't know. So, you know, that's where some of that extra weight comes from, you know, you were mentioning the CVT being at least more refined than typical, yes. Which again, is one of those Nissan things Nissan, I think, does a generally does a better job with cvts. And pretty much anybody. So, you know, it's not not surprising that, you know, it was less unpleasant than than most, most CVT power trains.

Roberto Baldwin  21:24  
Yeah, it's nice to see a nice Nissan Mitsubishi like bringing a new car here. When it's new. The the Outlander hybrid that they announced earlier this year is actually the last generation Outlander. So they, so it's like a two or three year old car, that they're bringing a hybrid. And it's just okay, some stuff.

Nicole Wakelin  21:48  
They like last year, they had they what do they do, they increased. The range went up by like to the electric range for about like two miles, but they give a little bit more horsepower for 2021. A little bit more, just to scope, a little bit more of, and they say the 2022 version is supposed to be here this year, sometime later this year. So they say, I don't know what later this year is. It's June. Yeah. So okay. We're halfway

Sam Abuelsamid  22:13  
between July and December.

Nicole Wakelin  22:16  
December 31. Right, technically came later this year.

Sam Abuelsamid  22:19  
We'll Well, we'll get we'll get the December deliveries report on January 3, you know, and there'll be three hybrids

Nicole Wakelin  22:28  
will have made their announcement. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin  22:33  
Oh, yeah. I think there's, you know, I think the key Italia right, put all these companies on notice, though, all these automakers on? Yeah, you have to, like bring it if when you when you're when you're putting out these new large SUVs, and you know, if you want to if you want to compete with them, and just feeling like a nice interior, you gotta at least try a little harder.

Nicole Wakelin  22:53  
Yeah. That's the thing, I think, you know, it's almost like Mitsubishi heard the criticism about, you know, your, regardless, they look a little they don't look very exciting on the outside, the styling needs some updating, and they feel cheap. And like here with the telly are improving, we can build an inexpensive car, we can build a car that's affordable relative to other cars in the segment. And it doesn't have to feel like you went shopping in the bargain basement, second section, you know, you, you can get one that looks and feels, not just the materials, but just the drive, the ride, the handling, the quietness, the smoothness of the suspension system, all of that feels good. Like, you don't have to spend a fortune to do that. So if kiya can do it, other guys can do it. Everyone has engineers, everyone has the smarts, everyone has the tech, you just have to take the time and make it a priority. And I really feel like Mitsubishi did that with this, the Outlander is really good. And the pricing like it starts at just under 26 and tops out just over 35 so $35,000 for a good looking SUV that can carry seven people that's a good price for what this is, you know,

Roberto Baldwin  24:02  
and 2500 start I mentioned 20 525,000 starting that's a great spot for people who you know, for families who you know, they need that extra space because they have a lot of kids but don't have a lot of money and so that the idea that they can get a third row SUV, without you know, shelling out you know, $35,000 is is feeling

Sam Abuelsamid  24:22  
so it's fine. It's finally a Mitsubishi that you would you might actually want to go out and buy rather than just say, you know, oh, it's the last rental car on the lot.

Nicole Wakelin  24:31  
Yes, like if you if you have this sitting there and you said, you know you can pick from different cars, it wouldn't be like well, okay, fine. If I have to drive that rather than walk, I will take it. I would actually say no, I will drive that. And you know, you can't underestimate for a family like you were saying Roberto, there are people who want big SUVs, not because they need to pack it full of stuff or they're going on these grand adventures. They literally just have, you know, three kids and they want to be able to put the kids and their friends in the car and they need a little bit of room for groceries and you know, sporting equipment, whatever, but they don't have the money to spend on a big bucks, huge thing that's, you know, has all the fancy, they just need a vehicle that will make it easy for their family to live. And this does that, like $25,000 that's, that's cheap for something that can take your entire giant family out there, or your kids and their friends. That's that's a good deal. Yeah, screaming deals from Mitsubishi who doesn't get screaming deal?

Sam Abuelsamid  25:27  
Alright, with a slightly less screaming deal, I had the the 2022 this is I think this might be the first 2022 model I've had 2022 Infiniti, Qx 55 sensory all wheel drive. Because, you know, you can't just call it premium or limited or platinum anymore. It's got to be something unique. But so the Qx 55 is the the latest from infinity, which is it's basically a Qx 50 with the back of the roofline sliced off. So you, Gx 50, with more of a fastback. And when they did the launch of this vehicle a few months back, and you know, when they announced it, they infinity kept bringing up the the original FX, you know, as kind of the inspiration for this because the the FX when it came out, I don't know, somewhere around 2000 or so was kind of the the the first of the sort of coupe like SUVs. Yeah, it was the original FX was built on Nissan's FM platform, which is the same platform that underpinned cars like the Z, the Nissan Z, and the the GX, the Infinity gx and assorted other rear wheel drive vehicles that were actually quite fun to drive, they were quite, quite engaging to drive. And, you know, the FX, you know, basically just took that jacked it up a little bit, put a an SUV ish body on it. And one of my favorite, I think, probably my favorite infinity of all time was the FX 50, which later became what the Qx 70 I think when they went to the QX badging, and, I mean, that thing was a hoot to drive, you know what that that big five liter V eight in there. This, you can see some of the FX design inspiration in there, I actually do really like the design of this thing, I think it's I think it's, you know, quite attractive moreso than the the Qx 50. And you give up a little bit of potential cargo space in the back behind the seats. Second row, you don't really give up anything, because the shape of the roofline, you know, you pretty much retains the second row volume, you just give up a little cargo space in the back. But you know, they've done some some other touches to it, the tail lights and the headlights are a little bit different have that sort of feathered look in the in the lights in the signature lighting, you know, which I think is you know, to kind of a unique infinity design touch. So, I think it looks good. The powertrain, you can get it with front wheel drive, or all wheel drive. The only engine in here is the Nissan's two liter variable compression turbo, which we've talked about in the past, you know, this is the one that can vary the compression ratio between I think about eight or nine to one up to as high as 14 to one through a rather complex mechanism at the the bottom of the crankcase. At 268 horsepower, 280 foot pounds of torque. As long as you leave it in normal or support mode, it's great. I would definitely not recommend putting it in Eco mode. Because in Eco mode, it seems like it just keeps the the the compression ratio at whatever the minimum is. And when you go to accelerate away from a you know, when the light turns green or you know from a stop sign or something. It can be a little sluggish. There There was definitely some slowness to respond in that case. So I just put it in sport mode all the time. And it was fine. It was quite nice to drive. I think, you know, there's plenty plenty of performance here. It's certainly no big honkin v eight. But you know, I think for most people, it's it's more than adequate. You know, this one had 20 inch wheels. It has infinities direct adaptive steering system. The the sensory is pretty much the I think the top of the line, fully loaded version with pretty much everything in it, including the pro pilot assist system heads up display, traffic, sign recognition, all that good stuff. I think, you know, I like the size of the Qx 55 you know, it's, you know, it's kind of that compact to slightly mid size, size class you know, not not too big, so Definitely, you know, five passengers, no, no thought even of a third row. You know, so this is similar, actually maybe even a little bit smaller than the rogue size wise. It still has infinities dual touchscreen infotainment system, which is never been crazy about it,

Nicole Wakelin  30:21  
you don't love that.

Sam Abuelsamid  30:24  
No. Functional Part Part of the issue is, you got these two separate touchscreen displays, that they're totally mismatched in in the way they look like one, the top one or the sorry, the top one or the bottom, one of them is much glossy or looking than the other one. You know, it just doesn't look right. I don't know what they were thinking with that. But at least for the top screen, so you know, they split the, the media stuff, you know, so if you're using CarPlay, or Android Auto, or radio or whatever, all that stuff, or navigation, that stuff turns us shows up in the top screen. The bottom screen is mostly relegated to controls the climate controls and, and settings and things like that. So you're mostly using the top screen anyway, which is up close to your your line of sight. But it's also further away from you. But infinity does have you know, it's a touchscreen, so you can use it as a touchscreen, but just a long reach. But they've also got a central control knob that allows you to control all that stuff as well, which, you know, I prefer using, you know, in this kind of scenario, the price tag on this thing, all in including delivery 58,975 bucks. So, you know, closing in on 60 grand for this A B you know, I like it, you know, I think the

Nicole Wakelin  31:54  
I wish you could say Sam's face as he started he's like closing in 60 grand, there's like this, like, grimace that you guys couldn't see before he said anything else.

Sam Abuelsamid  32:03  
You know, I mean, they start they started under 40 grand for a front wheel drive based front wheel drive version. And, you know, I think if you're going for a, you know, an entry to mid level version of this, you know, I think it's a really nice premium crossover. You know, getting up into the $60,000 range. I'd have a hard time recommending this against some of the competitors like you know, say a BMW X for you know, which is similar size class or or you know, something you know, or the Mercedes GLC Coupe, things like that. But, you know, for for what it is, you know, it's definitely good to drive. Yeah, I think it handles really well and it feels good on the road. And as long as you don't put it in Eco mode. It's fine. It's all good.

Roberto Baldwin  32:51  
Don't put it in Eco mode.

Sam Abuelsamid  32:53  
Yeah, definitely never put it in ever.

Nicole Wakelin  32:55  
Just kind of a rule of thumb like for cars in general. It doesn't matter what the car is. Don't put it in Eco mode 99.9% of the time you don't want to do i

Sam Abuelsamid  33:03  
mean if you're if you're you know taking a long highway road trip, you know, you can put it in Eco mode.

Nicole Wakelin  33:08  
No, you can't Sam you're like I don't think I've ever in my whole life willingly kept a card Eco mode for more than the two minutes it takes me to see how it drives in that mode then I'm like I've done

Roberto Baldwin  33:17  
a long drive. I'll put it I'll put a car in Eco mode. Because now as I've gone from on staff to freelance I'm like, Oh, I gotta pay for this gas myself.

Sam Abuelsamid  33:28  
Exactly. You're paying for the gas.

Nicole Wakelin  33:31  
You're paying for the gas

Roberto Baldwin  33:33  
right to find

Nicole Wakelin  33:34  
the soulless drive offered by many in Eco mode and feel free to let me know

Roberto Baldwin  33:39  
Yeah, but if you're just like cruising like 70 miles an hour down the freeway for like hours on end you're like hours to put it in eco Okay fine, cuz I'm not doing anything exciting. Yeah, the variable compression I remember when this came out everyone's like oh my god this is amazing. But then the dividends that it pays off is just like Alright, I got it and have they improved it is it better i mean it's it's it's it's not hasn't really changed Yeah, it's it's it's really great thing that they're doing but then you're like oh we saved you get you save one or two miles per gallon you're like okay, okay, cool.

Sam Abuelsamid  34:17  
You know the claim the claim for it when they brought it out was it gives you the performance of a V six with the fuel economy before cylinder which is mostly true. You know, I mean, it's it's the the Q x 55 is EPA rated at 25 miles per gallon combined 22 City 28 Highway. I think I got about 24 so when I was driving it, which is just fine. It's not great. You know, I mean, this is this is not you know, this is this is not a VA if what you're looking for is maximum fuel efficiency. You know, this, this is not gonna you know, any any of the vehicles that have this engine in there are not going to be the ones that that give you the you know, that fuel efficient If you're looking for, but, you know, if What if you're thinking about getting something with a V six, you know, and but you want something with better fuel efficiency, it will give you, you know, two or three miles per gallon more than you might have gotten with a V six, it's generally a lighter solution than a V six, you know that. According to Nissan, you know, this thing, this engine is about 100 pounds lighter than their 3.5 liter V six, which offers similar performance. So, you know, that means you especially on a vehicle like this, where it's a transverse mounted engine, you've got less weight on the front wheel. So that's, that's a good thing. You know, so it's going to handle a little better. It is a very smooth engine, you know, one of the unique things when I first talked to the chief engineer on this engine, when they launched it a couple years back at the LA Auto Show, you know, he was explaining how it because of the way the the mechanism works, there's actual actually less side loading on the pistons, when when they're going up and down. So there's less friction, but it's also less, it's better balanced. So they don't, they don't have to use a balance shaft on the thing, it is actually quite a smooth engine to drive, it doesn't vibrate very much smoother than Nissan's comparable four cylinder engines. So, you know, it's, it is quite pleasant to drive in that respect. So it, you know, it's a reasonable alternative. I mean, it does add complexity to it, I'll be curious to see, you know, 568 years down the road when these things have been around for a while, you know, how well they hold up? Because they're, there's a lot of stuff going on down there.

Roberto Baldwin  36:35  
It's Yeah, it's it. I kind of hope that that as time progresses, they they can like fine tune it and maybe like squeeze 510 miles out of it, you know, mpg and then maybe you know, made it within the hybrid and then just make it super insane complex. But the the technology I was, I was very excited about and just because you're like, like, we're varying the conversion rate in my head exploded, and like, yeah, you're getting two miles a gallon. Okay, wait a minute. Okay. Well, this is really cool, though. You know, this is you know, you got to start somewhere. And that's, that's that's been my that's been my position when it comes to the the variable compression Nissan engine is like, you got to start somewhere. Let's see where this goes. Come on.

Nicole Wakelin  37:16  
So they've started they started, just give them a little time to to improve it, right.

Sam Abuelsamid  37:21  
Yeah, I think but by the time by the time they do that, with this engine, they'll more likely have shifted to something electric or hybrid, though. And, yeah, I can't see them getting a whole lot more out of this particular engine. Oh, I think I think this is this is probably going to be a relatively short lived design. Yeah. Okay. probably less than less than 10 years

Roberto Baldwin  37:40  
is a cool science. But

Sam Abuelsamid  37:43  
yeah, no, it is. I mean, as an engineer, I love it. I think it's, I think it's a really interesting solution. Yeah. But you know, from as a as a

Roberto Baldwin  37:53  
product. Yeah, as a nerd. It's like, Oh, my gosh, but as a like a consumer, like

Nicole Wakelin  38:00  
everyone's like, this engine doesn't do anything to make my life better. Why, you know, engineers like, but it's cool.

Sam Abuelsamid  38:06  
You know, you get, you get a Toyota Highlander hybrid, you know, that is significantly larger than this and gets 35 miles per gallon.

Roberto Baldwin  38:13  
Yeah, that's a tough Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin  38:15  
Yeah. And you know what? I have to trip because I finally remember to look at the mpg I got on my Outlander, like everyone's criticized. Yeah. Like you got to look. Okay, so I looked everybody. So it's rated 24 City 30 Highway for 26. combined. I beat that I got 27.8 combined. And it was like probably a 5050 mix of driving for me between got driving on the highway and driving just around town. So I did I feel like I outdid there, you know, average fuel economy. There we go. See, so everybody stopped sending me tweet saying I don't know that I looked, I've mentioned it.

Roberto Baldwin  38:50  
And you didn't even put it in Eco mode. So imagine, just imagine

Nicole Wakelin  38:54  
what you could add in the fuel economy you would get if you drove it with a light foot and put in an eagle? Because I did not do that. Yeah,

Roberto Baldwin  39:00  
we're not Yeah, journalists aren't typically like feet.

Nicole Wakelin  39:03  
That is not me. In any way, shape, or form.

Roberto Baldwin  39:05  
People pay us for like, well, I'm gonna baby this car.

Sam Abuelsamid  39:10  
I'm not, you know, unless you're trying to do a range test with an Eevee. Like that. Put it on the

Roberto Baldwin  39:15  
magic. Cruise Control.

Sam Abuelsamid  39:19  
Yes. All right. So why don't we shift next to something by the time this show comes out? the embargo should have lifted on this, which is another Nissan based another Nissan SUV, which I don't think you've driven Robbie, but Nicole and I both have the Pathfinder. Yes. The 2022 Pathfinder. Let's touch on this briefly. What did you think of it?

Nicole Wakelin  39:45  
I liked it. I thought it was good. I mean, overall, I was happy with it. I thought it was I don't know that it's a ginormous improvement over the path that over the path one, the past one. But I did think it was an improvement. I liked it. They let us do some off a little off road course in it at the launch that I was I think he did it to drive in Detroit. I think Sam Yeah,

Sam Abuelsamid  40:08  
we Yeah, we took it to the Hollyoaks over RV park.

Nicole Wakelin  40:11  
Okay. tried it there. So you did, so we drove it out in Montana. And they had like a little off road course for us to do. And it was pretty, it handled it well. I mean, there was some, you know, if you're going to take your Pathfinder off road, it can actually do pretty impressively a little bit more than you probably think it could. You know, it's, it's, I don't think people really appreciate what some of their SUVs can do. You know, they think that unless it's like ultra doubt, and all these extra things, you can't go in the dirt, you can't go up some rocks, and you can, you can do pretty good in this. I liked it. I thought it was nice to drive. I thought it was quiet. It was comfortable. I mean, it sort of checks all the boxes that you want for a family vehicle. So overall, I liked it. What about you, Sam?

Sam Abuelsamid  40:51  
Yeah, I thought it was actually probably a more significant improvement. That sounds like you thought over the previous generation Pathfinder, you know, certainly the design, I think is a lot more interesting. The old one was just kind of a mushy blob. You know, it was kind of undistinguished, if you will, you know, I think this one is got a little more aggressive look to it, they've kind of they've tried to recall, you know, the essence of the original Pathfinder, the 90s, early 90s, or maybe it was even 80s 80s, I think, you know, with sort of the, the bulging fenders, the blistered fenders, they've the those original, that first generation Pathfinder had the three horizontal slots in the front edge of the hood, they tried to incorporate a little bit of that into the top of the grille of this thing. Yes, it's pretty subtle mean, most people probably aren't even going to notice it. But, but you know, if you know what you're looking for, in a Pathfinder, it's there. You know, I think that the interior was certainly a lot better than the old Pathfinder. Glad to see Nissan has finally started to adopt better infotainment displays, complained about with Nissan's for years is there that whoever they bought their displays from for their center screens, they got like the worst cheapest displays that anybody could find, you know, they were dim, low contrast, you couldn't see him with sunglasses on. You know, they were just they were terrible. And like the Nissan LEAF and the ultimate, and others still use those displays, they finally have a better quality display in this one. And the other big change, you know, is the the transmission they dropped the CVT from this one and went with a version of the Zed f nine speed, which I thought was a lot better to drive. In this vehicle.

Nicole Wakelin  42:40  
I actually agree with that. The You know, I've already stated my hate of CVT. So I did like the nine speed and it was, from that point of view was definitely much nicer drive. I think that was a lot of why it felt like a quieter ride was a part of that was that it just because it has an actual, you know, gears in it shifting, you don't get the same kind of wine. So I did like that. And I, you're right, I'm remiss in mentioning that the infotainment was greatly improved. The screen is very, very crisp. That was a huge improvement.

Sam Abuelsamid  43:09  
The interface is still the same.

Nicole Wakelin  43:10  
Yeah, you don't get it's not any easier to use than it was but it's easier to see it doesn't. It looks even it just looks more refined. It looks you you know, there's just because the clarity of the screen is better than before.

Roberto Baldwin  43:23  
It looks nicer when you plug in your phone.

Sam Abuelsamid  43:26  
Yeah, exactly. When you plug Exactly. When you when you when you plug in CarPlay or Android Auto it's it's way better it is it is you can actually see it

Roberto Baldwin  43:33  
is amazing how much a bad display sort of like, takes an off off, aka off a car whenever I have like, like regular like my wife or other people get in a car that I'm driving in displays not good. They're like, Oh, what's that? It doesn't matter what the car is how wonderful or great it is. I'm like this cars really good. They're like, Yeah, but look at this, I had to look at this all day.

Nicole Wakelin  43:55  
Because you just make it's a huge part of it. It's just you know, it's the screens dominate the dashboard in your car and they're getting bigger and bigger and bigger. And if they're if they're crappy screens, there's crap dominating your dashboard. I don't think that's the first impression anybody wants their car to be

Roberto Baldwin  44:10  
Yeah. So so you know the when the original Pathfinder came out it was you know, it was it was clearly going after like the forerunner it was looking it was this this sort of off road Be it was

Sam Abuelsamid  44:21  
more of a traditional body on frame S Yeah,

Roberto Baldwin  44:23  
yeah. So, you know, they're they're talking about, you know, this return to to what it was and you know, the you have a little bit of off roading, but it's Yeah, are they is that just sort of like to get a few more people in so it feels like they're, they're, you know, they're trying that and as opposed as opposed to really trying to compete against the, the the foreigner.

Nicole Wakelin  44:44  
I don't think it's trying to be like this off road monster or anything, but I think they genuinely want people to know, like, the what we were going over, you know, it was a fairly steep hill that we were going down and it's just, you know, dirt and sort of those loose Not like boulder rocks, but you know, loose rocks if you don't hit them, right, you're gonna, you know, slip and have to go back and try it again. So it wasn't like super technical driving or by any means, but it was the kind of thing that if you had, you know, a vehicle that really didn't, wasn't up for it, like not every SUV would do that without you having to take five tries to go up that hill that you just came down five minutes ago. This made it up on the first try with everyone and it made it up without a lot of fuss and a lot of finagling. And you know, people didn't have to go backwards and come back down which you'll sometimes see when they have you taken us up just a little too far. people that aren't used to driving off road or gets get stuck and have to start back in just try give it another try. This didn't do that. And that's you know, the number of times you see that on these programs when an SUV just can't quite do it because the driver doesn't have the skill. You didn't need the skill in the Pathfinder. It did what it was supposed to do just kind of crawled over those little rocks. So hardcore off roader. No, but if you really want to go in the dirt, and you really want to take a little bit of adventuring and you want to, you know, go a little bit further than a typical SUV, yeah, it can do it, it definitely can do it.

Sam Abuelsamid  46:04  
I mean, it'll, it'll get you to a remote beach or, you know, down a down a trail to a cabin, you know, to a lakeside cabin or something like that, you know, we're, you know, it's not not paved, you know, but as you said, Nicole, you know, not for the really technical stuff, but you've got things you've got features like hill descent control and drive modes with mud and rot and snow modes. So, you know, it'll, it'll get you through most of the stuff that most people are ever going to encounter. I mean, I can tell you 99.99% of Pathfinder buyers are never going to go to a place like Hollyoaks or RV park, right or any any other place like that. But, you know, if you get into you know, some slightly rough stuff, it'll generally get you through and and, you know, I mean this this is a competitor for you know, Hyundai palisade to tell you, right, you know, it's in that size class that that weight class and

Nicole Wakelin  46:55  
I always think to like, even though they're they're different, they're kind of the same in some ways, like if you're buying an SUV and you live someplace where it snows a lot. Not like snow is crawling up, you know, rocks on a, you know, on a dirt hillside of Montana, but you still you know, you that it has the capability to do that, that it handles well and does that kind of thing, when you do have really crummy weather and you're driving through you know, those berms of snow that is half snow, half ice, half sand, whatever your you know, Highway Department has thrown on the roads, and you're trying to get through that stuff. it bodes well for it being able to do well in the crappy kind of everyday diving that people have to do where it snows. So even though we didn't get drive in the snow, it felt like a good omen for me to handling Well, in bad weather,

Sam Abuelsamid  47:40  
you get confident Oh, and yeah, yeah, and, and speaking of this being a family hauler, you know, one of the interesting features that they have on us that I just remembered, is for the second row seats, if you put child seats in there, you know, the last thing you want to be doing, if people are trying to get in and out of the third row is have to remove your booster seats or child seats from the second row seats to get in and out. And then have to put it all back the the way these second row seats are set up, you can put in the child seat. And then when you release it, the whole seat tips up. And so you have room to access the third row without having to remove the kids. So not Yeah, it's it's a very nice, very handy feature. And

Nicole Wakelin  48:26  
you know, what I liked about it too, is you can there's I can, I'm trying to remember the buttons, but there's a button on the back of that seat. So if you're in the third row, like if for some reason you're using that third row as an adult, I think if you sit in very many third rows, everybody's been left back there once and you're like, hey, can somebody let me out of the car, I can't reach to get out one button. Really? Yeah, there's a button release. So it will put so you can be sitting in the back and a third row and you can hit the button and release and go forward so you can get out so you don't have to wait for someone to remember that you're trapped back there. So I actually like that you can do that not wait for the driver to come around and let everybody out.

Sam Abuelsamid  49:00  
And these will be available at Nissan dealers this summer. Cool. Don't don't remember the pricing information off to find that. And I'll add it in the show notes. But yeah, so these are coming soon. So next up, Texas. You spent some time in Texas this week, Nicole?

Nicole Wakelin  49:19  
I did. I'm calling it Toyota Lexus Palooza because it was all the Toyota Lexus things you could possibly want and the Lexus things we can't really not Toyota. Not Toyota thought this was cooler than Toyota. Oh, okay. There was shrimp. No. So they had it was kind of as if Toyota and Lexus said look, we haven't done an auto show in a year. So we're going to create our very own company Auto Show and we just spent the day at their HQ. We had product specialists we talked you know, we got the reveals of all the cars we could get our hands on them. Take pictures, see and play with stuff. They showed us a lot of new technology. And there were I'm counting 12344 different new I feel like there was a fifth 1am I missing one on that list, Sam I don't know. There were a lot there were a lot of cars that they revealed. Is that so they did the Corolla

Sam Abuelsamid  50:12  
er 86 yeah the Lexus LFC us debut the Bz 4x the Corolla cross

Nicole Wakelin  50:21  
because you're probably right it was so many it felt like you were it well there

Sam Abuelsamid  50:24  
was there was a special edition of the Supra the ACA 91 cF edition maybe

Nicole Wakelin  50:30  
that's when I think

Sam Abuelsamid  50:32  
there was a new TRD PRO Tacoma trail edition Tacoma TRD sport offer for runner. The ball the most important one of all are actually second most important the bronze edition Highlander. And then of course the night shade Prius.

Nicole Wakelin  50:50  
Yes. Which which I'm, you know, I'm the Prius is the Prius and they have this ha Prius and they did this presentation that was like, Behold the badass Prius. I'm like, you guys,

Roberto Baldwin  51:00  
it's a Prius.

Nicole Wakelin  51:01  
It doesn't I appreciate that the black looks cool, but it's still a Prius.

Sam Abuelsamid  51:06  
The upside is at least you don't really see as much of the detail of the Prius design

Roberto Baldwin  51:12  
as the Prius

Sam Abuelsamid  51:14  
it's a stealth brace

Nicole Wakelin  51:16  
no one knows you're driving a Prius but it was it was good it was neat to see the the Corolla cross was pretty was a good looking car especially inside I felt like on some of these they stepped up the interiors a little bit you know because it truly does a very mass market brand and not all of their cars look great on the inside especially in base you know base trims I liked the crawl across and we didn't get to drive any of these we literally just got to you know crawl over them look under the hood see the interiors was just like an auto show Yeah, it was exactly like an auto show. They even had little white sheets that they pulled off of things for us to feel like an auto show yeah they and they had people guiding you with like next press conference this way if there were other ones you could get confused and go the wrong direction to HQ when you know so it was good to see these and it did it did make you feel like Troy was making a real effort to get some interesting things in the pipeline. There's a lot of special edition stuff but that like you said earlier Sam like if you don't have a launch edition slash Special Edition slash bronze read you know off road limited whatever edition then you aren't really building cars anymore, right? So I think the funniest thing that I'm going to the Bz, b z for x

Sam Abuelsamid  52:30  
the the naming of this thing is just so rude. Okay, what

Nicole Wakelin  52:33  
was great is one of the journalists in the group said hey, is so is your product team going to come up with a name for this when it hits production? sound like a copier?

Sam Abuelsamid  52:44  
Yeah, I saw that. And Lisa, I can't remember her name. The product manager for the Evie stuff explained, you know, I mean, Bz is going to be our branding for beyond zero for our Evie. Yes, yeah, okay. Okay, so it's still not it's not too late to change that decision,

Nicole Wakelin  53:02  
right. And I'm sure everyone will figure it out. But like, you know, you see car companies that are moving away from these like, the alphabet soup numbers to actual names in here. Let's give it a name that nobody is going to be able to remember for at least a year, we're all gonna be like the B for the Z, the X the long one, like no one, none of us are gonna know what it's called.

Sam Abuelsamid  53:21  
So, what let's start about that one first, some more. You know, this is going to be Toyota's first purpose built, Evie that they're launching. Well, I guess they had they had the OSI on IQ, the electric version of the Scion IQ. But this is really their first modern purpose built Evie. This This thing is a rav4 sized crossover. What did you think of it? They showed it in Shanghai in April?

Nicole Wakelin  53:50  
Yeah, it looks good. I mean, it does look good. It looks very sleek, eat how we're saying the Prius looks like a Prius, you know, and it's sort of like this, this looks slick. Like, they sort of took the idea that, you know, you kind of don't want a V's to scream. I am an Eevee therefore, I'm important and you know, that you want them to sort of kind of look like regular cars with just some you don't like

Sam Abuelsamid  54:14  
virtue signaling. What's that? Yeah,

Nicole Wakelin  54:16  
you don't want virtue signaling necessary? I don't think I because I think the days of that are really going away. It's it's not so much, you know, when you were buying a Prius, and that was the only thing out there like that. And one other hybrid, you are virtuous virtue signaling that I have purchased a Prius. That's not the case anymore. You're just like, No, I'm, it's I'm getting newertech I'm getting environmentally friendly stuff. And they've gotten away from that, that look, and I think it looks very, it looks very modern. It looks very sleek, and it feels like a good choice. I mean, looking at it and seeing it. I thought it was an appealing car. And I think most of the people there said Yeah, it looks pretty good even though it's named after like a copy machine.

Sam Abuelsamid  54:53  
Did they give any indication of how this thing was going to be priced?

Nicole Wakelin  54:57  
I don't believe that we got pricing. I should have opened up my giant 8000 page document with information from this event. But I don't believe we had pricing most of these things we didn't have pricing on yet. So

Roberto Baldwin  55:10  
yeah, I saw, like, more information as we get closer to production, which is just like, Well, you've already shown off the car now you're showing it off again, please just give us like a little like an inkling of information. Something. Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin  55:22  
It feels like

Sam Abuelsamid  55:23  
it's coming next year.

Nicole Wakelin  55:24  
So this one's got a little ways to go. Yeah. But I feel like with the pricing, like, just in their conversations with toilet or whatever was saying about all of these, you know, they're they're aiming to make even, you know, something, it's an Eevee or even their snazzy or fancier you know, sporty things. They're still trying to make sure that these are affordable cars, you know, they're not kiya they're making not making this super affordable cars, but they they're not trying to price themselves into suddenly where luxury carmaker they have Lexus for that, you know, so they're keeping that they're keeping things in a reasonable, a reasonable realm. Give them what the vehicles are.

Sam Abuelsamid  56:00  
I mean, this is gonna be an interesting segment to watch, because by this time next year, or somewhere in the middle of next year, you're going to have this Bz 4x. You're going to have the Nissan Aria, they, there's going to be the key, the Hyundai, ionic five, the key v six, the VW ID four, and probably some others that haven't been publicly announced yet. I think probably at least one from GM in this same kind of compact, compact and mid size crossover segment, when you sat in it, you know, externally they said it's roughly the size of a rav4 Did it feel roomier inside than a rav4?

Nicole Wakelin  56:40  
That when we didn't i didn't get into it? Yeah, but it it feels rav4 sized. It looks like it on the outside from the outset. It looks squishier. Like it has like the dimensions don't look that quite that big. But looking at the insides

Sam Abuelsamid  56:53  
like it's a little lower. It's Yeah,

Nicole Wakelin  56:54  
it's like a little it's the profiles lower, but it doesn't seem like on the interior that you've you're compromised space wise, it's one of those sort of optical illusion situations like however they've done it, it doesn't feel like suddenly like if you're sitting in the backseat and you're taller your heads gonna be hitting up against the headliner. So I believe that like it seems like it could be about the same comparable to the rav4.

Sam Abuelsamid  57:17  
Okay, near term I think out of all these things that they talked about this week, you know, probably the one that is actually the most important product is the Corolla cross. What is a Corolla cross?

Nicole Wakelin  57:31  
It is a Corolla through and through, but it is a crossover, hence the name Corolla cross. They, they did not they did not try to mislead you there. They you know, they've they've said that this is I think that it's gonna replace what's that they didn't say this, but I say thank you, Joe. I think this HR Well,

Sam Abuelsamid  57:51  
I think they actually said that the car was going to stay because this kind of slots in between the car and the rav4

Nicole Wakelin  57:59  
it does slot in between so it has its spot but I don't it looks so much better than the car good gravy, it looks so much better. So I mean if I honestly like how many there's that that point where you're like well if we change every vehicle by one inch and give each one an extra five horsepower, we can slot in 8000 different sizes of crossovers. How many do you need to slot in there? I feel like it seems like the Corolla cross is going to be a better option to me than the car so I don't know what I don't know what sale what sales will do when it comes out. You know if car is rocketed and Corolla cross is in, but I think Corolla has bigger brand recognition people know Corolla I couldn't for a minute there think what the heck the car was called, like, I have, like, you know, another copier. But I can remember Corolla cross, you know, it looks really good. The interior This is fantastic. Like it really, really looks good. So I think I think it's going to be a solid vehicle and I think it's cool to expand the Corolla lineup, you know, Corolla has a lot of history, it has a certain cachet to it. And I think that this will expand that so I think Toyotas gonna do well with it. I think it's gonna do very well.

Sam Abuelsamid  59:11  
Yeah, I mean, they said they've sold something like 50 million karolos. Right, since since the original one debuted in the late 60s.

Nicole Wakelin  59:18  
Yeah, so it's like Pete like the Corolla has some brand history there. So it makes sense to where crossovers are all the rage right now to give one to Corolla to expand that Yeah, pull up slap a Corolla sticker on the roll call it

Roberto Baldwin  59:34  
dad pull up pull a Mustang and throw the name of an established vehicle on our on a crossover. Exactly.

Nicole Wakelin  59:41  
And you know, they'll they'll keep it in line with the Corolla. They said, No, you know, this is a Corolla we're not trying, you know, Corolla is affordable, and find and all those things and they're trying to keep that aesthetic when they build a crawl across. It looks like they did. Again, we haven't driven any of this yet, but from appearances, it looks like that's exactly what they did.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:00:00  
And this one's coming this fall right? Yeah

Nicole Wakelin  1:00:01  
This one's sooner This one's not as far off

Roberto Baldwin  1:00:04  
yeah it's it's it yeah as you're talking like the car and now the Corolla cross is it going to eat into the car? sales I feel like it probably will. I feel like it's gonna cannibalize some of that I don't see the very you know I see a few car cars on the road but it's such a weird like wait What is that? Which one? Is that the Honda or Toyota one?

Sam Abuelsamid  1:00:25  
I'm not sure I've ever seen a car on the road around here.

Nicole Wakelin  1:00:30  
I mean, we have so few of them I see them on rare occasion do we see them up here?

Roberto Baldwin  1:00:34  
I think it's it's gonna go the way to the Honda Fit I think what's gonna happen is they're gonna keep it around for a little while the people who like it like it but it's just gonna go but that you know, I think the Toyota SUV that needs to go ways to Venza Why is that? Why is Avenger Venza? Why is that a thing?

Nicole Wakelin  1:00:49  
You want a Venza?

Sam Abuelsamid  1:00:50  
It's it's, it's basically a nice, it's a rav4 with a fancier looking body. That's

Roberto Baldwin  1:00:57  
it. And the rav4 is fine. And it's a high end hybrid. Oh, yeah, no,

Nicole Wakelin  1:01:02  
it's your it's your Yeah, it's your rav4 for fancy people. Yeah,

Roberto Baldwin  1:01:04  
just get rid of it and keep them around for that's Yeah,

Sam Abuelsamid  1:01:08  
I mean, you know, through through the first three months of this year through through the end of March, Toyota sold 10,000 ch Rs. So that's, that's about a 40,000 a year run rate, which is not that great. Especially by, by Toyota

Roberto Baldwin  1:01:21  
standards. That's

Sam Abuelsamid  1:01:23  
what is, you know, for what is effectively a fairly mainstream vehicle, you know, a little the styling is not that not that mainstream. You know, By comparison, you know, in that same time period, they sold 69,000 or 72,000 Corolla sedans. Yeah. So, you know, that's, and I think that if I recall, I think they said that they're, they're expecting, probably about a third of Corolla badged vehicle sales going forward, at least in the first year are probably going to be this Corolla cross. You know, so that's it. That's, you know, that's gonna that's gonna be selling in a lot higher volumes than the car. I think the car and the car front drive only in North America. They do an all wheel drive version overseas. But

Roberto Baldwin  1:02:13  
yeah, I don't think it's long for this world. I think it's Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin  1:02:17  
I really doubt the fit. I

Roberto Baldwin  1:02:18  
think the fit was a great little car. I think the great was fit was wonderful. But for this market, it's just like, when I talked to a Honda about it, or like the fit says this many. The CRV sells this many, like, what are we going to do? in this in this market? I'm like, All right. Well, I mean, you throw numbers when you're using logic and numbers fine.

Nicole Wakelin  1:02:36  
Yeah. When you take out your numbers, and you figure things out, whatever, fine, get rid of it.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:02:42  
And in that same first quarter of this year, Toyota sold 114,000 rav4. Yeah, sold 10 times more than 11 times as many Rab fours as they did see.

Roberto Baldwin  1:02:55  
The Corolla cross is gonna destroy the car.

Nicole Wakelin  1:02:58  
It is I think that like, they're not getting rid of it yet. But um, I just think the right bean counters have to look at those numbers and do your little math there, Roberto. And that's the end of it, it's gone.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:03:08  
The one one thing that did kind of surprise me about the Corolla cross is that they, they did not announce a hybrid version at launch, which is unusual, I think for Toyota right now, because they have a hybrid version of the Corolla, which by the way, actually is selling I believe is selling better than the than the Prius is at this point. But they also you know, they the rav4 hybrid accounts for almost a quarter of rav4 sales now.

Nicole Wakelin  1:03:41  
Yeah, there was talk about why they had done that and of course, there wasn't a lot of information about it, but i i don't know i feel like the there will probably be a just give it time It hasn't even gotten

Roberto Baldwin  1:03:52  
well they'll probably announce it when they give you information about the Bz 4x 4000 dash two, you know, you need you have to sort of you have to sort of spread out the news. automakers are really good at spreading out the news. So we'll get some hybrid corrode across karole across news probably like an auto show like early next year. Like a proper we're all outside in a big giant warehouse. Staring at things under bad lighting.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:04:20  
Then there'll be like or in November the LA Auto

Roberto Baldwin  1:04:22  
Show. Yeah. Or at the LA at the LA show.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:04:25  
Yeah, that could be Yeah. All right. Let's see what else Oh, anything about the gr 86.

Nicole Wakelin  1:04:35  
They had it they had it there. It was there on a stage. No it they that also looks pretty good. They they had that on display for us. It looks good. They The interior is is on that one. They did a lot on that like it felt the the 86 felt kind of like it was harsh looking and it did look cheap, but it was kind of plasticky there and this this is greatly upgraded. sight. It was worth the oohs and ahhs that everyone gave it. And you know, it's gonna be a fun little sporty thing to fling around the road when you when you finally get your hands on,

Roberto Baldwin  1:05:10  
have you seen the BRC? In in real life? The new BRC?

Nicole Wakelin  1:05:14  
I have? I don't know if I see it in real life I seen it. I can't remember

Roberto Baldwin  1:05:18  
if I seem to ask you, what do you think of which, which, which one looks nicer? or which one would you? I mean, they're the same car but like Which one do you like?

Nicole Wakelin  1:05:25  
i? I like the 86. I think about the 86 appealed to me more because there's you know, it's just I it was also bright red and beautiful. display and it's hard not to like a bright red sporty car. I don't know. What did they pick the right color? I think I got the gr 86. I liked how it looked. I thought the interior is good. You know, and I have to there was one I gotta mention that what the bronze edition of the Highlander? Is that what it was Sam, you knew it. You said it earlier.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:05:53  
So that's all because I'm looking at it. Okay,

Nicole Wakelin  1:05:55  
I know I can see him now. He's staring at everything right on the screen. So the bronze edition Highlander, which they say is gonna you know, appeal to a younger crowd and you know, give it some pop and personality. But we have to put a picture up or somebody has to look for the interior of that car. It has this diamond patterned seats there like this phone and there's some like bronze trim on the seats. And Ed Kim, who is another journalist pointed out to me now this is all I will ever see. It looks like a Romulan thing from Star Trek. It looks like some gray outfits. The romulo Yeah, no, no clothes, you know there then this sort of gray. Yeah. Sam is nodding. It looks just like so now I will forever think of that is the Highlander Romulan edition, even so somebody that worked on that has to be a nerd because once you see it, it's like, oh my god. That's exactly what it looks like.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:06:49  
Yeah, definitely. Do

Nicole Wakelin  1:06:50  
you see it, Sam, now that you're looking at it? It's like, oh, gosh, Yep. Yep. Here we go.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:06:56  
Alright, so that's that's all the reason you need to buy a Highlander bronze edition, right.

Nicole Wakelin  1:07:00  
It's the Highlander edition.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:07:02  
If you are a Romulan fan.

Nicole Wakelin  1:07:04  
It's that's the one that you're hoping for that.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:07:07  
Yep. fact, let me make sure I download that now before I forget. All right. So what about Lexus? They, they showed the LFC, which they showed in Shanghai. Any thoughts on that?

Nicole Wakelin  1:07:22  
I love the way the front of that looks. I absolutely love it. I love that the spindle grille isn't really a spit. I mean, I know it's still there, technically. But without all the black in the little, hey, we're trying to make this look fancy with it, making it IID. It looks actually really nice. I love the way the front of it looks and the way the lighting effects are done on the front of that. It looks like straight out of the future. It's an attractive looking vehicle. It looks very fancy.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:07:49  
And I'm assuming that you can't tell us anything about the new annex.

Nicole Wakelin  1:07:53  
What new annex?

Sam Abuelsamid  1:07:59  
What What about the Lexus teammates system? Did they give you any demo rides or give you a chance to try that out?

Nicole Wakelin  1:08:06  
They did have the opportunity to try teammate Unfortunately, due to the timing of my flights I didn't get to stay to to experience it. So I do not have any first hand on that, unfortunately.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:08:17  
All right. Well, that sounds like the you know, they they had a ton of stuff to show off there. But there's there's also more more news coming out this week. By the time this show comes out. It will you will the world will have seen the new Ford Maverick which is what something I think forward to saying something that nobody saw coming even though we've seen it and coming for months and months. years. This is Ford's new compact pickup truck. And it's the I think it's Yeah, it's the first time Ford has done a unibody pickup truck. So this this is a truck that slots in underneath the Ranger. It's built on Ford's c two platform architecture which is the same architecture as the escape the Broncos sport as well as the focus and Fiesta that are still sold in Europe and in Asia What do you guys think of this?

Roberto Baldwin  1:09:17  
I am a fan small pickup trucks bring back maybe trucking magazine that's all I'm gonna say. There we go. That's That's my only

Nicole Wakelin  1:09:26  
I love it. I'm excited. I like small pickup trucks. I I appreciate that people need gigantic full size pickup trucks that can you know do a day's work and go out in the ranch but I like the idea of the smaller truck that still gives you a little bit of truck utility and capability without you know being this giant behemoth that you need to you know you could the dimensions of this are SUV like you know they're small enough that you could drive this in a city and not feel like you're going to take out cars along the side because the streets are so narrow. I I'm excited about this. I like the name Maverick.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:10:03  
Yeah, I think this is gonna be really interesting to see how well this one does. I mean, right now, you know, but this is coming out this fall. It's going to be basically a class of two vehicles in at least in the US. Yep. The Hyundai Santa Cruz, which is launching this summer. Yes. And the the maverick. The Maverick is about four inches longer than the Santa Cruz. But it's got a more the design is more traditional for truck, like, you know, not not quite as modern. Yeah, not really like modern.

Nicole Wakelin  1:10:38  
Well, in the same way it doesn't look truck like in a lot of ways it has that little bet on the back. But if you even from this the profile of it, it doesn't have traditional truck styling to it. It's like you look at it you think who what, what happened to that SUV or what's going on there where the maverick you're like little truck,

Roberto Baldwin  1:10:55  
it's like it's more baja than truck.

Nicole Wakelin  1:10:57  
Yes,

Sam Abuelsamid  1:10:58  
yeah. Yeah. Or I was gonna say the original Subaru brat. Jabra. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, but this one definitely has the more truck shape to it, although it is a unibody there's, there's not a separate bed to it. What I think what's what's really interesting about this, you know, this thing is 11 inches shorter than arranger. Yeah, so if you if you know, the size of arrangers thing is almost a foot shorter than that, and a couple of inches lower as well to the ground. But I think what's really fascinating is Ford is really pricing this thing aggressively, the starting base price is going to be 1999 95 plus 15 $100. So, you know, 21 21,021 and a half $1,000, which makes it the cheapest Ford you can buy in the US. And it's coming standard with a hybrid powertrain. And it's an it's an updated version of the hybrid the new hybrid system that's in the escape it which and you get for $21,000, that's what you're going to get is the hybrid 40 miles per gallon cities what they're saying. And, you know, this thing is small enough that you know, like you said, it is gonna be reasonable to drive in the city, you've got a four and a half foot bed, it's got, you know, the cabinet is big enough to hold five people you know, as long as they're not too wide in the backseat, you know, so I mean, it's gonna be similar similar sized cabin to what you get with an escape or a bronco sport. One of the one of the other interesting details about this, you can also get it with an optional two liter turbo four cylinder, if you get the the two liter EcoBoost with all wheel drive, you can option it up to be able to tell up to 4000 pounds with it, which for a small truck like this is pretty impressive. But you know, one of the neat details is what they're calling the flex bed because you know, they're they're targeting this you know, more entry level I mean, this is gonna be Ford's entry level vehicle in North America, because they don't you know, you can't get the escape or, or the fusion or the Fiesta anymore. This is the cheapest Ford you can Ford branded vehicle you can buy. And so they've done things like mold in to the bed slots and divots where you can do some DIY accessories. Like for example, they show, you know, you can buy an aftermarket bike rack to put mount bikes in the bed, or they give you they give you instructions on how to make your own bike rack for about 45 bucks from a two by six and a couple of fork mounts and, and some screws. They also there's a video and some instructions that you can download for how to build your own bed rails. And there's 12 tie down hooks in the bed, you know, and the, the tailgate, they're calling it the multiposition tailgate, the The bed is wide enough, it's 53 inches wide. So you can put four by eight sheets of plywood or drywall in there above the wheel wells. But because it's going to be above the wheel wells, you know, if you just put the tailgate down, the the boards would be slamming down. So they have this multi position tailgate that allows you to take the cables off and hook them at a different position. So that the bed will be the tailgate would be halfway down so it will support the the you know the boards so they're actually tilting slightly down into the bed so they don't slide out which is

Nicole Wakelin  1:14:30  
the coolest part of it as I'm as I'm reading the giant press release is that the tailgate features tie down clamps that double his bottle openers, so you know

Sam Abuelsamid  1:14:37  
yes, they show that in the video too. Yeah. So So yeah, when you when you get to your campsite or whatever, you know, or tailgate party got got your bottle opener right there.

Nicole Wakelin  1:14:47  
Right there handy. You don't have to worry about it. It's built into your truck. That's kind of fun. Yeah,

Sam Abuelsamid  1:14:51  
I think this is this is going to be a very interesting segment to watch because, you know, when they brought the new Ranger out, yeah, it was. It's substantially larger than the old generation Ranger, you know that a lot of people were fans of this, this Maverick actually slots in if you remember the size of the old Ranger and there's actually two of them in my neighborhood here. Near nearby me. One's a regular cab and once the extended cab version, and this actually slots in midway between those two. So it's a little bit longer than the regular cab oldstyle Ranger, but shorter than the extended cab, but because of this, you know, this one's a true four door, you've actually got room, you know, the backseat people, you know, actual human beings can sit in the backseat of this thing, as opposed to you know, in the the old extended cab Rangers where they just had the little flip down benches in there. That, you know, nobody could really sit sit down

Roberto Baldwin  1:15:48  
sideways and just look at the person sitting across from you.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:15:52  
Right? Yeah, pretty much.

Nicole Wakelin  1:15:54  
No, I think that there's no I mean, like you said the only real competition in this this size is going to be the Hyundai Santa Cruz, which I think is coming out towards the well. It's also due this year, I believe.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:16:04  
Yeah. This summer this summer.

Nicole Wakelin  1:16:06  
Yeah. So I think this is a nice thing. Because, you know, the the full size truck segment is huge. You know, that's the f150 sells a bajillion units every year. But there's a lot of people who want something smaller, and I think they doing smaller and more city friendly. And just like, I want a little bit of truck. I don't want to medium it's like the despite being the smallest, it's gonna be the just right size for a lot of people.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:16:29  
Yeah. And, you know, even in the base form, they're saying, you know, with the front wheel drive hybrid, it can have a 1500 pound payload, I think they said, you can put like, 37 bags of mulch in the back and all that man.

Nicole Wakelin  1:16:43  
Always you're always the most man. It's always the most.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:16:49  
You know what, what else? Just a lot of neat. Oh, the interior. They the armrests, they did this cutaway design on the armrest. So it's actually like a two piece armrest where there's there's a missing segment in the middle, which allows you to actually put a one liter water bottle standing upright in the pocket and the door. You know, because they basically cut away part of the armrest. So fit in there. You know, just a lot of neat touches. You know, and, you know, for that starting price of you know, just over 20 grand. You know, that's, I think the I don't think Hyundai has announced official pricing for the Santa Cruz yet, I think most estimates are gonna be, it's gonna be somewhere in the mid 20s. So probably around 2524 25 grand. So this is likely to be several $1,000 cheaper, get 40 miles per gallon. You know, the base form, the EPA numbers for the Santa Cruz just came out the other day, it's only getting 23 miles per gallon. Ouch. Yeah, so this is gonna get 40 you know, and it's it's only four inches longer than the Santa Cruz.

Nicole Wakelin  1:17:54  
This is gonna be like the little and I thought this about the Santa Cruz when Hyundai showed it off at the Tucson event, we got to like, look at it and got some hands on time with it. It feels like such the like, it's like the act you know, the active lifestyle thing. But truly, like, it's not just like, oh, we're gonna make this look rugged so I can throw my bike in the back. He's like, No, no, no, we want you to be able to throw your stuff in the back of this and actually use this and have fun with this or putting cool stuff in here. So you can make it whatever you want to make it if you're at the beach with your friends if you're going to the mountains with your friends if you're just going to your friend's house and hang out in his backyard. This truck is gonna make that more fun like it really does feel like the let's go out and have fun truck not the get work done. Although you can get a little bit done with this just to go out and have fun truck. I think it's fantastic from what this is showing us right now.

Roberto Baldwin  1:18:38  
I think it's gonna do phenomenal. Bring back the Baja that's my That's what I'm saying. I think we I think everyone needs to have a nice smaller truck. I like the idea of a smaller truck. The big trucks they don't make the for me personally, I don't tow anything. I don't you know, I don't need a gigantic monstrosity sitting in my, you know, sucking up gas and taking up you know, more space than my first apartment in San Francisco. I need something small that I can throw stuff in the back. I can pick up mulch and I swear to God, I pick up mulch all the time. I don't know what happens when you buy a house mulch just covers up everything. It's It's It's like

Nicole Wakelin  1:19:13  
I haven't picked up mulch. It's been two weeks since we've gotten mulch, Roberto and I don't know that I've ever gone that long without buying mulch, and I'm a little off kilter because of it. So you know,

Sam Abuelsamid  1:19:21  
yeah, I mean, the way my mulch schedule is worked out this year. I you know, it hasn't worked. It hasn't synchronized with one I've had trucks. So I've actually had to have it delivered. Oh,

Nicole Wakelin  1:19:31  
look at you all fancy. Let's wait until we have the appropriate vehicle to haul our motorhome ourselves.

Roberto Baldwin  1:19:38  
Yeah, I think a lot of buzz around the Santa Cruz is going to transfer over to the maverick just because of the price point. And you know, and I remember when I was in high school, like I'm from a small town with a lot of people who have horses and all the kids wanted a ranger. They all wanted a ranger. Everyone wanted the smallest rock that they could, you know, throw hay in but they can Hanging out with their friends and throw all their other stuff in and maybe haul like a small horse trailer with like a single horse and you know, it's now it I feel like those the the small truck, they're coming back and we got to bring back money truck and bag.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:20:12  
Oh yeah. I drove in at 1984 GMC s 15, all through college and you know, for a year or two after that, and yeah, that was that was a great size truck, you know, for, for what I needed it for, you know, because I, my engineering program was a co op. So I was going back and forth to school, you know, alternating back and forth between school and work every semester. And you know, so I would just throw all my shit in the back of that thing. It was It was great. It was fantastic. And you know, it was easy on gas.

Nicole Wakelin  1:20:40  
And you guys just so that, you know, that's an official official truck. There is in fact a maverick first edition package. Oh, there you go. If you were questioning it, you know, they mean that there's a first edition package and I love this. One of the things is it comes in carbonized gray area 51 and rapid red to the first edition area 50 area 51 What's that one?

Roberto Baldwin  1:21:04  
It's probably got a little alien like easter eggs on it.

Nicole Wakelin  1:21:08  
It could be green. It could be like alien green. Like that electric line. They

Sam Abuelsamid  1:21:12  
have a show briefing, so I don't know what it looks like

Nicole Wakelin  1:21:15  
area 51 I need to know what color is that guesses? Anybody? I'm going with green? Because they have red. They have great. Seems reasonable, right? Like those that that like sort of incredible hulk like Green Lantern green that all the OEMs are doing now.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:21:28  
Yeah. And you know and Ford Ford's been doing some interesting colors. You know, like the Ranger trimmer that I have in the driveway right now talking about next week is in cyber orange you know, so this thing is

Nicole Wakelin  1:21:39  
he was a names are cool, very bright.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:21:43  
So yeah, I'll be curious to see what area 51 looks like.

Nicole Wakelin  1:21:46  
should ask. I should ask for somebody tell me what area 51 is.

Roberto Baldwin  1:21:49  
It might just be Black Edition.

Nicole Wakelin  1:21:52  
That will be so disappointing. Roberto. It's just black,

Sam Abuelsamid  1:21:55  
green, black. Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin  1:21:56  
There has to be something like you know, there has to be something else. No, it's not black, gray, red and black.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:22:03  
It's got to be a bright neon green,

Nicole Wakelin  1:22:04  
right? It has to be green. I'm going with green. If it's black. I'm going to be really sad now because I'm expecting bright green.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:22:14  
All right. Let's see. I think that's all we had for this week. I think we hit everything on the list. Anything else you guys want to talk about now? Or? You got anything exciting coming up this week?

Nicole Wakelin  1:22:28  
I'm going to Seattle. I'm for what? Just because and I'm going to get to see just because and I'm going to get to drive this week the Jeep Grand Cherokee L. So yeah, that'll be the beginning of the week. Start in Detroit and up in Seattle.

Roberto Baldwin  1:22:48  
I'll be driving. You're gonna be in Detroit this week. What's up?

Sam Abuelsamid  1:22:51  
You're gonna be in Detroit.

Nicole Wakelin  1:22:52  
I am gonna be in Detroit

Sam Abuelsamid  1:22:54  
for the Grand Cherokee or Yeah. Oh, I didn't get it. Oh,

Nicole Wakelin  1:22:59  
Oh, ouch. Sorry.

Roberto Baldwin  1:23:02  
You know what, you bought a bus get to go drive other cars that I don't get to drive. You know, you don't want to go to things in there like, Hey, I think it's just the way

Nicole Wakelin  1:23:15  
you just never know when we could get you're going 20 places the next week he gets to sit home just it's all about balance.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:23:21  
Yeah. All right. Any Anything else? Robbie,

Roberto Baldwin  1:23:25  
I don't know if I'm allowed to talk about the car I'm driving next week. I will have the four XC though or four by IE not the four XC I'm sorry,

Nicole Wakelin  1:23:32  
four by four.

Roberto Baldwin  1:23:33  
I will have the four by E next week as well. But I'm driving something else. I can't remember if I'm allowed to say what I'm going to be driving next. Alright.

Nicole Wakelin  1:23:41  
Okay. So when we when we stop recording, you need to tell Okay, that's fair.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:23:45  
So that means that that means that everybody has to come back and listen to the next show to find

Nicole Wakelin  1:23:48  
out the mystery. Robbie will be driving to the next area. 51 Maverick. He knows what the color is. He's not telling me Blackest Night.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:24:01  
All right. Well, thanks everybody for listening and make sure you stay subscribed and tell your friends about the show and we will see you next time. Bye.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai