The good oil: Big cat on prowl

Jaguar hosted a drive day at Pukekohe racetrack on Wednesday. Jaguar owners and guests - watched by the big silver Cat pictured above - whipped around the circuit guided by instructors from Ford's Advanced Drivers' School. The big six- and eight-cylinder rear-drive cars certainly have a turn of speed but drivers weren't allowed to wag the Jaguar tails. The carmaker insisted that traction-control systems remained on - it didn't want its cars going backwards in circles. Some people in Britain reckoned Jaguar was encouraging drivers to do exactly that in a recent magazine advertisement seen by 12 million readers. The ad said: "Suddenly weekends are a blur again," and pictured a Jaguar travelling around a bend. Its wheels and the surrounding landscape were blurred. The ad has been banned by the advertising standards people because complainants believed it "emphasised speed and encouraged irresponsible driving on rural roads."

Cheaper here by far


New Zealand will be the first right-hand-drive country to get the new Renault four-wheel-drive Scenic, a mid-range lifestyle carry-all. A picture of the vehicle appeared on the front of Automotive News in last Wednesday's Herald. It will go on sale here in May priced at $39,990. A month later it will reach the market in Britain at sterling 19,600, which converts to nearly $65,000. No wonder the British public can't believe how cheap European cars are in New Zealand.

High country to the Outback


Porsche has hit the Outback trail in Australia as part of a test programme for its new luxury off-roader. The secret model, spotted in the snow at Queenstown last year, is now on an expedition in the tough Flinders Ranges in the company of three rival four-wheel drives: the Toyota Land Cruiser, Jeep Grand Cherokee and Mercedes-Benz M-class. Pirelli is also joining in as it develops the world's first 250km/h off-road tyre. The Porsche engineers will be right at home in Australia. For years they have used the Northern Territory's long, straight roads to test high-performance models. Porsche is keeping the styling of its new model secret by clothing the platform in modified M-Class panels for the tests. The first public showing of the finished car will be at the 2001 Frankfurt Motor Show.

Soft-top Ferrari on show


The convertible version of Ferrari's acclaimed 360 Modena, the Spider, will make its public debut at the Geneva Motor Show next month, then make its way Down Under for the Melbourne Motor Show. The 360 Spider is powered by the same 3.6-litre V8 as the hard-top, but all other details are being kept secret by the Italian supercar manufacturer. The waiting list for the new model stretches to two years.

We are the world


* A contractor in Japan, hired to carry 1000 speeding tickets from one office to another, failed to notice them blowing out of a box on the back of his van. Yokohama police spent 40 minutes picking them up.