Japanese F1 GP Preview -- Mercedes-Benz

 

Toto Talks Japan

We have made a positive start to the season but it is only that. In both Australia and China, we had several close calls that could have ended our weekend. These cars are new and fragile; we were fortunate that none of the issues we faced severely compromised our results. We have work to do to make sure that continues to be the case. The grid is also learning so much every time we take to the track. Each weekend brings a new set of challenges and we are focused on completing our work, and looking to improve. We know that the moment you think you've got this sport figured out, you are usually proven wrong. 

That is as true for Kimi as it is for the team. His win in China was a great achievement and a moment to be proud of. However, his focus and ours are on what is ahead. His first victory is a first step and all that matters is how he builds on it. We will support him to navigate the expectations that come with performing at the front more consistently.

We're also hopeful that the exciting racing we saw in Melbourne and Shanghai will continue in Japan. Suzuka is one of the world's great race tracks but it has, in recent years, been a difficult place to overtake. Hopefully under these new regulations we can put on a good show for the fans.

Finally, we will be sporting an edgy look for this weekend's race. As a team, we continue to lead the way in blending our sport and wider culture and that is reflected in our work with Y-3's legendary Japanese designer, Yohji Yamamoto. It is fitting that his collection will be seen on the team trackside, plus his designs on the drivers' overalls and helmets, and on the W17 itself. It is a significant honour to partner on such a collaboration with Y-3, becoming only the third sports team after the Japanese national football team and Real Madrid to do so, and I'm sure it will prove to be an iconic one.

Third Driver Insights

The Japanese Grand Prix is truly one of a kind. Suzuka is a legendary circuit, steeped in decades of Formula 1 heritage, and it reminds me exactly why I became a racing driver.

The rhythm of the track is incredible. The fast, flowing corners push you physically and mentally, demanding precision, commitment, and total trust in the car. It’s a real driver’s challenge, the kind that brings out the pure joy of driving. It can be tricky to overtake at Suzuka but we've seen some fantastic racing so far this year; it's not an energy poor circuit but there will be some interesting decisions to take with deployment and that could lead once again to some great battles.

Last but by no means least, there are the fans. The Japanese supporters are some of the most passionate and creative in the world; their love for Formula 1 is almost beyond compare. Their energy makes the entire weekend feel special.

Did you know?

• Suzuka holds the distinction of being the only circuit we race at that is laid out in a figure-of-eight configuration.
• 2026 will be the 40th edition of the Japanese Grand Prix.
• No Grand Prix or track has seen more F1 world champions crowned than Japan (13) and Suzuka (12). The 1976 season was settled at Fuji.
• The 1994 Japanese Grand Prix remains the last occasion a race was decided using aggregate times after the race was split into two parts due to a red flag.
• All six of Mercedes’ wins in Japan came in consecutive seasons between 2014 and 2019.
• Mercedes clinched a record-equalling sixth consecutive Constructors’ title at Suzuka in 2019.
• In 2025, Kimi became the youngest driver to set a Grand Prix fastest lap in history by setting the quickest race tour in Suzuka.
• In the same race, Kimi also became the youngest in Grand Prix history to lead a lap, holding P1 for 10 of the 53 tours.

2026 Japanese Grand Prix
Session	Local Time (JST)	Brackley (GMT)	Stuttgart (CET)
Practice One – Friday	11:30 – 12:30	02:30 – 03:30	03:30 – 04:30
Practice Two - Friday	15:00 – 16:00	06:00 – 07:00	07:00 – 08:00
Practice Three – Saturday	11:30 – 12:30	02:30 – 03:30	03:30 – 04:30
Qualifying – Saturday	15:00 – 16:00	06:00 – 07:00	07:00 – 08:00
Grand Prix - Sunday	14:00	06:00	07:00

 

Circuit Characteristics
Circuit Length	5.807 km
Race Laps	53
Race Distance	307.5 km
Number of Corners	18 (8 L / 10 R)
Distance from Pole to First Braking Zone	330m
Pole Position Side	Left
Pit Lane Length Under Speed Limit Control	396m
Drive-Through Time at 80 km/h	18s
Braking Events (>2G)	4
Heavy Braking Events (<0.4s @ >4G)	1
Braking Energy	Medium
Top Speed	326 km/h (expected)
Race Lap Record	1:31.0 (ANT, 2025)
Absolute Lap Record	1:27.0 (VER, Q3, 2025)

 

Race Characteristics (2018 – 2019 & 2022 - 2025)
Safety Car Probability	40%	Average Track Temperature	27.8 °C
Average Ambient Temperature	14.8 °C	Maximum Track Temperature	40 °C
Maximum Ambient Temperature	19.2 °C	Wet Session Probability	7%

The Distinctive Chrysler Crossfire

 2008 Chrysler Crossfire

The Chrysler Crossfire arrived in the early 2000s as a car built from an unusual set of circumstances: a design statement wrapped around a partnership. Produced from 2004 to 2008, the Crossfire was essentially a Chrysler-bodied sports coupe and roadster riding on Mercedes-Benz hardware from the prior-generation SLK (R170). That origin story shaped everything about it—its strengths, its compromises, and the way it has been judged since. The Crossfire wasn’t a clean-sheet American sports car, nor was it a pure German roadster. It was a hybrid of corporate strategy and styling ambition, and its legacy is inseparable from that mix.

Visually, the Crossfire was the point. Chrysler leaned hard into sculpture and proportion: a long hood, a short rear deck, and a cabin pushed back toward the rear axle. The most debated feature was the fastback’s “boat-tail” rear end, defined by a central spine that ran down the hatch and split the rear glass. Some saw it as elegant and daring; others saw it as overwrought. Either way, it gave the Crossfire a silhouette you could identify instantly, which is more than can be said for many coupes of its era. The design also communicated a kind of premium aspiration—Chrysler trying to play in a space usually occupied by European brands—without simply copying their visual language.

Underneath, the Mercedes connection gave the Crossfire a credible foundation. Using proven components meant the car had a solid chassis, familiar powertrain options, and a level of structural integrity that would have been expensive to develop from scratch. The standard car used a 3.2-liter V6, and the SRT-6 variant added a supercharged version of that engine, turning the Crossfire into something genuinely quick for its time. The Mercedes-derived five-speed automatic was common, and while it wasn’t the enthusiast’s dream pairing, it fit the Crossfire’s personality as a sporty grand tourer rather than a razor-edged track tool. The car’s dynamics reflected that: stable and planted, with a sense of heft and refinement, but not as playful or communicative as the best purpose-built sports cars.

That tension—between image and intent—defines the Crossfire’s critical reception. Chrysler marketed it with the aura of a sports car, but it often drove like a stylish, compact GT. The cabin, too, revealed its dual identity. Some of the switchgear and ergonomics felt Mercedes-like in a good way—sturdy, familiar, functional—while other elements reminded buyers they were in a Chrysler wearing a premium suit. Practicality was limited, especially in the coupe, where the dramatic roofline and hatch design constrained cargo access and visibility. These weren’t deal-breakers for a niche car, but they made the Crossfire harder to justify against competitors that offered either more performance purity or more everyday usability.

The Crossfire also carried the burden of timing. It launched during a period when Chrysler was navigating shifting corporate ownership and product direction, and it competed in a market that was increasingly crowded with credible sporty coupes and roadsters. Enthusiasts could choose cars with clearer identities: Japanese sports coupes with sharp handling, American pony cars with big power, or European roadsters with brand cachet. The Crossfire’s identity—part Mercedes, part Chrysler, heavily style-driven—was distinctive, but distinctiveness doesn’t always translate into sustained demand.

And yet, that same distinctiveness is why the Crossfire has aged in an interesting way. In a modern landscape where many cars converge toward similar aerodynamic shapes and shared platforms, the Crossfire’s commitment to a bold form feels rarer. It represents a moment when a mainstream American brand tried to build a design-led halo car and had access to a high-quality parts bin to make it feasible. The SRT-6, in particular, has become the version that best aligns the car’s dramatic looks with its performance promise, giving the Crossfire a sharper point in automotive memory.

Ultimately, the Chrysler Crossfire is best understood not as a failed sports car or a rebadged Mercedes, but as a product of a specific era of experimentation—when partnerships could produce genuinely odd, compelling machines. Its styling remains polarizing, its driving character sits between categories, and its interior reminds you of its corporate genealogy. But those very qualities make it a fascinating artifact: a car that tried to turn collaboration into charisma, and in doing so created something that still looks like almost nothing else on the road.

The Unusual Plymouth Prowler

 The Plymouth Prowler was Chrysler’s late-1990s proof that a major automaker could still build something unapologetically weird—and get it into showrooms. Introduced for 1997, the Prowler looked like a 1930s hot rod filtered through a concept-car studio: exposed front wheels, a long pointed nose, a tightly pinched cabin, and a tapering tail that made it seem in motion even when parked. In an era dominated by rounded sedans and practical minivans, it was a rolling act of defiance, designed less to blend in than to start conversations at gas stations.

What made the Prowler especially interesting was that it wasn’t just a styling exercise. Chrysler used it as a technology demonstrator for lightweight construction, leaning heavily on aluminum for the frame and many body components. That focus on mass reduction fit the hot-rod spirit—light, quick, and visually minimal—even if the car’s mechanical package was more modern cruiser than tire-smoking brute. Power came from Chrysler’s 3.5-liter V6 paired with an automatic transmission, a choice that disappointed purists who wanted a V8 and a manual. Yet the decision also revealed what the Prowler really was: not a kit-car fantasy, but a factory-built specialty vehicle meant to be reliable, drivable, and compliant with modern safety and emissions rules.

The Prowler’s cultural impact outweighed its sales numbers. It arrived at a moment when “retro” design was becoming a mainstream strategy, and it helped set the stage for more nostalgia-inflected products—most famously Chrysler’s own PT Cruiser. But unlike many retro-themed cars that borrow a few cues and wrap them around conventional proportions, the Prowler committed to the hot-rod silhouette so completely that it remains instantly recognizable decades later. Its compromises—limited practicality, polarizing looks, and the mismatch between dramatic styling and relatively modest power—are part of why it’s remembered so clearly. The Prowler is best understood as a factory hot rod in the most literal sense: a bold shape, a technical experiment, and a reminder that sometimes the point of a car is not to be sensible, but to be memorable.

The Mercedes-Maybach VLS -- Back Seat Comfort in An Age of Inordinate Income Inequality

 

• Mercedes‑Benz expands the top-end portfolio by announcing the all-new Mercedes‑Maybach VLS, elevating Grand Limousines into the realm of sophisticated luxury
• The Mercedes‑Maybach VLS underscores the brand’s pursuit of perfection with timeless elegance, a first-class interior, a new level of digital sophistication and an exceptional rear-seat experience.

Last year, the Vision V show car provided an early glimpse of how Mercedes‑Benz plans to expand its top-end portfolio: with a Grand Limousine defined by prestige and exceptional elegance. This vision now becomes reality – with the all-new Mercedes‑Maybach VLS. It is an unparalleled Grand Limousine for customers with the highest expectations, bringing together generous space, uncompromising elegance and an uncompromising commitment to the rear passenger – for a one-of-a-kind “Welcome home.” feeling.

The all-new Mercedes‑Maybach VLS delivers an exceptional sense of space with unrivalled exclusivity, welcoming passengers into a completely new world of comfort and digital sophistication. This extravagant Grand Limousine transforms the generous space into an extraordinary private lounge with everything that characterizes a Mercedes‑Maybach: impeccable craftsmanship, luxurious materials and exquisite design details. It’s a true Maybach, now combined with the ultimate spatial and immersive digital experience, elevating automotive excellence even further.

What more can one say of a car for the rich made available at a time when the global economy may well tank due to the war with Iran! But the wealthy will remain wealthy, as happened in 1929 when clever traders read the markets, made adjustments, and came out of the crash better than before.

1939 Promotional film about the Autobahn -- Themes of Nature and the Environment, the Volk, and Mobility that brings Happiness.

 How wonderful it must have been to drive the Autobahn in 1939, before WWII and before there was much traffic and trucks to get in your way. The film is joyous -- filled with smiling travelers, drivers, construction workers getting paid, beautiful young women on a picnic. It is so ironic that this ribbon of road can blend so seamlessly into the land. A fantasy in a way, populated with rural folk and urbanites unified by a highway that would redefine the western word after 1945.

Life is a Highway -- Rascal Flatts

Life Is a Highway

Song by

Rascal Flatts

Whoo!
Mm, yeah
Life's like a road that you travel on
When there's one day here and the next day gone
Sometimes you bend, sometimes you stand
Sometimes you turn your back to the wind
There's a world outside every darkened door
Where blues won't haunt you anymore
Where the brave are free and lovers soar
Come ride with me to the distant shore

We won't hesitate
To break down the garden gate
There's not much time left today, yeah

Life is a highway
I wanna ride it all night long
If you're goin' my way
Well, I wanna drive it all night long

Through all these cities and all these towns
It's in my blood and it's all around
I love you now like I loved you then
This is the road and these are the hands
From Mozambique to those Memphis nights
The Khyber Pass to Vancouver's lights
Knock me down, I'm back up again
You're in my blood, I'm not a lonely man

There's no load I can't hold
A road so rough, this I know
I'll be there when the light comes in
Just tell 'em we're survivors

Life is a highway
Well, I wanna ride it all night long (whoo!)
If you're goin' my way
I wanna drive it all night long (all night long)
A gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme, yeah
Life is a highway
Well, I wanna ride it all night long (mm, yeah)
If you're goin' my way (you're goin' my way)
I wanna drive it all night long (all night long)

There was a distance between you and I (between you and I)
A misunderstanding once
But now we look it in the eye
Ooh, yeah (mm, yeah)
There ain't no load that I can't hold
The roads are rough, this I know
I'll be there when the light comes in
Tell 'em we're survivors

Life is a highway
Well, I wanna ride it all night long (all night long, yeah)
If you're goin' my way
Well, I wanna drive it all night long (a gimme, gimme, gimme, a gimme, gimme, yeah)
Life is a highway (life is a highway)
I wanna ride it all night long (whoo, yeah)
If you're goin' my way (you're goin' my way)
I wanna drive it all night long (all night long, yeah)
(Come on, gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme, yeah)

Life is a highway
I wanna ride it all night long (yeah, I wanna drive it all night long, baby)
If you're goin' my way (you're goin' my way)
I wanna drive it all night long (all night long)

Songwriters: Thomas William Cochrane. For non-commercial use only.