I’m John Davis – and this is MotorWeek!

This weeks episode has been a long time coming, and its pretty special for me, and any of us that live in DMV. I don’t remember a time when there wasn’t MotorWeek – its always existed. That said, I was very fortunate to meet John Davis when I was about 10 years old at a PCA Potomac Region monthly meeting in Tysons Corner, VA. He was the guest speaker that evening, with a Q&A session riddled with questions and spoilers about new models coming to market like the 968 and 993. Somehow, I was seated right next to him before he went to speak, he was so kind and encouraging, even signed an autograph (which I still have) that says “keep up the good work” – since I was there doing homework while he waited. It took nearly 30 years to reunite with John, and it came in the weirdest way… My neighbor stopped to talk to me one summer day and I remembered he used to work for MPT and we chatted about the passing of Pat Goss (also on MotorWeek); and I told him about meeting John, etc. He told me that he might be able to make something happen. Months went by and I thought nothing of it, until I got a text that read “Hey Eric, this is John Davis from MotorWeek, Fred says you’d like to interview me for your show” – I stared at that text for a loooooong while, not sure what to think or respond. Fast forward to today, and you get to experience what came next. I’m honored and flattered that John came on the show, he’s always been a hero to me, and if I can emulate even a fraction of what he’s done for our community in the last 42 years, I’m ok with that! Someone did leave us a review that I am very proud of and it said “you guys are great, a mix of NPR and MotorWeek” – and you know what, I’ll hang my hat on that! Thanks for being a constant inspiration John! ~ Crew Chief Eric. 

• Let’s talk about the origins of John Davis the petrol-head. Were any of your family members into cars? What attracted you to them? Was there a certain/specific make/model that got you excited about the automotive world? 
• You went to school to become a mechanical / aerospace engineer. What was your plan there? How did you end up in the automotive world? And more importantly transition to Broadcasting?
• Many people are familiar with the show, for some of us, it’s always “existed” there’s never been a time without MotorWeek – How/Why was MotorWeek born?
• For those that might be learning about MotorWeek for the first time, what is the shows format, segments, how are reviews conducted (the criteria).
• We all get things wrong, have there been any reviews that just didn’t go quite right? What are some of the memorable outtakes from MotorWeek? What are some of the “best of” memories from MotorWeek?
• You’ve worked in recent years with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to promote public awareness of alternative fuels. What are your thoughts on the EVolution as we call it here on the show?
• You’ve owned a variety of high performance cars, including several vintage Ford Mustangs, Chevrolet Corvettes and a DeTomaso Pantera. What’s in your garage these days? What does John Davis daily drive? Is there a bucket list vehicle (new or old) you’d still like to review for MotorWeek?

and much, much more!

[00:00:00] Hello and welcome to the Gran Touring Motor Sports Podcast Break Fix, where we’re always fixing the break into something motor sports.

Our guest tonight is a mechanical and aerospace engineering graduate, as well as an M B A from NC State and the University of North Carolina. He’s been on commercial radio and television programs nationwide for over four decades. He is a sought after speaker and frequently addresses automotive executives, consumer groups, automotive enthusiasts, and students interested in the field.

His weekly program offers him that rare chance to bring the enjoyment of a hobby to his professional life and to use his broadcasting, engineering, and analytical expertise to supply information and insight to those who enjoy cars. Tonight we are proud and honored to let our guests distinct voice, introduce himself to our audience and share his.

So without further delay. Hi, I’m John Davis and this is the Break Fix [00:01:00] podcast. Welcome, John. So like all good break fix stories, there’s always a who, what, where, why, and when. Some sort of superhero origin story. So tell us about your Petrolhead origin story. Were you from a family that was into cars? How were you attracted to them?

Were there certain makes and models that got you excited about the automotive world as a. Well, you’re talking a long time ago, uh, Eric, and basically, you know, a southern boy that grew up in the fifties and sixties. Basically, you grew up with gasoline in your vein and, and it had been pretty prevalent through my family, my father, his brothers.

They were all car fishing autos. I will say it was pretty much almost entirely a Ford family, which wasn’t unusual. We were there sort of the birth of nascar and we followed the people like Fred Lorenzen in the sixties during his NASCAR peak days. So yeah, it, it was kind of a natural, but I really went into school at NC State to become.

[00:02:00] An aerospace engineer, although about halfway through when I realized how expensive it was going to be to get a pilot’s license, cuz I really wanted one very badly, I even gravitated even more towards automobiles. I mean, I was driving my grandfather’s 1953 DeSoto with a, you know, three on the tree up and down his driveway.

Gosh, from the time probably I was 12 or 13 years old, just going forward and back and forward, and. So it wasn’t an unusual thing that cars became a fascination, but I did not expect to make my career in it, and I didn’t for a long time. I mean, after engineering school into the Vietnam War, there weren’t as many jobs for aerospace engineers.

Those that were there, they wanted you to go get a business degree. So I went ahead and got my m MBA before, and by that time I had set my sights on going to Wall Street, which I did move to New York for about a [00:03:00] year, but I had worked my way through college and radio and television just as a way to make some extra spending money.

Weekend disc jockey and then, uh, with a couple of the local TV stations, just, you know, weekend fill ins for the news desks and the sports desks and so forth. I, uh, ended up having an opportunity to go to, uh, Maryland, in Maryland, public television to work on the pioneering financial series Wall Street Week with Louis Ru Kaiser, which really started financial television as we know it today.

And I was the. Producer of that from 73 until it’s demise about 30 years on. But during that process, when I had become executive producer, I was charged by my boss at the time to basically do a couple of pilots to see whether or not I was a one trick pony or had some other, uh, talents. One of the pilots I did was motor week because being an automotive enthusiast, and by that time I had owned a de Tomaso Panera, number of [00:04:00] Mustangs and a Corvette.

I mean, I basically was putting my money where my enthusiasm was. We did the show in 78, a pilot. It sat on the shelf for three years. And then in 81 when we got a hint that another big public TV station was gonna do an automotive series and the idea for the series was it would be a national series from the get-go.

When we got that idea that they were gonna do something, uh, we jumped into action and finally got it on the air. So went on in the fall of 81 in October. Thought it would be fun to do for about five years. And here we are, uh, 42 years. So for many of our guests, they’re obviously familiar with the show.

It’s been on for 42 years. And if you’re not, if you’re not, you should be ashamed of yourself. If you call yourself a gearhead and you haven’t stumbled across us on YouTube or something, shame on you absolutely . And what’s beautiful is you guys have started to also bring back some of the old motor week tests, which are fantastic to watch online.

We do a lot of that. Bar, uh, retro reviews, and that’s all done by [00:05:00] an ex staff member who is not my son, even though he was often accused of it. Ben Davis, he, uh, basically does that after he’s moved away and couldn’t work for us full-time anymore. He works for us part-time and he puts together one of the retro reviews for our, uh, motor week listing on youtube.com/motor week.

Tries to do one a week, and then every time there’s a holiday. He’ll do, uh, a whole weekend in marathon where you can call in and sometimes I’m there. Sometimes some of the old staff like Lisa Barrow show up, so it, he’s turned the retro reviews into a real thing. Thank you, Ben. And you know what’s fun is you guys really set the bar, not just here in the United States.

Once those retro reviews came out, I started to see that in publications even overseas where they’re like, well, motor Week started doing that. We’ll, we’ll start doing that too. And some Italian magazines were doing it, bringing back old trials. That’s interesting. Eighties and nineties, and I thought that was really, really neat.

It’s interesting. I didn’t know that. Well, nobody has got our library. That’s, I mean, that’s true. It’s [00:06:00] just that simple. There really isn’t any other depository except maybe some commercials of video going back in our offices. We’ve actually got old tapes, cassettes, and, and we have still have some machines that will play them of manufacturers B rolls that go back about 30 years.

And I’m sure those manufacturers don’t even have that stuff in their archives. We actually recently had Dennis Gage on who has the second longest running automotive program in the United States, my classic car, and when he was here, we actually asked him about how he constructs his episodes and his are a little bit more freeform and things like that.

But I wonder after 42 years of doing motor week, how do you guys figure out? What are you’re gonna talk about next and what cars you’re gonna review next? How do you put all that together? If you’ve watched the show for any number of years, you know the format has basically remained unchanged. And indeed, it’s really similar to what we did with the first episode 42 years [00:07:00] ago.

The idea was it is a magazine. It is designed with short segments that can be taken. Others put in their place or you take them out to run commercials. Cuz our show is not only, its first run on public television station around the country, but we also basically run the show as a second run on cable systems.

Right now our partner is, uh, Mav tv, the Auto Sports Racing Network. We have to be able to leave them time to make their. With a magazine style show, you can pull out segments, leave time and not basically destroy the entire program, which is harder to do when it’s not formatted. We’re very highly formatted.

Our show came along about the same time as two other magazine style, and that’s really is the concept for Motor Week as an automotive magazine for tv. But you had a, a series on, um, commercial TV for many years called Evening Magazine. It was done by the Westinghouse stations. It sort of [00:08:00] pioneered the magazine style segment after segment for television.

And also back in those days, entertainment Tonight was fairly new, very new. And that was the, uh, format they used. So it has a lot of great possibilities. Now, the downside is you gotta know what you’re gonna put. and you’ve gotta do it to time. Time is what we live by as far as what we cover. It’s really simpler than you would think.

There are always new cars coming out and you’re basically trying to keep up with the newest stuff that’s there. Our idea was from the beginning, we wanna be as timely as the major print magazines back when they were keen. So if they would have something in their magazine on a, on a certain. Whatever the cover month was.

Well, during that month, we would try to have it on the air, and the idea was they couldn’t show as many pictures, so you got a lot of the technical data from them, and you got more of the pictures from us. [00:09:00] Now, today, of course, it’s much different. Everything’s up on the internet almost instantaneously. So now what we spend most of our time with is more in depth.

But we do think the one thing that sets us apart from so much of the video that’s out there today is we actually do test cars. We don’t just write about them. We just don’t just talk about ’em. We don’t just look at the press kit and kind of regurgitate it. We’re at the track every week with whatever we’ve got.

and we run through our regimented tests just like we have for, for decades. So when you hear what we’re doing, you know, it’s firsthand experience and we’ve got the miles to prove it. We are public television. We’re lucky enough to have that shine on us because they hold us to a, a very high standard and we’re very happy.

That they do and we think that makes us, uh, still very unique. It’s gotta be challenging, especially getting cars in to do the tests and things like that. And right now it is ordinarily we have two cars in a week for two [00:10:00] weeks that we test. And that’s a long time. Those car makers don’t want to give you a car for two weeks when you figure how much videotaping we have to do and we have to deal with weather.

That’s what it works out. Right now though, because of the shortage that everybody hears about the supply chain, there’s no cars on dealerships. Sometimes the cars show up for far less than that. We just have to work faster When a car comes in. If you watch the show, I’m usually standing up next to the vehicle to do my little introduction.

That’s usually a dealer car. Dealers don’t have cars, so right now, the moment that car comes in, I have to do whatever I need to do with the car while we’re testing it because that car will likely, we will not be able to get one back for a second taping. So the pandemic and the supply chain shortage has had a big impact on us as well.

So what would you say was probably one of the hardest cars to attain and bring in for a review? Oh, it’s always one of the exotics right now. Some of the newer manufacturers, you know, it’s tough to get a Tesla. It’s uh, [00:11:00] it’s tough to get El Lucid. We managed to do it. What we’ve always done with a lot of the exotics, and now we do it with some of the new brands, is if the manufacturers don’t have a car in our area and they’re small and they try as best they can, but it doesn’t always work out.

We’ll get an owner’s car. We have lots of owners that come to us and. You know, I noticed you haven’t done one or you haven’t done one in a while. I’ve got one. Would you like to do it a little more careful with their vehicle, shall we say? A lot more careful actually, to be honest. But we’ll still if they’ll let us take it to the track and do our evaluations.

But the newer brands, exotics, we’re very fortunate that Porsche works with us very, very well. Uh, Lamborghini does as well. Some of the other. Uh, a little harder to get to and, but if we can’t get it from a manufacturer, we’ll get it from an owner. And that’s kind of standard throughout the automotive media business.

Uh, many times in the, over the decades when you would see a, a car being tested an exotic by one of the big buff books, it, they’d often [00:12:00] tell you it was an owner’s car. So, It really hasn’t changed over the course of reviewing thousands of cars. There’s probably episodes that just didn’t go right. I personally remember as a kid, the Zuzu trooper slalom exercise and how that all went down and you know the reviews that came from that later real it, it’s true.

It happened. What are some of those memorable outtakes for Motor Week and what are some. Best of memories for you after the last four decades. Of course, you always remember the stuff that doesn’t quite work out right. I am thankful to say, knock on wood, we’ve had very few accidents over their years and no one has ever gotten seriously hurt, and I hope that continues.

Uh, I hope way beyond my tenure. You have to be careful. Cars are lethal if you pardon that, I hate to use that word, but there are big machines and they move fast and they weigh a lot and you can get into trouble if you’re not what you’re doing. Safety is something that we live by day after day. We did have one car, and I’m not gonna mention the name, but let me just say it was a large [00:13:00] European made top of the line.

and we were at our testing facility doing low speed slalom, which we only do at 35 miles per hour. And the bottom of the, uh, engine let go. Ooh. Coded the track with engine oil and the car ended up on a roof. Oh no. You think, you know, you could roll a car at 35 miles an hour? Yes, you can. You can actually roll a car at about 15 miles an.

and it turned out that we discovered that the engine had a fault. So after the automaker finished getting very upset with us, about two weeks later, they let us know that we had done them a favor. I had another situation where we had another European sedan. We were driving it to, uh, Robling Road in Savannah, Georgia, which is our winter testing ground.

And we had almost gotten to Fayetteville, North Carolina. It was a cold day, had stopped for gas, cranked it. The, uh, pulley on the front of the engine on the crank shaft exploded [00:14:00] and left us standing. And then once again, car maker, of course, was very upset. Car had to sit there for like two weeks because they had a freak snowstorm right after that.

But we had discovered a manufacturing fall. Every five years. When we do an anniversary, we show some outtakes. We used this one for a while, but we sort of stopped, but it was where we caught a vehicle. It was a compact S U v. Again, I’m not gonna say which brand. Then we rolled it at our test track. We discovered that the suspension had a harmonic, that if you got it going back and forth just properly, the car would literally jump off the.

Wow. And turn itself on its head. These are all old stories. I mean, these go back 25 years to 30 years. I’m happy to say the cars today are much, much better, and quality is so much better. We really don’t have these instances now. It tends to be something like the screen doesn’t work on the infotainment system or something electronic.

We don’t tend to have [00:15:00] mechanical issues because cars today are designed so. But over the years, you know, we’ve had our share of mishaps. They’re few and far between and I wanna keep it that way. Probably plenty of great memories to combat all of those, so that’s awesome. Oh yeah. I mean, you know, every day you’re driving somebody else’s pride and joy.

Some engineer has spent, you know, the better part of the last three or four years on it. I feel bad for them be in one aspect because you love it, you love it, but suppose you don’t like it. Cars are not all designed by one person, suppose. You get in a vehicle. I can remember back in the oh nineties when in dash stereo systems were starting to get really, really complicated.

Lots of small buttons, and we really would take some of the manufacturers to task. because the buttons are so small. You a regular hand, you, you couldn’t hit the button. You, you were ended up two and three buttons. You know, I used to think after we had scolded some brand on that poor engineer that was [00:16:00] designing that he probably was told to put all those controls on there.

Probably knew better. But that’s what you get and. We are enthusiast. When we point out something that we don’t like on a car, which people know is, is fairly rare, we’re pretty positive most of the time. We wanted the car to get better. That’s the whole bottom line. We’re trying to give them feedback that maybe they’ll take to heart.

Over the years though, there have been so many wonderful situations, so many accolades, so many anniversaries, so many great cars we’ve driven. So John, along with that line of thinking, what is one of the most memorable cars that you’ve reviewed in all these years on Motor Week? The answer is, and it’s an exotic, is the Enzo Ferrari.

Oh. And the reason is it was the first exotic. That I felt number one was designed for a six foot tall American first Italian. Anyway, it was super comfort. . It was the easiest car I had ever driven. Insanely [00:17:00] fast in and felt comfortable. And there was something about the way they designed from start to finish.

They wanted the most refined Ferrari they had ever developed in memory of Enzo, yet they wanted it to uphold all of his performance standards and they. and they did an incredible job. And that combination of all the parts working together perfectly and ending up with a vehicle that is just a joy to drive both at 30 miles an hour and 130 miles an hour is very, very rare.

And the only other vehicle that comes to mind that we walked away from feeling about the same. The bullet, not the first bullet. I believe it was bullet number three, Mustang bullet number three. That was. Just a perfect combination of parts engineering and build and was just an [00:18:00] amazing car. And those vehicles just don’t come along very often.

So I have to ask one of our famous pit stop questions cause I think a lot of our guests are gonna be interested to know. And like you said, you have a pretty sorted pass when it comes to your own personal cars, but you’ve. Thousands of cars over the last 42 years. If you had to pick from all those cars and all the ones you know about, what’s the most beautiful car of all time, that’s an easy one.

For anybody my age, there is only really one answer, and that’s a Jaguar x k e. There is no more beautiful automobile that has been designed in my lifetime in the X K E, so that’s easy. That’s an easy. Well, the hard one is then what about the ugliest car of all time or the worst car of all time? That’s not hard either.

that’s not harder. That’s not hard at all. It’s the Yugo. Oh, really? Well, you know, you’re the second person to say that now. That’s awesome. Oh, absolutely. I mean, we tested one. We drove one. We picked it [00:19:00] up by its bumper and carried it across the parking lot. And one of our ex writers, Martin Peters, he actually owned one.

No, he didn’t own that. He owned a turbo. Sorry, just as bad. Uh, he owned a turbot. Well, we knew quite a few people actually that owned, uh, Yugos at the time, which really ist very fair. I mean, it was a little fiat that basically it. Commandeered and built under license, and I have to say it’s probably not the absolute ugliest I could throw in a couple of.

Oh, I mean, a lot of people like to pick on the poor Aztec from Pontiac, but I think in my book, the Aztec, I guess, would be right up there with the, the Yugo there. There were a couple of, during the, uh, eighties and nineties that deserved all the scorn that you could reap upon them, but I, I’m sure I’ve now upset at least one or two of your listeners because if you know anybody that owns an Aztec, they love them.

That’s very true. That’s a very true statement. You said [00:20:00] the e type of all time, are there any future classics, any that you see coming on the horizon that really gets your interest? Well, we just finished testing the, uh, Audi e-Tron gt, which is based on the, uh, tycon from Porsche. It’s one of the most beautiful automobiles I’ve ever seen.

It is stunning. It is so gorgeous with so many SUVs on the. Finding a real beauty is getting harder and harder. The tycon, which is one of my personal favorites, and then seeing what Audi has done to, uh, the basic shape. I would say if I had to pick today the prettiest car, certainly that’s come through our lot in the last two years.

It would probably be that Tron gt gorgeous. . So I have another question about the construction of Motor Week, and it’s pretty important, yeah, for those people that, again, I’m questioning where they’ve never heard of Motor week before, but I often when I say, oh, did you catch Motor Week? And they go, auto week?

No Motor Week, you know the show? You mean Autoweek, the Peterson Mag? No, no, no, [00:21:00] no. It’s like the old, old, old top gear. And they go, oh, so where did the name come from, and how did you kind of decouple the confusion between Autoweek, which has been around forever as a publication, and the show itself? We never really get confused with Autoweek.

The obvious confusion comes with Motor Trend, which for several years we were actually on the Motor Trend cable network. Basically what happened was back in 1978 when we were doing the pilot, I did a name search, and in those days you had to basically go down to Washington, start looking around, talk to lawyers that had access to all of the, uh, copyrighted names.

So we couldn’t copyright a name, but you could copyright a logo. We came up with Motor Week oddly. We came up with it at the same time somebody else did. So when we went on the air in October of 81, in January of 81, I got a call from some folks at Turner Television in Atlanta, and they were launching [00:22:00] a show called Motor Week, and they wanted to know who we were.

By that time, we had already done whatever preliminary registration of the name you needed. They had done the search at the same time we did, they added the name illustrated, so they were Motoric Illustrated. Their logo was very different and, and that’s all you can really copyright at that stage is the look of the logo.

So we coexisted for a long time they were on the air, then they were off, and then they were a production company for quite a while. I think I had gone in with a long list of names and it was the best one that came out that it was available. So it wasn’t magic at all. Motor pretty obviously, I will say the week was.

Because I had been producing Wall Street Week for so many years, and I wanted the show to be a weekly. I didn’t want it to be a limited run series. I wanted it to be on week after week after week, year round, because I wanted stations to leave us in a time spot. And if you’re on for [00:23:00] 13 episodes or 26 back in those days, and you finish running new shows or going to reruns stations would tend to move you to a.

Great time spot. I wanted us to be new every week and basically hold on to our time spots and that has worked. Growing up in the D M V, it’s always just been one of these things when you watch Motor Week, especially as a kid, you realize the testing was always done at 75 and 80 drag strip. Right, which has been closed now for many, many years.

A reopened. It closed again. Well officially that’s true. The track did close. as far as to be open. This is a drag strip that, for those that don’t know, near Mount Air Maryland in a little community called Monrovia, and it was owned for, um, many years by Bill Wilcom. Bill was, uh, a dear, is a dear friend, I should say, as I believe his son didn’t want to take the track over.

So as Bill got older, he first farmed out the operation to someone else. It was briefly closed [00:24:00] to the public that it opened again during all of this time, though we continued to use it as a test track, so legally it was not closed. It did not close for absolute good until. Two years ago, and even then the new owners, cuz it was finally sold, have shown interest in reopening it.

They haven’t managed to do it yet, but at that point we were fortunate enough, bill had introduced us to the folks behind Mason Dixon Dragway in Boonsboro, Maryland. It’s a very nice track, a beautiful setting. It’s up in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountain, so it’s a, a good, another 45 minutes for us, but it’s a beautiful.

And we’ve been very fortunate to go from 75 80 up to, uh, Mason Dixon. But yeah, for 75, 80, we started using them in the eighties and, uh, stopped what, two years ago. So, but more importantly, for many of us here, we pilgrimage every weekend after weekend after weekend to Summit Point. [00:25:00] Motorsports Park. Yes.

We’re, we’re motor Week also tests, so that’s always. An exciting thing to see. Oh, there, you know, that’s term 10 at Summit. It’s always super exciting when you guys are there. Yeah. Again, uh, personal relationship. The longtime owner of Summit was a dear friend. We had a little bit to do when they built the Jefferson circuit, which really is used I think, a lot by motorcycles, but we tend to use it a lot because it’s a short fast and it’s easy to shoot.

But we’ve been able to continue to. Summit and we also use Dominion Raceway down in Fredericksburg. That’s been relatively new. We don’t tend to go back to, uh, Pocono much anymore. We used to do that quite frequently as well. We’re lucky enough that summit is, you know, within the easy drive as is, uh, Mason Dixon and Dominion.

So we’re very, very fortunate. They’re not right next door, but they’re not that far. Very nice people. I mean, the owners of these tracks are just really great people. That’s all I can say. So switching gears a little bit, many people may not know that you’ve [00:26:00] worked alongside the Department of Energy to promote public awareness of alternative fuels.

Correct. So, I wanted to ask you another one of our pit stop questions, which is, what are your thoughts on the current, what we. Evolution and the birth of these EVs and the change from internal combustion to these electric vehicles. What are your thoughts and are there some that stand out at you right now as some up and comers?

I’ve got gasoline in my veins, and I wouldn’t say I’m a contrarian. I’m a realist. I think that the governments are pushing a little too hard for EVs and everybody’s garage, uh, too quickly. But that is, Governments and politicians tend to do. We’ve been lucky enough to be intimately involved in the entire alternative fuel, uh, world, actually since the show began.

But for the last 20 years, working with the US Department of Energy, uh, looking at alternative fuels and not just electric, but uh, natural gas and propane and biodiesel, and, [00:27:00] uh, you name it, we’ve probably done something about it because, We found it really goes back to 2001. I was at a conference with the, uh, department of Energy folks and they had asked me to come give a little chat about what we do, and I realized that it would be great to find some kind of, Soapbox purpose, something we could focus a lot of the energy on the show on that wasn’t already mundane.

I mean, everybody and their brother talked about safety and even fuel economy was just everywhere. So it struck me after listening to a number of these speakers, All of these amazing fuels, and we had done shows on coal powered car that GM came up with back in the eighties. I mean, we’d done electric conversions, we’d done all sorts of stuff, turbine cars, we’d done it all, but we hadn’t really looked beyond the surface, beyond the vehicle.

After talking to these folks that ate, slept, and drank alternative fuels, we realized there was a great story there and a lot of success [00:28:00] stories that our audience would like to know. And so I’m very thrilled that we’ve been able to work with them so closely over two decades. They’re great folks. They have lots of wonderful ideas.

Most people don’t realize that an awful lot of the technology that’s going into battery electric vehicles and just. To about everything you can think of the lightweight materials, that all comes from laboratories that are run by the Department of Energy. So in other words, it’s your tax dollars at work and just like NASA and its forerunners, create things to make air travel better, and then airframe manufacturers and airlines get to, they use it for free.

It’s the same really with the DOE labs. So when you get into that battery electric, There’s probably some of your hard-earned tax dollars. Help get it to where it is today. Getting back to what you ask, I think the push towards going all electric, even by some of the brand manufacturers, like General Motors by [00:29:00] 2035, I think it’s a little fast.

I think it’s gonna happen. Everybody knows the major problems for public acceptance or range and infrastructure, charging infrastructure. The range is continuing to climb. I mean, we are very fickle in our business. First it was, well, when they get to 200 miles of range, will think that’s maybe enough and then it was 300.

Now I think most of us are holding out. For 500 and it’s coming. I mean, the new Silverado is probably gonna have 500 mile range, uh, or 400 anyway to start the, uh, lucid got 500. Of course it’s pricey, but my point is, when you get to the point where these vehicles can be used, on fairly long trips where people can view them as if not their only car, A car.

They don’t have to worry about getting where they want to go. If they have an emergency without stopping for 30 or 40 or 50 minutes, then we’re there. Where are we now today? Where’re at the level where many of these [00:30:00] vehicles. Are terrific for the second car or a commuter car. We’re seeing the prices come down.

GM’s Chevrolet’s, new Equinox. EV $30,000 with a 250 mile range should be very, very successful and not only looks great, it’s gonna do what people need to run it to work. Charge it once a week, either at work or at their home with a, a relatively slow charger, a two 40, you know, like a dryer, circuit charger.

But to take it on the road, you know you’re gonna need more fast chargers. Either if you’ve got a Tesla, you’re ahead of the game because they’ve got their chargers and more places right now. But brings me home and why this is not ready for prime time is two weeks ago. On my way to Vermont, we always stop in Rutland, Vermont and gas up and, and we pulled into a station and here’s a row of Tesla chargers and I’m there and gone in about seven minutes.

And the three or four Teslas that were there, they were there when I got there. People reading [00:31:00] magazines and newspapers and their tablets. And they were there a long time after I left. And I don’t think most Americans. Are willing to take two hours out of their day if they’re making a long trip for this.

The other thing is while the Tesla’s, their charging system is well done, they plug in it, knows the car, it charges it, you’re gone. The commercial system’s out there right now, they’re not quite plug and play yet. It can take you 15 minutes to get them to work. If you’re unlucky, you may have to call their 800 number.

It can be enormously frustrat. , when they work, they work great. When they don’t work, they’re frustrating. And you roll up and there’s four of ’em, and three of ’em are occupied and one’s vacant, but that one doesn’t work. There has to be. Some maturity along with just not only more infrastructure, but it has to work better.

It’s coming. It is the future. I hope it doesn’t displace all internal combustion engine [00:32:00] vehicles anytime soon, 2050. I think that’s a very realistic timeframe to where they could become total, shall we say. 2035 is pushing it in my opinion. I, I’m being honest with you, I really don’t like politicians telling people what they can and cannot buy when it comes to automobiles.

It’s never worked back in the seventies and eighties when they tried to make everybody buy small cars. What did everybody do? They discovered the loophole and they went into SUVs and pickup trucks. There you go. Okay. And so, I, I sort of feel like I’ve lived through this kind of forcing you to do things against your will and I, I don’t think it’s gonna work this time any better than it worked last.

Who knows, California certainly is at the forefront and as are the other states, uh, including the state of Maryland who are likely to follow. But even there, there’s a loophole. They, they’re still gonna allow some plug-in hybrids, which have an internal combustion engine. So I think plug-in hybrids have been largely overlooked because to me that’s the best of both worlds.

A [00:33:00] Chevrolet Volt, v o l t, that was a fabulous vehicle. 65 miles of battery and enough gas. To get you anywhere you needed to go in an emergency and keep going, that’s a great solution. My ideal electric vehicle is a plug-in hybrid with a about a hundred mile range on the battery and a small engine that will either charge the battery or give me direct power and let me do my 500 mile trip right now.

The Europeans seem to be a little more interested in that than the American manufacturers, but I actually think that’s the perfect solution, the other perfect solution. Lawmakers would set back and just look at facts. If you wanna demand something, demand manufacturers make all their vehicles just regular hybrids.

Small battery doesn’t have to be a big electric motor. Gives you help when you start out, when you use the most gas. That would cut the carbon footprint of automobiles in half, almost overnight. And a couple of manufacturers, [00:34:00] notably Toyota, they’re working towards that. Almost everything new they bring.

The standard vehicle is either hybrid or it’s just barely one up from the bottom. So standard hybrid today is possible and would really alleviate the carbon footprint more than some pie in the sky that’s gonna inconvenience people. because most people with hybrids don’t even know what they’re driving except for the fact that they get great gas mileage In the D M V especially, we talk all the time about how speeds are up.

Driving seems to be extremely erratic, especially after Covid and I came to find out that you’re actually the spokesperson for the Smooth Operator program, which a lot of us see on the digital billboards, like on 6 95 and places like that. That was a long time. That was years ago. They were nice enough to ask me to contribute to that campaign.

But so that’s that. That is in my pa. I mean, I haven’t done anything with them for years, but I’m delighted that somebody still sees it. They still pop up. I see ’em as I’m going [00:35:00] down the road. Funny, I’m putting these two together, but do you think it’s changed? Do you think it’s still the same? What are your thoughts on the way people are driving in the big cities now?

I think people are driving like crazy people. Covid has done more damage to highway safety. Than speed, I think ever did because unfortunately when people weren’t going to work and are still not going to work, the people that were out on the roads, they just felt like, Hey, there’s no traffic. I can go as fast as I want.

A lot of the law enforcement were staying home because of Covid. What little decorum there used to be on the roads around, you know, the Maryland, Washington, Delaware area, I think’s pretty much gone out the window. I mean, you have to drive offensively much more now than you did, I think even three years ago.

I’m not trying to pretend that, you know, I don’t take liberties with the speed limits too, but what see on the roads these days is a total disregard. For safety and for your [00:36:00] fellow man. And I find it’s really sad. Covid has done that in a number of ways, but one of ’em that’s most recognizable is, uh, driving.

We often bring that back to a conversation around motorsports too, because people will poo poo on the racers quite often and say, you guys don’t know what you’re talking about. You know, you’re addicted to speed and this and that. And if you talk to most racers, they’re. We’re some of the calmest people on the road.

We have very high situational awareness, but I think the track kind of gets it out of your system, and oftentimes I recommend to people, you should go take an advanced driver course and see what it’s like, because I hate to say anybody can go. Fast and a straight line, but it’s really different when you’re taking a turn at 80 miles an hour on a racetrack like you guys do when you’re testing cars versus what you do on the street.

So I can’t recommend it enough for people, you know, spend the couple hundred bucks for that advanced training and you will learn so much and you’re driving will change. To be honest, they don’t even have basic training. I don’t think you ought to start with advanced [00:37:00] training . You know, if I had children, I.

The first thing I would do when they became legal so they could drive, would take them to Kip Barber has it. There’s the summit point, does it all the time. They’re basically skid breaking skid schools. Uh, yeah. Tire rack, street survival. Street survival. Learn how to break and steer, learn how to steer.

Bertel Russ who, um, is gone now. There’s still a school up in Pocono with his name Bertel Taught, and he was the most important instructor that I ever learned from. He called it ocular driving. And what he had done is he had brought over from Europe the concept that you basically had to use your eyes, look as far into a corner as you could look, look as far down the road as you.

Trying to anticipate what was going to happen. And I have stuck to that to this day that when iwhenever, I’m driving either on a racetrack or just on a, an interstate to [00:38:00] try and look as far as my eyes can see, anticipating either what the net vehicle’s going to do or if there’s a crossroads. What am I gonna do if somebody’s coming?

and the other part of ocular driving that he taught, and it may sound stupid, but it’s, it’s not intuitive. Look where you want to go in an emergency. Chances are you will get there. If you look where you don’t want to go, you’re gonna get there too, . So you have to train yourself that if somebody’s coming at you.

Find the escape route and do everything you can to get to that is stay focused on that and chances are very good that will get you out of the fix. We do drive very fast on a track, and yes, we do get that probably out of our systems, but. Safety is not just paramount. It’s the only thing we are concerned about.

We preach to our drivers. Never drive over your head, never do something you feel unsafe. If the car is not responding to you properly and you [00:39:00] don’t feel that it can be pushed any harder, don’t push. Because if you push the car beyond your limits, You’re in trouble. And unfortunately when I see, oh, an older sedan flying around the Baltimore Beltway at 80, 85, 90 miles an hour, I’m wondering what kind of tires does he have on it?

Or he or she, uh, has it been maintained properly? It wouldn’t take very much for that car to end up on a roof. Worse, and that’s what we see a lot of people driving like video games. That’s the thing that gets me. And I actually think video games maybe have done more damage to driving habits than any kind of racing or competition.

But yeah, if you’ve ever driven with a professional driver, and I’ve driven with a lot of them, they’re the coolest people on the planet. You may be frightened to. , but they’re cool as a cucumber. They do it every day. It’s their job. Let’s take a step back for a moment. So when I first met you, [00:40:00] you and I were both much younger and I remember the day like it was yesterday.

I’m flattered. Thanks. It was a Porsche Club event you were getting. Uh, you were giving a talk and all this kind of thing, and I’ll never forget because it was one of the most exciting and also traumatic experiences for me, cuz you were taking questions from the crowd. And this is at a P c A event where all they want to talk about is the latest nine 11 that’s coming out and the 9 68 and all these kinds of things.

And here I go, I raise my hand and I go, you know, Mr. Davis. Can you tell me something about the Dodge stealth and maybe this new Acura that’s coming out and you just heard the air get sucked completely outta the room as all the heads turned and looked at me and you’re like, I must have blasphemed in church or something.

Right. To come back from that, I want to ask. You about two cars that are hot right now from the same manufacturer and get your opinions on those. And they are not the Dodge Steal, thank goodness, and not Acura vigor. They are both from Toyota, the new GR Supra, and the GR Corolla that is hitting our shores here [00:41:00] in October.

I wanna get your thoughts on those cars, as you’ve probably seen, tested and reviewed both of them. Well, we loved the sro. The only reason it didn’t get more awards when he came out is it had some real competition, but it’s a fabulous. The rebirth of the Supra was far and away more than the original car ever could deliver the GR Corolla, I think I applaud them because here you’ve got a company that on one hand is doing everything they can to, uh, promote, uh, fuel economy making hybrid standard almost across the board.

That’s their aim. And at the same time, they haven’t forgotten that some people really want to enjoy driving even down to their most mundane product line. I think Toyota. Fascinating company. A lot of it comes from, of course, their roots, but a lot of it is their US management team, which most people don’t realize.

When Toyota was pretty young in this country, most of their management team were ex folks from Detroit automakers, and they’ve, over the years, shepherd dual paths of performance, but [00:42:00] also common sense when it comes to, uh, Fuel and how it impacts the environment. So I think they’re both very exciting vehicles.

Toyota is unusual. They’ve got a lot of money so they can afford to kind of cover all the bases, but super is one of our absolute favorite cars of all time. The new super gazo racing, however you wanna pronounce it. They’ve got some very talented engineers. It reminds me not too many, uh, years ago when you used to see that kind of skunk works inside some of the, uh, Detroit, uh, automakers as well, even coming from brands like Volkswagen and others where they were always throwing something out there to get the enthusiast based excited.

So it’s good to see that that’s a great case in point. Vw. Vw, how many times over the years have we said on motor? I’m testing some lowly. Product or Jetta or whatever, how they’ve instilled all the essence of some of the finest and most expensive European sports sedans [00:43:00] in a vehicle that everybody can buy.

After all, VW was the every man’s car, and they continue to do it. I mean, Volkswagen’s one brand that no matter what vehicle you buy, you’re going to buy a vehicle that it has above average performance, ie. Handling, braking, and reasonable acceleration. It’s part of their d n. I’m not sure there’s any other automaker that I could say that about that makes affordable cars.

I mean, their good solid street performance is their D N A, no matter what they do. So there’s one more car I wanna ask you about, cuz I talked about it a lot. I was super excited about it and everybody’s gonna cringe and go, oh, he is gonna ask about the new DeLorean Alpha five. No, no, no, no, no. I wanted a DeLorean really badly until I drove one.

I have to tell you, an acquaintance of mine who had been a writer was their PR person. And I followed John DeLorean, followed him in General Motors. I followed him in this new project, and when the D M C came out, we really wanted to get our hands on it. I [00:44:00] wanted to buy one. They wouldn’t send them to the press, and finally got one.

And when we got one, we realized why they didn’t send them to the press. They were probably one of the worst handling automobiles ever built. It came with super wide rear tires, which told you something. It was never meant for that puja, Reno, V6 that was in it. The engine was too heavy. It was a worst pendulum card than the early nine 11 s.

As far as if you got in an off camera corner, you basically. To go into a, a slide. I cried. It was so terrible. Taking a quarter, 30 miles an hour, that was an off camera return was scary. So the new car looks very promising. We followed a lot. The company behind it, we followed those folks and the, uh, folks that kept D M C alive for many, many years.

We went down to Texas and did some stuff when they were custom building from parts left over. I wish ’em well. It’s a very exciting looking vehicle. Now it’s yours again. Ask me the question. I’m so sorry I interrupted. The [00:45:00] Nissan Z, the new 400, what do you think? Haven’t driven it yet. Has anybody driven it yet?

Uh, not to my know of, but we’ve been to two events. At least two events. One of our folks have been, and maybe three. You know, it’s one of those cars that it seems like it’s never gonna finally get here, but it’s very exciting. I think it’s gonna give the super run for, its. I think that Nissan’s very serious about it being a new Halo car forum.

We may be looking at one of the last new sports cars, period that’s not run with battery electric. So I’m very excited about it. I love Z and always have. Well, that’s a great segue because you have owned a variety of high performance cars over the years, and you mentioned a few Mustangs, Corvette’s, detto, Maso, Panera, a couple.

What’s in your garage these days? What do you daily drive? Nothing exciting. Nothing exciting. There’s only two cars that I’ve ever hated that I fell in love with when I. [00:46:00] One was the Mustang Machi. Really, I hated the concept. I thought it was heresy what Ford was doing with the Mustang name until we drove it.

When we drove it. I thought Ford had done an amazing job, cuz I’m an old Mustang guy. I’ve owned more Mustangs than anything else. Old ones. I thought Ford had done a remarkable job of instilling Mustang d n a in it, almost bought one, but wasn’t quite happy with the range for the kind of driving I wanted it for, but was very.

The other car though I did buy back in 2001, we knew it had been coming the B M BMW Rebirth of the Mini Cooper. I spent a lot of time in England and in Europe riding around in the original Mini East. I thought this new car was. A terrible idea. It was too big, it was too modern, just not original until Ray Kawata, my videographer and I went to, uh, San Francisco for the introduction of the mini.

We got in the car. We spent all day [00:47:00] driving in around the wine country on a lot of the, some very great roads. Fell in love with it. I said, this is not a commuter car. This is a two box sports car. That Model 50 was the best handling front wheel drive vehicle that we had ever driven, with the exception of maybe a couple of of early sobs.

I came home, I called up the PR guy. The next morning. I put in my. , I’ve still got that car today. Wow. It has all of 31,000 miles on it, and my wife drives it as her daily driver. Six months a year during the winter. It stays in a nice, warm, heated garage. I have a very eclectic. Not particularly interesting fleet.

We have an old Ford Ranger pickup truck. You know, one that was a, the real ranger, not the new truck. We’ve got, uh, a 2012 Subaru Outback. Got a 2014 Mercedes S L K because we missed our Miata and wanted a little Roadster back again. And we’ve got a 2020 Hyundai policy. I drive so many interesting cars at.[00:48:00]

That I really don’t need a garage full of really high performance or even classics, nor do I have the wherewithal to do it. I mean, we’re our public television, by the way, Zoe. We’re not commercial tv. No big bucks there, but that’s my garage. It’s not very interesting. I’m afraid the mini is this car that just today I put some charge on the battery and it was just so much fun just to go out and drive it for about an hour and just remember what a great little handling car.

I’m sure people wanna know what color is it? Blue and white? Of course. So did you defer your thoughts against the Mini to the Beatle and the Fiat 500 instead? So , I love the Fiat 500 I, you know, especially the Abar. That was more fun than a barrel of monkeys, too. Great little car. The Beatle, not so much.

The Beatle with the, I spent a long time crunched up in the back seat of a Beatle, uh, going up and down the East Coast when I was in college. I have nothing but admiration for the Beatle. The only thing about the Beatle I never liked was back [00:49:00] in the seventies when they tried to put a, an automatic transmission in it.

That didn’t work very well. And I had a friend that had one that was nothing but trouble. But you know, the Beatle, that basic chassis is, uh, has got a lot of performance in it. But I don’t have a problem with the Beatle. I think the, the Beatle served its purpose for a long time. And it’ll be back, I’m sure somewhere in VW they’ve got an all electric beetle.

If they brought the bus back, they’re gonna bring the beetle back. Amen. And hopefully the Carmen Gia too. So we’ll just leave it at that there. There would be a treat. There would be a treat. So is there still a bucket list vehicle, new or old that you’d like to review for motor week? Oh, I’d love to have my old Pantera back do a retro review.

I recently did a podcast for one of the Pantera groups, and uh, they asked me if I still had the VIN number. They could find the car for me, but I don’t have the VIN number anymore, which is too bad. But I laid under it every weekend to work on it to keep it running. But I did love the car. It’s a very good question.

Do I have a bucket list of cars [00:50:00] right now? It’s odd. I like what’s new. I’m not a classic car guy. I don’t know a lot about classic cars. I know what I like. If I have a bucket list, it’s gonna be for something new. I, I definitely want an ev. and I’m probably gonna buy an EV as a commuter car. I’m looking at the second generation, no surprise, mini Cooper se when it comes out next year, it’s rumor to have where the current one’s a little over a hundred mile range.

It’s gonna have 200, 2 50. So the rumors go, you know, that would be a great commuter car because right side, I’m sure it’ll still have all the things that many is noted for as far as its handling capabilities and use of. I think that’s an interesting vehicle. I mentioned the Ty. I think that’s just one of the most fabulous automobiles that’s ever been devised by any group of engineers.

And Audi with the e-tron GTS just made it better. It’s a a pretty amazing car, you know, when you start looking at the stratosphere, you know, like the new Ferrari [00:51:00] s u v and stuff with a v12, you know, I don’t know. I do think that if I was gonna go out today and buy something, I’d probably at least try and buy something with a V8 because there’s not gonna be around much many of those around much longer.

And I think anybody that’s got one of the last V8 s is probably gonna have something that’s at least semi collectible, even if it’s a pickup truck. There’s that new Mustang dark horse coming. You know, they might have John Davis written all over it. Uh, you never know, you know, if this is indeed gonna be the seventh generation, which they just showed in Detroit the 14th of September, they unveiled the new, um, seventh generation Mustang, interesting looking car.

I’m not, say, I’m not sure. I’m absolutely in love. But it is clearly a Mustang and you know it’s still gonna have a V8 for a while. Could very well be end up one of those parked in my garage right next to the Machi. Who knows. John, as we wrap up here, any shout outs, promotions, or anything else you’d like to share that we didn’t cover?

Anything about the future of Motor Week that you’d like to [00:52:00] share? Time marches on time is important to us on the show and it’s important to everybody and hopefully even though. Television has changed a great deal, and a lot of people now don’t think they watch tv, but that’s what you’re watching on your tablets, whether you want to acknowledge it or not.

20 years ago, we were worried that there weren’t going to be enough automotive enthusiasts to keep automotive journalism alive. Fortunately, we were wrong. , all you have to do is go to YouTube and see that just about anybody with a camera has opinions on vehicles. I cringe when I hear some of them actually get some kind of remuneration for it, but there’s also a lot of great people out there giving very good, honest advice.

The idea of unbiased reviews for the second biggest purchase in most people’s lives is alive and well. I’d like to think that being the first non-conventional media being television that covered cars, we had something to do with that heritage. I think it’s gonna continue and [00:53:00] grow stronger. So I’m very hopeful for the future.

You know, more opinions is, , fewer opinions is bad. I’ll give the same advice I’ve always given. If you’re going out and buying a vehicle, look at everything you can about that vehicle. Don’t trust one, two, or even a half dozen reviews. Keep going until you think you’ve really gotten every side of it, and then go judge yourself and that will tell you.

Who’s giving you, uh, the straight poop and who isn’t. But I think that we’re lucky that we live in an age where so much information is available so easily, including everything from Motor Week. For all you folks out there that still haven’t watched us, youtube.com/motor Week, or your public television station, or Mav tv.

There’s no excuse. I do want to say one more thing before I wrap up my part, Eric, and that is I want to thank the tireless team at Motor Week who really works seven days a week, 24 hours a day to bring this 52 week a year series into [00:54:00] everybody’s home. And I also wanna thank all the folks that go back all the way to almost the beginning of Maryland public television because they’ve allowed us to produce motor.

We, it’s been, uh, the love of my life. So thanks everybody for making all of this. As Motor Week’s host for the show now celebrating its 42nd season, John Davis has the opportunity to put all of the new car models through extensive road tests and to judge their practicality for buyers. He also acts as final editor on all the new car road test segments and writes many of the test opinions as well as other portions of the program.

Motor Week is the staple in the automotive journalism world, and countless of us will continue to enjoy the program for many years to. As Emmy award-winning producer, host, and creator of Motor Week Television’s original and longest-running automotive series, John Davis can be seen and heard throughout the United States on PBS broadcast and MAV TV cable networks.

To learn more about John Davis, log on to [00:55:00] www.motorweek.org g or follow them on social at motor Week. And don’t forget about those Motor Week retro review. On YouTube. And with that, John, I cannot thank you enough for coming on Break Fix, sharing your story with us and for me personally, you are an inspiration.

Like I said, there has not been a time where motor week has not existed for many of us. I hate to say imitation is the most sincere form of flattery and Absolutely, and we try week after week to emulate some of the things you’ve done with Motor Week. Whether you realize it or not, you’re one of the heroes of the automotive world.

That’s high praise. Well, you’re welcome. I hope it was lost string of consciousness in the air. Absolutely. It’s good seeing you again, John, and let me know when you get that Z 400. We wanna come see it. Well, thanks Eric. It was a pleasure. Anytime. Just give us a call. All right. Bye now. Bye-bye.[00:56:00]

If you like what you’ve heard and want to learn more about gtm, be sure to check us out on www.gt motorsports.org. You can also find us on Instagram at Grand Tour Motorsports. Also, if you want to get involved or have suggestions for future shows. You can call or text us at (202) 630-1770 or send us an email at crew chief gt motorsports.org.

We’d love to hear from you. Hey everybody, crew Chief Eric here. We really hope you enjoyed this episode of Break Fix, and we wanted to remind you that GTM remains a no annual fees organization, and our goal is to continue to bring you quality episodes like this one at no charge. As a loyal listener, please consider subscribing to our Patreon for bonus and behind the scenes content, extra goodies and GTM swag.

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