A Car Guys Annual To Do List

5 Ways You Can Easily Improve Your Car This Spring

With the warm weather approaching, here's a list of perfect improvements for your car this spring.

1. A good clean

Many think that improving a car means installing new parts, but that’s not always the case. You can improve on what’s already there, and a good detail is a perfect way to do that. Most owners don’t take care of their cars like we do, and that means that some cars have only seen a few dirty old sponges in their entire life. That can be fixed with a proper deep clean, and it can really take years off the look of your car.

Aspect Valeting is a specialist in the field of giving cars a new lease of life through detailing, and it’s worked on some of the most exclusive cars in the country. It provides everything from a simple wash, all the way up to a full detail inside out that will leave your car looking perfect. Its special ‘snow foam’ helps to remove dirt without scratching paint, but if your paint needs more remedy, Aspect offers full paint corrections and ceramic or wax protection that starts from just £450. Treatment like this usually costs around £700, so bag a deal!

Aspect Valeting has locations in Portsmouth, London, Essex, Birmingham and Swindon, so one of its mobile units will be able to get to you, pretty much wherever you are in the country. With services starting at just £15, head to its site here and see how you can treat your car!

3. A little more performance

For petrolheads, spring time is when we get our cars ready for summer blasts and show season, but you never want to turn up to the meet with a car that hasn’t changed since last year. Because of that, we are always on the look out for ways to improve the performance of our cars, and that always leads to buying car parts.

Forge Motorsport is one of the top names in the game, and provides a massive amount of performance products that are sure to give you the edge over others on the track. From new intakes to custom-made intercoolers, it covers most cars, and even has universal parts for some cases. Want to see some of its work? Just take a look at the absurd Mk1 Golf that features many of the company’s parts.

Head to the Forge site right here to see what they can improve on your car now.

4. A better suspension set up

With temperatures rising and grip levels with it, petrolheads usually use this opportunity to head out on to the back roads to do some canyon carving. But what use is there in doing this if your car doesn’t handle as well as it should? Buying the right suspension components is a perfect way to solve this, as they will all work together to make your car a more fun drive.

One of the best components to switch out is your coilovers, as they don’t only drastically improve your handling, but help to give your ride a more aggressive stance too. Enjuku Racing is one of the best sources of quality coilovers suited for both road and race use, and has built savage race cars with parts straight off the shelf, available to the general public.

Although it specialises in Nissan products, it provides parts for all varieties of cars - check out the site now to see what parts are available for your car!

5. A new set of wheels

The final piece of the spring time improvement is a new set of rims. It’s likely that you already have a set of aftermarket rims on your car, but that shouldn’t stop you wanting to buy more, because more is always better. A new set of wheels is one of the easiest ways to quickly improve the look of your car, be it a $1000 rust-bucket, or a brand new exotic.

Unfortunately, wheels tend to only suit a specific car, and it’s hard to find the perfect set that match your style goals. That’s where Cosmis Racing wheels are different. It’s one of our favourite wheel brands simply because its products look good on pretty much anything. From deep dish six-spoke designs to higher offset multi-spoke wheels, there’s a rim to suit anything.

With sizes that fit a massive amount of cars, it would be rude not to go look at the Cosmis Racing site, to find out what would look best on your ride.

Complete list (CarThrottle.com)

The Automotive & Aftermarket Win A Battle

EPA Abandons Proposal to Ban Converting Street Cars for Racing 

The rule, hidden in a giant 629-page ​proposal, caused outcry among auto enthusiasts and the performance parts industry. 

After the EPA proposal was made public by SEMA, a bipartisan coalition of five members of Congress championed a bill to block the measure. Congressman Patrick McHenry (R-NC) introduced H.R. 4715, the Recognizing the Protection of Motorsports Act of 2016, in Congress in March, co-sponsored by representatives Henry Cuellar (D-TX), Richard Hudson (R-NC), Bill Posey (R-FL), and Lee Zeldin (R-NY). "Congress never intended for race cars to be subject to the Clean Air Act," the bill read. "The RPM Act would simply confirm that race cars are exempt from EPA regulation via the Clean Air Act."

This week, Republican leaders of the House Energy and Commerce Committee joined the effort, sending a letter to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy asking her to clarify the legal justification for the EPA's proposal to rule on amateur motorsports.

Apparently, the groundswell of grassroots opposition from SEMA, coupled with Congressional pressure, was enough to convince the EPA to abandon the proposal. In a statement, the members of Congress who backed the RPM Act said "we are pleased that just days after our letter, EPA slammed the brakes on their gambit to regulate auto racing."

(Road&Track.com)

Did You Know - Leicester City Football Club

10 things to know about Leicester City -- and the city of Leicester

Started from the bottom, now they're here

• There are many reasons why Leicester City's rise to the top of Premier League table is so improbable. But paramount among them: The team wasn't even in the Premier League two years ago and was in danger of being relegated back to the Football League Championship, the second-tier league in the English soccer system. Just seven years ago, the Foxes were in Football League One, the third-tier league. The Foxes were dead-last in the Premier League last season for 4 1/2 months between late-November and mid-April, including a 13-game winless streak, which was the longest in the league. They staved off relegation by winning seven of their last nine matches, but no one saw that as a sign of things to come. If anything, most pundits had them fighting off relegation again this season.

Where in the world is Leicester?

Well, first of all, if you're talking about the city and not the football club, Leicester is a city in the East Midlands of England and the county town of Leicestershire. The East Midlands region of England consists of Leicestershire, Derbyshire, Northamtonshire, Nottinghamshire, Rutland and most of Lincolnshire. If none of that makes much sense to you, it's a 100-mile drive north on the M1 motorway if you're in London, or you could hop on the East Midlands Train from London and get there in a little over an hour. Leicester has a population of about 330,000, which would put it on par with Corpus Christi, Texas, or Riverside, California. Leicester, which was known for its hosiery factories in the 19th century, was a finalist for the UK City of Culture Award in 2013 but lost to Kingston upon Hull.

Complete list (ESPN.com)

The Hip Hop Way To Get Inducted

See Kendrick Lamar Induct NWA Into Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame And Legendary Group Destroys Critics

Lamar honored each member of N.W.A., starting with DJ Yella:

First off, DJ Yella Ye. Ah? Ah? Hip-hop, we in Compton. His personality, charisma not only poured out into the company that was around him, but it shown whenever he got behind the turntables in production, providing some of the illest breaks, cuts, scratching, that only the most elite – I said elite – Compton MCs can spit over, you dig that? Any time my boy Yella dropped that needle, you know it’s time to get busy, right? Right?

MC Ren:

MC Ren, the motherfucking – can I cuss? MC Ren, the motherfucking villain! The name is just not self-proclaimed. It was proven every single time he stepped behind that microphone. Hardcore lyrics that not only made you jump out your seat, but feel like you’re getting your motherfucking head pushed through the speakers, you dig that? A true code red every time we heard a rhyme, you dig that, so it was nothing but honesty, spoken from a true tone of a Compton resident: MC Ren, believe that, boy. 100. Yessir.

Ice Cube:

Cube! Where y’all at? I said Ice Cube? Storytelling genius. Every bar had us hanging over our seats. Punchline, delivery, detailed imagery made you get just a small glimpse of how it was growing up in the city of Compton, you dig what I’m saying? Cube was always proving to be one of the greatest MCs to ever step behind the mic, and on a personal level, my debut album, you was the blueprint on how I went to approach it. That’s for real, you dig what I’m saying, so salute to that. That’s 100.

Dr. Dre:

Doc Dre! Dr. Dre! The scientist! The perfectionist. The producer extraordinaire. My mentor, you dig what I’m saying? This dude here taught me a lot as far as never being satisfied with the work you do, on and off the record. Whether I’m on the mic, whether I’m out in life, in general, always taught me that. Number two, make sure you take care of your music and your family each and every single day. I never forget the words, you dig what I’m saying? Since the first day meeting me, you always gave me the energy, saying “Superstar!” You never called me Kendrick Lamar. So that gave me the belief in what I was doing, and also gave me the energy of knowing I was doing it right, and then I became. I appreciate you for that, every time.

With that being said, not only on a personal level, when I met Dre, it was way before I actually met him personally, it was on the music, you get what I’m saying? So let me say this. Dre has provided N.W.A with unapologetic production made on high-level soundtracks for hardcore lyrics. You could never press play without having an extra pair of Kenwood speakers. You know what I’m talking about, woofers! You know what I’m saying? Tweeters! You understand when I’m having ’em blown out. Every single hi-hat, snare make you break your neck! I believe Andre to be one of the greatest producers of our time, and still to this day. Believe that. That’s real.

Eazy-E:

Last but not least, the legendary, the late great Eric “Eazy-E” Wright. He was a true mastermind. A businessman, an incredible entertainer. His persona was unmatched. His confidence spoke with abundance. His high-pitched tone spoke to nations around the world, y’all. There was no better voice to put across than Eazy-E. He is the gatekeeper of reality rap. He’s the reason why I’m proud to stand on this stage and rep Compton. He’s the reason why we’re proud to have songs like “Dope Man,” “Express Yourself.” I said, “Fuck tha Police,” “Express Yourself”! “Boyz-n-the-Hood.” These are the records that made L.A. known all across the world. It was dubbed gangsta rap, but what it was for me was an intimate look at what was actually happening in our community in Los Angeles, and in Compton in particular.

Video link (BroBible.com)

Change Is Inevitable, But Not Always For The Better

10 Things Going Extinct in Los Angeles 

2) Diners
 
R.I.P. Ships, 1956 to 1996. (According to Wikipedia: "The Ships menu included Shrimp Louie, navy bean soup and cottage cheese with peach or pineapple. Toasters were located at tables and on the counters for customers to prepare their own toast.")

R.I.P. Tiny Naylor's. R.I.P. Twains. R.I.P. Jan's. R.I.P. Junior's. R.I.P. Victor's. R.I.P. Zucky's. R.I.P. Ed Debevic's (!). And of course, R.I.P. Johnnie's, 1956 to 2000, which became, and remains, a potemkin village diner, available only as a filming location.

At least there's still Norms.

5) Horse racing
 
The decline of horse racing, once known as the "sport of kings," has been felt especially sharply in California, which saw the closing of the Bay Meadows Racetrack in San Mateo in 2008, followed by the closing of Hollywood Park in Inglewood in 2013. The former playground of Bing Crosby and Jimmy Stewart will soon be the site of Inglewood's new $2.5 billion NFL stadium.

Now there's only one racetrack left in L.A. – Santa Anita.

10) Indoor Malls
 
Life as a teenager in the 1980s and 1990s revolved around the mall: sheltered, antiseptic, cavernous. The medium arguably reached its peak in Los Angeles with the Beverly Center in 1982. But it was another Los Angeles locale which helped kill the indoor mall – The Grove, built in 2002, and designed to look just like the city of Europe. Rick Caruso's brainchild quickly taught Californians that if you're gonna spend all day watching your wife try on pants, you may as well get a few minutes of sunshine.

Outdoor malls are in; indoor malls are out. In South L.A., Marlton Square Shopping Mall was demolished in 2011. Hawthorne's Mall remains eerily abandoned. And Santa Monica Place, designed by none other than Frank Gehry, tore off its roof in 2010, begetting this wonderful headline: "SANTA MONICA PLACE SWAPS GEHRY FOR AIRY." (It really only works if you say it aloud.)

At least we still have the Beverly Center, which is planning yet another expensive renovation.

Complete list (LAWeekly.com)

You Have To Be Willing To Brave The Elements To Enjoy This

The Worst Sport To Watch In The World

Rallying: The Most Methodical Major Motorsport

It’s important to understand that rallying is possibly the most obsessively, methodically inane form of major auto racing. The face of it is that you take a regular road car, strip it, cage it for safety, modify it with insanely expensive suspension, custom all-wheel drive, and an extremely high-strung turbo engine. Then you race the car on real public roads, which rally organizers have closed for safety.

But the thing is that these cars don’t race against each other; they race against the clock. Cars run one by one, spaced out one, two, or even three minutes apart. The roads they race on, typically twisting forest logging tracks, are by necessity in the middle of nowhere. Most of the time the competing rally cars are simply driving from one section of closed road to another.

You need to invest the better part of an entire morning to see the field of cars pass you a single time.

You’d think nobody would even show up to watch. And yet, I kid you not, thousands upon thousands of people trekked out into the Welsh forests for this rally. Wales was not kind to them.

I remember standing on top of a dam, in 40-mile an hour winds that had long since torn my poncho in half, being pelted with stinging rain blowing up the face of the dam and directly into my face. I stood there for several hours waiting for the top drivers to pass. They were only in view for a few seconds at a time.

That was only a single morning on the trip. Watching a rally like this requires driving hundreds of miles criss-crossing Wales, from one remote forest to another. I (and everyone else I talked to following the rally, from locals to tourists coming in from all over Europe) was up early and home late. Too hot and too cold, never dry, stained with mud and exhausted. The tea was good, at least.

In and of itself, watching a rally is a horrible experience. It would easily put itself in the running for the worst sport to watch in the world, and that’s leaving the deaths aside.

(Jalopnik.com)

Did You Know - Las Vegas' New Arena

New Las Vegas arena boasts hockey-specific features designed to lure an NHL team

1. As much as T-Mobile Arena has all the earmarks of a Vegas-specific venue, its seating bowl is very much set up for hockey. In fact, if you were to take out venue's signature Hyde Lounge triangular platforms atop one of the end zones, the seating bowl is reminiscent of Winnipeg's MTS Centre -- scaled up to fit 2,500 more fans. Part of the reason for the hockey-specific sightlines is technology (in the lower bowl) that's been installed to allow the arena to alter the angle of the seats, depending on what sport is being played that night. For hockey, the angle would be one of the NHL's steepest inclines.

2. T-Mobile Arena features at least one club on every seating level. They range from expensive VIP lounges that casual fans will never see to the building's Hyde Lounge, which will be open to the general public. The Hyde Lounge sits above the upper deck behind the net that the Las Vegas home team would shoot at twice per game, from one corner to the other corner. The boundaries for the Hyde Lounge are the seating bowl's most distinguishable feature. Two gigantic triangle platforms jut out from the club over the upper deck, which some of the arena's first visitors have noted as being reminiscent of the deck of the Titanic, where in the film about the ill-fated ship Leonardo DiCaprio delivers one of the movie's signature lines.

3. The arena is about a block off the Las Vegas Strip, between the New York-New York and Monte Carlo hotels. In conjunction with the arena's opening on Wednesday, a fan experience called "The Park" also debuted, connecting the Las Vegas Strip and the arena. The Park primarily consists of restaurants and bars, and could create a vibrant pre- and postgame experience that would combine a hockey crowd with the Las Vegas Strip, which is a five-minute walk away. The Park, including its own waterfall pathway, could rival LA Live in Los Angeles and Broadway in Nashville as one of the most fan-friendly setups outside of an NHL arena.

4. This arena's architects didn't try to hide the fact that this is a Las Vegas facility. On its opening night, performers dressed as traditional Las Vegas Showgirls danced atop a bar in an upper-level, general-admission concourse. Outside, in T-Mobile Arena's Toshiba Plaza, stands a massive 200 foot by 45 foot LED video screen, within a few dozen yards of a 40-foot sculpture of a dancing woman. For a general hockey audience, some of these features might seem a little peculiar at first. But for those who hoped that a potential Las Vegas NHL team would play in a Vegas-ish atmosphere, T-Mobile Arena definitely won't disappoint.

5. The size of T-Mobile Arena's dressing room facilities for the road team will impress visiting players. In NHL arenas, home teams invariably have a spacious setup that includes everything from the actual dressing room to player lounges and workout rooms. In many venues, however, road locker rooms aren't much fancier than what you see at a (nice) municipal skating rink. At T-Mobile Arena, the visiting accommodations will rival the setup many home teams currently enjoy. T-Mobile Arena's road-team dressing room is already completed, while its home dressing room is still under construction.

(ESPN.com)

Now There's Scientific Proof To Provie it

Tag Someone Who Says ‘Money Can’t Buy Happiness’ In This Post Because Science Says That Person’s An Idiot 

A study from Cambridge University appears to have confirmed something that humanity has been aware of since the very first king was crowned many centuries ago: money can buy happiness. People who are short on money like to say ‘the best things in life are free’ or ‘money can’t buy happiness’, but I’m here to spread the word today that those people are wrong as fuck.

The study found that having money to spend on (tangible) things in life that match a person’s personality traits does in fact correlate with being happy. Specifically, after combing through over 77,000 financial transactions the Cambridge University study found that the ‘people who spent more on purchases that matched their personality were happiest.’

(BroBible.com)