“Do you want to get in and out of your car easily and do you want to be able to back out of a tight parking spot?” Ford Mustang buyer and former Chevrolet Camaro shopper John Oglesby wrote to Car And Driver for its September 2016 issue. “If so, you need the Mustang.”

John Oglesby is truly representative of the market as a whole. After holding its position as the top dog in the segment for five years, the Chevrolet Camaro predictably lost its title to the Ford Mustang in 2015, the year of an all-new Mustang; the last year for the now-departed fifth-generation Chevrolet Camaro.

2016 hosted the launch of an all-new Chevrolet Camaro, but a return to sales leadership wasn’t in the cards. Not at any point since the nameplate’s 2009 return has the Camaro sold so poorly. Year-over-year, U.S. Camaro volume is down 15 percent compared with 2015, the Camaro’s previous worst year since returning. Read More >

If you go through Volkswagen’s historical model catalogue, you’ll notice many occurrences of the exact same model sporting unique names in the U.S. and Canadian markets.

For example, Volkswagen marketed the last-generation Jetta Wagon in the United States as the Golf Wagon in Canada beginning in 2010. Roll ahead to present day, Volkswagen has called its Golf SportWagen (U.S.) the Golf Sportwagon in Canada since 2015.

Thankfully, that’s about to change.

According to Volkswagen Canada representative Thomas Tetzlaff, the Canadian outpost will drop the Sportwagon name in favor of the name used in the United States — SportWagen.

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Updated with details on all-wheel drive being standard equipment for Alltrack.

Volkswagen of America needs a winner as it reels from the ongoing diesel emissions scandal, and its forthcoming Alltrack — a jacked-up, all-wheel-drive version of the SportWagen — is hopefully just the ticket.

As Volkswagen prepares to launch the new model on American shores, it’s all hands on deck for the German automaker as it sends representatives from its internal training department to every single dealership in the United States.

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Click “pause” on that Model S vs. supercar/fighter jet video, Tesla aficionados.

The newest Model S P90D will outrun last year’s top-shelf Tesla while in Ludicrous mode, according to acceleration tests published by Drag Times. Read More >

With front-wheel drive, a 2.0-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine, and a seven-speed dual-clutch transmission, the all-new 2017 Audi A4 Ultra’s EPA highway fuel economy figure is 37 miles per gallon.

Audi says, “No other luxury sedan in its competitive segment offers higher EPA-estimated city or highway mileage” than the new fuel-sipping A4, which the Environmental Protection Agency rates at 27 mpg in the city and 31 mpg combined.

The EPA scores the rear-wheel-drive BMW at 32 mpg city and 42 highway and the 330e at a combined 72 mpge equivalent. Audi presumably excluded these non-entry-level, uniquely powered models from the “competitive segment” definition. Read More >

Mercedes-Benz Canada’s surprise reveal of a diesel-powered C-Class Wagon at January’s Montreal International Auto Show has not been followed by the car’s arrival in Mercedes-Benz showrooms. Nor is it about to be.

Only yesterday we listed the C-Class Wagon, intended to go on sale in Canada as the C300d 4Matic, as one of eight cars Canadians have access to that Americans don’t. Recognizing that the 2017 C-Class Wagon wasn’t yet featured on the company’s Canadian website, our curiosity was further piqued by TTAC reader bortlicenseplate, who suggested that, “the C-Class Wagon is no longer Canada-bound.”

bortlicenseplate is mostly right. Mercedes-Benz Canada still intends to import the C300d 4Matic Wagon, but Mercedes-Benz Canada spokesperson JoAnne Caza told TTAC yesterday, “We’re still waiting for certification.” Read More >

Cadillac will introduce a new design concept this coming Thursday during California’s Monterey Car Week.

At 10:45 p.m. EST on Thursday, August 18, Cadillac will debut a car the company says, “will feature an array of curved OLED screens, co-developed with LG Electronics.”

Cadillac has stayed relatively true to the edgy themes of 1999’s Evoq Concept for nearly two decades. But that theme, Paul Snyder, chair of the Transportation Design Department at Detroit’s College for Creative Studies, told Automotive News last January, has softened. “It’s gotten more artistic and less scientific,” Snyder says.

Could the curved OLED screens Cadillac describes in the company’s 65-word press release portend a new design direction for Cadillac? There’s no time like the present. Read More >

Nissan’s second-generation Titan arrives in crew cab, V8 form with a U.S. base price of $35,975, including $1,195 for destination and handling.

A terribly long run for Nissan’s first full-size pickup truck effort resulted in only 471,242 U.S. sales between 2002 and 2015, roughly the total number of Ford F-Series pickups sold every seven months. Nissan has forged a unique strategy for the Titan’s relaunch, with the heavier-duty — though not quite Heavy Duty — Titan XD already on the market with a 310-horsepower Cummins 5.0-liter V8 diesel powerplant.

Now the regular-duty 2017 Nissan Titan is arriving in concert with an upgraded full-size pickup truck warranty that matches Nissan’s commercial van coverage: bumper-to-bumper, five years/100,000 miles.  Read More >

American Honda has wisely revealed studio images and announced a level of detail regarding its 2017 Honda Civic Hatchback. After pictures (from an unfortunate angle) of the new car’s early shipment filtered to America last week, the tenth-generation’s third body style looks significantly better in Honda’s official shots.

Honda’s 1.5-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine will power all U.S.-bound Civic Hatchbacks across LX, Sport, EX, EX-L, and Sport Touring trims. The LX, Sport, and EX will be available with a six-speed manual transmission. Until now, the 1.5T upgrade in the tenth-gen Civic was linked exclusively to a continuously variable transmission. Read More >

With your left hand’s thumb, scroll through the steering wheel-mounted controls and select Settings. Move up to Driver Assist. Proceed to Drive Control. Then select Comfort.

Now your 2017 Lincoln MKZ Reserve Hybrid is a good ol’ fashioned barge of an American car, with enough rear end float to make pregnant women seasick. Firm? Far from it. That dip in the pavement half a mile ago is still causing the rear occupants’ bellies to teeter-totter as the MKZ attempts to locate its equilibrium.

Pair this menu selection with a prod of the Eco button to the right of the central touchscreen and you now have a modern Lincoln that mostly ignores throttle input, steers with remarkable lightness, and turns potholes into pillows. That sounds like the perfect Lincoln for a customer base that has all but gone extinct.

Fortunately, the refreshed MKZ Hybrid does not need to be driven in Comfort/Eco mode. In fact, the 2017 MKZ is at its best when, as is often the case, Lincoln allows the MKZ to manifest its deep-seated Ford Fusion roots.

So why not buy a Ford Fusion instead? Read More >

The fourth-generation ND Mazda MX-5 Miata is undoubtedly, indisputably, undeniably the best addition you could make to your garage.

Some people disagree.

Fiat Chrysler Automobiles reported 480 U.S. sales of the Fiat 124 Spider in July 2016. The Spider is a thoroughly transformed version of Mazda’s fourth Miata: different body, distinct suspension tuning, unique powerplant.

With the 124 Spider’s arrival in the United States, 13 months of Mazda MX-5 Miata sales growth came to a screeching halt. Read More >

Mazda sales representatives across the United States finally have the golden ticket for all of those eventual Honda Civic buyers who walked out the door before even test driving a Mazda3.

“When the driver maintains a constant steering angle, GVC immediately recovers engine drive torque, transferring load to the rear wheels to enhance vehicle stability,” Bill will tell his next up, quoting Mazda USA’s press release. Says Joe to the young couple expecting their first child: “The extremely subtle amount of deceleration force added by GVC normally amounts to 0.01 G or less.” Tom, with a patronizing over-the-glasses glance at the fixed-income senior citizens across the desk, says, “GVC demonstrates its effect consistently over a wide range of driving situations, regardless of the driver’s level of skill.”

GVC, or G-Vectoring Control, is the next step in Mazda’s Skyactiv-branded technology. G-Vectoring control debuts on the refreshed 2017 versions of the Mazda6, a chronically unpopular midsize sedan, and the increasingly uncommon Mazda3, sales of which have tumbled by nearly a fifth since the car’s 2012 peak. Read More >

Yes, Camaro sales figures. They’re not attractive, not what General Motors was accustomed to achieving when the reborn Camaro returned in 2009 as a fifth-generation Ford Mustang fighter. Not for the first time, we told you that story yesterday. Much as we all expected that the Camaro, in its final year, would be outsold by the high-production sixth-gen Mustang in its first year, 2015 is over. This is 2016. The Camaro is the new car. The Mustang could be resigned to Yesterday’s News status.

Instead, the Mustang is outselling the Camaro by huge margins, the Dodge Challenger has outsold the Camaro in each of the last three months, and Camaro volume is down 37 percent since May, year-over-year.

What’s an automaker to do? Read More >

General Motors just released pricing and performance figures for its 2017 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1, and unless Ford comes up with a hotter Mustang, it looks like Dodge still holds the domestic performance crown.

Billed as the most powerful production Camaro ever, the 650-horsepower ZL1 comes with an MSRP of $62,135 for coupe models, $69,135 for drop-tops. Lower-end models stand to benefit from Chevy’s 1LE performance package. Read More >

As our own Tim Cain reported this morning, if not for the mid-sized truck sector, total U.S. new vehicle sales volume would have risen by less than one-tenth of one percent. Now, forecasters are reducing their outlook for the remainder of 2016, leading some automakers to start fighting the stagnating market by deploying aggressive incentives.

Sound dangerously familiar? It should. A quote from George Santayana is very appropriate at this juncture: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

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