Autoblog

As if Ferrari needed any help promoting its brand, they've gone and hired Dany Bahar. During his tenure at Red Bull, the intrepid Turk transformed the energy drink company from a simple sponsor into team owners, first acquiring Red Bull Racing from Ford when Jaguar's F1 team went bust, then going in on an unprecedented second team – Scuderia Toro Rosso – and even spearheading Toyota's entry into NASCAR in a team owned by... you guessed it, Red Bull. Bahar also orchestrated the deal that brought Ferrari power to Red Bull last season and to STR for 2007.

Bahar left Red Bull way back in February, and it didn't take long before the rumors of his defection to Maranello started flying around like a club-going teenager jacked up on taurine. Although the speculation initially indicated that Bahar would assume a role at the Scuderia, Ferrari announced that he'd be put in charge of a new department that will operate alongside the racing team and road-car divisions, and report directly to the CEO.

With the construction of the Ferrari World theme park already under way, the company's merchandizing efforts already seem to be at full tilt. It'll be interesting, therefore, to see what new direction Bahar takes the brand.

[Source: Italiaspeed]

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It seems every automaker is lining up these days to snag their letter in the alphabet for their high-performance divisions. Audi's claimed S, while Chevy has SS; Honda has the Type-R and Volkswagen launched the R-line; Mercedes acquired AMG and Ford still has SVT. Now Lexus has laid claim to the letter F, but BMW has always had M.

Unfortunately BMW's stoic performance division didn't have anything special in store for us at this year's Detroit show, but they did have their full M range lined up all pretty like in sparkling white at the back of their booth. The whole gang was there, including the Z4-based M Roadster and M Coupe, the M5 sedan and the M6 coupe and convertible. It was a wet dream come true for fans of the ultimate driving machines, so for all you BMW enthusiasts out there we went by to snap a few photos. Click here to check 'em out or on any of the thumbnails below.