We obsessively cover the auto industry…

When something bad happens, it's easy to resort to scapegoating. At least for some of us, that seems to be exactly what has happened following the tragic death of actor Paul Walker and racer Roger Rodas, who were killed on November 30 in a Porsche Carrera GT. Even though officials have not yet determined the cause of the crash, that isn't stopping many theories from being put for – theories that include blaming the Porsche supercar. Rather predictably, not only is the CGT's difficult nature getting examined, but indeed, the nature of all high-performance cars is being put under the public's microscope, with some wondering what the need for all the power is.

A Google search of "Porsche Carrera GT" will find no shortage of articles about the razor-sharp handling and outright speed of the CGT. Pistonheads' Chris Harris has a different, insightful take on both the Carrera GT and the nature of all fast cars. He reflects on the matter, ironically, en route to drive the successor to the car that killed Walker and Rodas, the 900-horsepower 918 Spyder hybrid supercar.

We think it's well worth a read, as it makes a number of good points about modern high-performance automobiles and the way they're used. Click over and take a look.

I spend a lot of time trying to convince my friends and colleagues that the Mercedes-Benz Sprinter is the world's most perfect vehicle. Basically – in my eyes anyway – there is nothing it cannot do, and do well. And that point figures to be more true now that Daimler has introduced this all-wheel-drive Sprinter 4x4 model.

As you'll recall, the majestic Sprinter received a host of updates for the 2014 model year, including some minor styling tweaks and a new four-cylinder, Bluetec diesel engine. The Sprinter 4x4 can be fitted with a 129- or 163-horsepower version of that new inline-four, or a more powerful, 190-hp 3.0-liter Bluetec V6.

Unlike Mercedes' passenger car models, the Sprinter's all-wheel-drive system is not an always-on affair. Drivers need to press a button to engage AWD, at which point the 4ETS (electronic traction system) takes over. All-wheel drive can be activated when the vehicle is stationary, or at speeds up to 10 kilometers per hour (just over 6 miles per hour, you speed demons). When AWD is engaged, the Sprinter defaults to a 35/65 fore/aft power split. There's even an optional low range reduction gear, for low-speed, off-road conditions, as well as Downhill Speed Regulation that holds the vehicle at a consistent speed when driving down hills (self-explanatory, right?). The 4x4 Sprinter's body has also been raised by 4.3 inches up front and 3.1 inches in the rear – you know, for when the going gets extra tough.

Mercedes-Benz will offer the Sprinter 4x4 in a variety of bodystyles, with ether a medium- or long-wheelbase, as well as the normal, high and extra-high roofs. As for North American availability, that's unclear as of this writing, but stay tuned to this space for an update once Merc's US arm officially confirms things for us, one way or the other.

For now, scroll down to read all of the details in Mercedes' press release, and check out two videos of the Sprinter 4x4 in the snow. There's a huge gallery of high-res images up top, too.

Just five months ago, our spy photographers caught what appeared to be a mule for the forthcoming Lexus NX crossover with the body of a CT 200h for disguise. Then the LF-NX Concept CUV debuted at the Frankfurt Motor Show (it showed up at the Tokyo Motor Show as well) with a massive spindle grille and an extreme version of Lexus' sharp-edged new styling language on full display. Now Auto Express reports that a production version of the LF-NX concept will grace the Geneva Motor Show next March and go on sale next summer. If the names that Lexus trademarked a while back are any indication, it'll come in two trims, NX 200t and NX 300h.

Concept vehicles often look outrageously bold, with more extroverted styling than what eventually makes it into the production version. But Lexus reportedly will leave much of the LF-NX concept's styling alone for the production version, citing its customers' changing tastes.

"What we're finding is that these days customers want to be more expressive, so a lot of the concept's inherent design will come out in the finished car," says Paul Van der Burgh, Lexus' European director. "Why would you want something that looked like everything else in the segment?"

Rumors of a brand-new 2.0-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine have been floating around since those first test mules were spotted, and they were seemingly confirmed when the LF-NX concept was displayed at the Tokyo Motor Show with the new engine. That'll be the NX 200t model, and the NX 300h model is expected to be a hybrid model with the 2.5-liter four and electric motor found in the IS300h and GS300h.

CarMD has released its third annual Vehicle Health Index, which for the 2013 tracked the frequency and cost of repairs for "check engine" problems of 119-million vehicles built between the 2003 and 2013 model years. For the first two years of the index, Toyota ranked at the top of the list, but this year's results see Hyundai moved to number one, pushing Toyota down a spot.

The Korean automaker's rise to the top has been "fueled by its low repair frequency," according to CarMD. Toyota is second to Hyundai in lowest repair frequency, but Toyotas also have the highest average cost of repair. (Interestingly, General Motors vehicles have the lowest average.) Both Toyota's and Hyundai's manufacturer "health" ratings suffered this year, but Toyota took a bigger hit, which also is what helped Hyundai achieve the top ranking.

While Hyundai is the top manufacturer in the index, the 2012 Toyota Camry is the top vehicle. The best-ranking Hyundai was the 2010 Elantra (behind three Nissan models and four Toyotas), which took the number eight spot. Hyundai has six other vehicles in the top 100.

The top-ten manufacturers with the best overall vehicle "health" rankings are Hyundai (No. 1), Toyota (No. 2), GM (No. 3), Chrysler (No. 4), Honda (No. 5), Ford (No. 6), Nissan (No. 7), Kia (No. 8), Volkswagen (No. 9) and Mitsubishi (No. 10).

Check out CarMD's study (Warning: PDF file) to check out all sorts of data related to car health – there's a ton of information to peruse.

Maybe you've heard of Bitcoin by now, but if you haven't, here's what you need to know: it's a decentralized, electronic currency contained in the world's first completely open financial network (for a better understanding, visit this informative Washington Post article). Bitcoin can be used to buy all sorts of products through the growing list of vendors who accept the currency, and Lamborghini Newport Beach now can be added to that list.

On Wednesday, the Lamborghini dealership sold a Tesla Model S to a customer who paid for the car in Bitcoin, which were converted by an exchange service into US dollars. In an announcement on its website, Lamborghini Newport Beach says it's "fully capable of accepting Bitcoin as payment for vehicles." The electronic currency's value has increased greatly since it started catching on in early 2011, and, as of this writing, one Bitcoin is worth around $900.

If we'd only bought 100 of them for around $100 a couple of years ago...

On December 1, Zydrunas Savickas, a five-time World's Strongest Man champion, pulled 12 Nissan Notes (the equivalent to our Versa Note) weighing 28,530 pounds over 16.4 feet in 32.9 seconds. The feat, performed in Lithuania at the end of the country's Car of the Year test camp, was enough to secure him the Guinness world record for "Most Cars Pulled By One Man."

"Once I got into my stride pulling the 12 Nissan Notes, [it] was fine," Savickas said after the pull. "Obviously, a big thank you to Nissan for helping me set the record and making it all happen."

"We at Nissan like setting records and are always aiming high," said Taina Erkkilä, Communication Director of Nissan Nordic Europe. "Today we are delighted to have been able to help Zydrunas set another world record and see so many people turn out to support him."

The Nissan Note launched earlier this year in the European market. The little five-door hatchback is built at the automaker's Sunderland plant in the UK and features a supercharged 1.2-liter four-cylinder engine. Head below to see the press release and the video of Savickas pulling the 12 Notes and being awarded the world record.

The 2014 Soul has come on strong since its introduction, going so far as to become the Korean automaker's top-selling model last month, but Kia isn't wasting any time in creating a little extra excitement for its boxy hatchback. Although the name is a little wonky, the Kia Soul Red Zone marks the first special-edition model for the second-gen Soul, and its styling is meant to mimic the 2012 Track'ster Concept, the showcar that inspired the design of the 2014 Soul.

While there's no pigskin or AstroTurf (or any other football-related references) to be found on this car, the Red Zone package consists of a distinctive white paint scheme with bright red accents. The red theme continues on the inside with contrast stitching and piping acting as highlights to the otherwise all-black interior. The 2014 Soul Red Zone goes on sale early next year, and while official pricing has not been announced, production will be limited to just 2,000 units.

We've written about approximately 187,000 rumors about a return of the Toyota Supra to the land of living cars. There are a couple of good reasons for this: first, Toyota won't stop dropping hints about a new halo sports car. Late this summer, Toyota sales guru Kazuo Ohara called a Supra successor "one of the options we have" – a comment followed by a hint that there would be "better news" on the subject in the future.

The second reason for all the Toyota tales is, of course, that we all have missed the Supra since its departure from the US market in 1998. So, when a member of the Autoblog team is party to a nudge-and-wink-filled conversation about a new Supra concept headed to January's Detroit Auto Show, we tend to listen up.

A 400+ horsepower hybrid sports car would match up pretty well with the upcoming NSX.

Recently, a few very well-placed members of the Toyota team indicated to us, in not-so-cryptic terms, that the Japanese automaker is ready to shock the world with a Supra concept car for this year's shindig in the Motor City. Further, the indications we've been given are that this "concept car" will signal broadly about a production version still to follow.

In 2007, the FT-HS concept (pictured) seemed like a perfectly promising Supra replacement, right before the economy fell off a cliff and everyone in the business shelved all non-essential product plans. This year, however, there'll be about 16 million cars sold in the US and a 400+ horsepower hybrid sports car would match up pretty well with the upcoming Acura NSX from rival Honda, not to mention president Akio Toyoda's mandate to shed his company's staid image.

Of course, on the record, Toyota is still staying perfectly mum – not only on the topic of the previously rumored gas-electric powertrain, but on the existence of the concept itself. Our requests for any official confirmation have been met with firm retorts of approximately "no comment" from our friendly Toyota PR staffers.

Still, the pattern of executive-dropped clues about a new sports car follows that which composed the achingly long lead up to the eventual Toyota GT86/Scion FR-S/Subaru BRZ. We'll have to wait about a month to see just what Toyota has under the sheets in Cobo this year, but we're crossing our fingers and hoping the new year brings with it a new Supra, at long last.

Alan Mulally isn't going anywhere... at least not just yet. The CEO who helped turn around Ford Motor Company has been linked to the top job at tech behemoth Microsoft, leading to a flurry of rumors about potential successors. Those rumors, though, may have just been put to rest – at least for a little while.

Speaking to Edsel Ford II (great-grandson of company founder Henry Ford) at the unveiling of the new Mustang, Automotive News Europe confirmed that Mulally would stick around until the end of next year. "Alan is staying through the end of 2014 and that's all I know," said Ford. "Frankly, he has told us that his plan is to stay with Ford through the end of 2014."

Presuming that Edsel Ford is correct and that Microsoft isn't so hot on Mulally that it saves the position for him, it seems increasingly likely that the 68-year-old exec is more interested in continuing to work in Dearborn rather than in Redmond.

This is one of those fun stories where we could have gotten by without writing a single sentence, just by running the video and the headline. That title really does say everything that needs to be said – this is a video – a highly stylized, beautifully filmed video - from McLaren of its attempt at breaking the seven-minute barrier at the Nürburgring Nordschleife with its new P1 hybrid hyper car.

Our only gripe with this short film might be that while McLaren claims it broke the seven-minute mark, we still have no clue as to what its actual time was – how are we supposed to know if the Brits bested the Germans? Hopefully, that'll come out soon.

Still, the fact that McLaren took a car on "production tires" and completed that lap time is amazing. It's made more amazing by the fact that the car was not trailered to the track - it was driven 390 miles from the UK to Germany. For those who are interested, there's a great running commentary on the lap in the press release from McLaren test driver Chris Goodwin, the pilot shown in the video.

Finally, this video clarifies the mystery of XP2R, a car we showed you lapping the Nürburgring back in July. It turns out that the car shown in the video is the same one we showed last summer, although McLaren still hasn't let on as to whether it differs from other P1s.

Scroll down for the full video and press release from McLaren.

Ferrari announced a panoramic roof option for its all-wheel drive FF at the 2012 Paris Motor Show, promising the new full-length glass panel would offer its well-heeled clientele "a genuine open-air driving feeling, while providing thermal and acoustic insulation." That statement was intriguing, as my experience with glass roofs usually ends abruptly after I close the opaque shade - as a Southern Californian, I always find tinted glass panels too hot during the day and too cold at night.

While the FF I reviewed in August was fitted with a solid aluminum roof, I was fortunate to catch up with a brand-new silver Ferrari FF (it only had about 160 miles on the odometer) with the optional panoramic roof (a $17,666 upgrade) at the Formula One race at Circuit of the Americas just last month. It was my lucky day, as I was about to spend about six hours with the four-place Italian, blissfully enjoying it during the warm day until long after the sun had set on the Texas horizon.

Driving Notes

• Unlike the electrochromatic sunroof Ferrari offered on its 612 Scaglietti a few years ago (which was able to vary the amount of light coming through its panel into the cabin with an electronically reactive color-changing gel sandwiched between its panels), the large glass roof on the FF does not utilize an electrical current to work. Instead, it employs a special reflective glass (LowE) that is coated during manufacturing to permanently minimize the amount of ultraviolet and infrared light that passes through. While the special glass blocks the invisible light that heats your skin and warms the cabin uncomfortably on hot summer days, it still allows visible light to pass through so the cabin stays bright. As an added benefit, the LowE glass has insulating properties, keeping temperatures from passing from one side to the other in extreme climates.
• While most automakers split their panoramic roofs into two or more panels, Ferrari has elected to go with one very large single piece of glass. The glass is fixed, meaning it does not pop-up or slide back, and it extends from the edge of the glass windshield rearward to the end of the roof. A small aluminum panel, about five inches wide and serving as a base for the satellite radio antennae, separates it from the glass rear window. The panel is offered in both body colors (as was the case on my silver test car) or painted black (as we saw in the first press release). After seeing both, I prefer it painted black, as the panel visually disappears and blends into the glass on either side.
• The FF's panoramic roof appears slightly reflective and dark from the outside, but the view from the inside is much lighter both day and night. The driver and front passenger enjoy the open cabin (the glass panel actually provides more head clearance), but their forward seating position means a glance upward still means looking at the opaque windshield header. Interestingly enough, the panoramic roof is actually better taken in the from the rear seats, where the view is unrestricted, expansive and rather dramatic. The clear roof visually opens up the cabin, giving the illusion that it is larger inside. After experiencing it during the day, evening and night, I couldn't find any faults. The new panoramic roof is not just a no-compromise improvement - it's a must-have upgrade.
• Thankfully, swapping a large aluminum panel for glass doesn't noticeably affect performance. The spectacular hand-assembled 6.3-liter V12 screams every bit as loudly, maybe even a bit more, with the new roof. The all-wheel drive FF remains a driver's car, with wickedly quick steering, strong brakes and more cornering grip than most passengers will tolerate. Only a short list of vehicles can best its exotic acceleration, and none of those will offer as much comfort when stuck in gridlock traffic.
• My car was loaded to the sills with more than $70,000 worth of options, which isn't uncommon on a Ferrari. The list including the aforementioned roof, range-topping carbon-fiber steering wheel with LED tach, diamond-quilted leather and the carbon interior package.
• One final observation: A single afternoon with Ferrari's unusual FF is simply too short.

Humans are odd creatures. Some of us collect things associated with bad events, particularly when it comes to cars. Your author, for example, has the grille of his wrecked 2004 Mini Cooper S hanging on the wall. As a more extreme example, an 18-year-old Californian is in trouble with the LA police, but not for taking an item from his own car accident. Instead, he has been arrested for stealing from the wreck of the Porsche Carrera GT that killed actor Paul Walker and racer Roger Rodas.

And it wasn't a small piece, either. It was the Carrera GT's carbon-fiber roof panel. Making matters worse is word that the theft happened while the tow truck that was hauling the wrecked Porsche was sitting in traffic. According to the LA Sheriff's Department report, "A witness saw a male exit a vehicle that was following the tow truck. The male grabbed a piece of the wrecked Porsche off the tow truck bed." Besides the eyewitnesses, it didn't help that images of the roof panel were later posted on Instagram.

The man, Jameson Witty, was later arrested at his home, where police also found the roof panel. The driver of the car Witty was in when he took the roof panel, meanwhile, is planning on surrendering to the police, according to CNN. It remains unclear if the district attorney's office will charge the two, although if it does, they'll be facing felony grand theft and tampering with evidence.

Judging by the direction Audi is taking with recent concept vehicles, the forthcoming Audi Q1 crossover – confirmed for production in 2016 – should be an exciting little crossover. Last year, the automaker revealed the Crosslane Coupe Concept, and now it has announced it will reveal a new CUV concept at the Detroit Auto Show next month.

Teased in a trio of sketches, Audi says this unnamed concept is designed with a shooting brake style, which to us it makes it look like a combination of an Audi Allroad and a three-door A3. Little information is available on this concept, but it is about seven inches shorter than the Q3 and Audi notes that it will possess "design elements that are typical of e-tron models," which suggests some sort of powertrain electrification. There's still about a month before the Detroit show kicks off, but until then you can check out the sketches and press release (posted below) that Audi has provided.

We have on good authority that this is the all-new Chevrolet Corvette Z06, the hotter version of the 455-horsepower Corvette Stingray. Feast your eyes upon it, and know that we'll have a lot more when it makes its official debut at the 2014 Detroit Auto Show.

First, you'll notice we're calling it "Z06" instead of "Z07." That's because Chevy isn't going to shake things up too drastically, despite a previous report from Car and Driver. Like the C6, the model will be called Z06, but there will be a Z07 package. It's not clear what that will entail, but on the C6 generation, it included a number of upmarket style and performance features from the Corvette ZR1. As there is no ZR1 yet, we've no idea what to expect.

As we're still a bit in the dark in terms of details, here's what we think we know: It's very likely that the Z06 will receive a forced-induction engine. We previously reported that that could mean a twin-turbocharged setup, but considering GM's aversion to big, turbocharged engines in favor of big, supercharged engines, it'd be foolish to not consider that the Z06 will arrive wearing a blower. In fact, the engine shown above, which looks to be a supercharged LT4, has popped up on Instagram this morning thanks to American Velocity Performance. Regardless of what extras Chevy fits to the 6.2-liter V8 (that's right, the 7.0-liter is rumored to be kaput), power output is expected to far outpace the 505-horsepower of the C6 Z06, with rumors of over 600 ponies.

Visually, the Z06 looks even more aggressive than the already pugnacious Stingray, with prominent side sills and rear fender ducting, a jutting front air dam and a much larger rear spoiler. Note, too, the absence of the Stingray's namesake silver emblems on the front fenders.

We'll have much, much more on the next Corvette Z06 when it makes its live debut at the 2014 Detroit Auto Show in January. Until then, have your say about this newer, hotter Vette. Is 600 hp enough? Would forced induction ruin the whole point of the track-minded Z06? Let us know in Comments.

UPDATE: It appears that the yellow Corvette above is a well-done Photoshop product, not the real Z06. That said, we still believe it to be a very close representation of the real thing. The engine pic, however, is still believed to be authentic.