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- 🚘 CR-V Dethrones F-150, Ferrari's Manual, Bolt Axed
🚘 CR-V Dethrones F-150, Ferrari's Manual, Bolt Axed
PLUS: $63,630 Tesla 3-Row, Montero Returns, Weird X5
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Summer's here. Larry handles calls, jobs, and memberships automatically.
Air Design used to spend hours every day manually calling their 600 members to schedule seasonal tune-ups.
They turned on Podium's AI Membership Coordinator. It contacted 471 members, booked 187 jobs, and generated $24,000 in revenue.
Across home services, the story repeats.
Magnolia Plumbing cut invoice-to-payment time to 6 minutes and saved 60 hours of admin work every month.
This is what Podium's AI Operating System does: phones answered, jobs booked, invoices collected — automatically, without adding headcount.
2026-07-06
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Releases & Reviews
Ferrari keeps the 12Cilindri's 818 horsepower (610 kW) V12 and dual-clutch gearbox but adds a servo-actuated shifter and clutch pedal that mimics a gated manual—down to the clack of the metal gate. The company admits the analog feel makes this limited edition slower: entertainment over performance, built purely on customer demand.
Killed once in 2023 and revived by popular demand, the Bolt exits again after 2027. Our reviewer loved the charming, cheap EV: 210 horsepower (157 kW), 262 miles (422 km) of range, and 150-kW charging from $28,995. The catches are highway noise and GM's stubborn refusal to offer CarPlay.
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Technology, Market Data & Analysis
Tesla delivered 480,126 EVs in Q2, a 25% year-over-year jump, with the Model 3 and Y accounting for nearly all of it. The rebound suggests buyers have moved past their Musk-era hesitancy, and registration data points to Europe driving much of the surge. Energy storage deployments also rose 40%.
For the first time, a compact SUV is outselling America's full-size trucks: the CR-V hit 226,114 sales at midyear, topping the F-150 and Silverado. Supply hiccups at Ford and Toyota helped, but 15-day dealer inventory shows real demand—buyers balking at $66,000 average truck prices are choosing the $38,000 Honda instead.
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Car Culture
MTV's Xzibit-hosted show pimped 72 hoopties from 2004 to 2007, and most of the absurd builds—salmon cannons, in-car hot tubs—were sold or scrapped soon after. Galpin Auto Sports still keeps two, including an 800-horsepower (597 kW) biodiesel '65 Impala. Superfans have traced roughly 50 cars; 17 remain with original owners.
Heading to Bonhams' Monterey auction, this 2000 Diablo GT is a back-to-basics, track-focused send-off for Lamborghini's 1990s icon—naturally aspirated 6.0-liter V12, 575 horsepower (429 kW), rear-drive, and a five-speed manual. Just 83 were built, making it the second-rarest Diablo road car; this one, number 74, shows 8,828 miles (14,204 km).
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Miscellaneous
Ford is recalling 741,195 F-150s, Explorers, Expeditions, and Lincoln Navigators and Aviators from the 2018–2021 range over a rollaway risk—damaged park-system components can let a vehicle move while in Park. Regulators note 24 property-damage claims and nine injuries. Dealers will update the powertrain control module software and replace parts free.
The fan-powered Speirling Pure hypercar has a humble buyer questionnaire—no net worth or follower count required, just where you live, how you'll use it, and a spot for your own questions. You'll still need $1.3 million for the 1,000-horsepower (746 kW) fan car that hits 60 mph in 1.55 seconds.
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Tesla's stretched three-row SUV—six inches longer than the standard Y with real third-row space and 325 miles (523 km) of range—arrives as a Model X replacement, with the Launch Series starting at $63,630.
The fifth-gen luxury SUV swaps chevron lamps for four multifunctional 'double-X' signatures that pack running lights, low beams, turn signals, and side lights into one module—and yes, you can switch off part of the X.
Revived globally this fall (and badged Montero in the US, where it died in 2006), the retro off-roader teases a Multi Meter cluster with an altimeter plus pitch and roll gauges.
The average marketed price of a new car hit a record $51,974 by June 30—up 4.9% year over year—with compact sedans jumping the most at 12%, likely as buyers hunt cheaper models.
Forget four-wheel drive—senior editor Ezra Dyer argues the 4Runner's signature is its roll-down power rear window, a hard-to-engineer party trick Toyota deliberately preserved for the sixth generation.
Max Verstappen griped that F1's drivable-LEGO parade—28,000-brick karts with a 15.5-mph (25 km/h) top speed—makes drivers look like 'kids and clowns,' while Lando Norris says he's 'down to clown.'
This rare Dover White and Seminole Red Special was Buick's cheapest 1956 wagon at $2,775, packing a 322-cubic-inch V-8 good for 220 horsepower (164 kW)—one of just 13,770 built.
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