The end of the super sports car?

It wouldn't surprise me... most of the Gen-Y folks I know could care less about supercars, or sports cars in general, except for a mild: "Oh, wow, that's pretty cool" acknowledgement - kinda like if we were talking about a fighter jet... Cool, but they could care less about ever having one.

Not all of them, that's for sure, but this applies to quite a few of the ones that I know, anyway.

 

They'd be making a huge mistake to cater just to the hippie greenies. I'm Gen Y, born 1984, and I don't care about any of the green BS and I certainly don't pine over the latest and greatest hybrids.
I want 600 HP station wagons and two seat sports cars that shift instantly allowing for a 3 second 0-60 time. I would like to be able to see the gas gauge drop when I stomp on the loud pedal.

 

Stick shifts are for yesterday, old cars and old men. I love the manual gearboxes on my old cars; I love the paddles on my new street and race cars. As long as testosterone flows and the motor vehicle is controlled by its occupants, the desire for speed will conjure up fast, if not super, cars. Generalizations about generations are risky.

 

Yep. I'm in this group and I want a Dauer 962 lol. Also think the 918 is going the right direction. For someone who lived during the 70s I'm not sure how, and when taking into account all the super powerful cars that are on the mkt today from nearly every builder, one could say super sports cars are dieing out.

This generation however is more mindful of waste. But just because we may want hybrid, diesel, or electric for our boring tasks like going to the store or dr, doesn't mean we don't want 600 hp v12 for the weekend get away with the wife.

To be honest I think the baby boomers hurt the sports car mkts the most. They brought us the minivan, autos in all cars, cup holders and tvs everywhere, and stupid safety regs that have kept us from some of the greatest cars.

Ya just because I want my iPhone to sink with my radio properly doesn't mean I don't want a 600hp v12 to carry the radio lol.

And consider the source; The LA Times? No agenda there lol.

 

As long as guys with small weenies want to get hot girls, there will be demand for supercars. OK that was satire. My first sports car (other than a Nissan 300zx and a BMW 635) was a Porsche 911. I pulled up to a friends house with a sh*t eating grin on my face. She walked out and said, "Is that your Porsche? Sorry to hear about your penis."

OK, my real response is this . . . the current generation has no ambition, and is perfectly happy living in the middle class. They have lost their mojo. They lack inspiration. This is cyclical.

When they get it back, the will need something to inspire them and we will see a renewed desire for supercars. Also the economy is so bad that demand is weak.

 

Ditto

I am amazed at how many Hot Young Women with tattoos, pircings and very little clothing offer to do things with me that I've never even heard of when I take P 4/5 to CVS to buy denture glue.

 

And who screwed the Econ? And no ambition? This generation isn't the one who thought a house in the suburbs with 3 kids a minivan, crap load of debt, and golden retriever along with the mandatory divorce because we were too scared to live our lives when we were young and now have to have one last hoorah with a gen y'er lol is the way to go.

 

Hoorah lol.

 

The Super Sports car is fine. It's fitted with KERS, has a developed engine that makes 40 more HP, a shark fin, a bigger rear wing, a new nose, a new undertray and a roof engine air inlet but it's fine. I'm going over to track test it in a few weeks.
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This.

 

Mind if I borrow P 4/5 for a weekend?

 

Supercar manufacturers are focussing on China, India and the rest of Asia. China has more than offset the drop in sales in the West and is now Ferraris biggest market. In worldwide terms the genre is definitely not dying out.

 

This.... Is Amazing! And I know plenty of gen y'ers who would kill to simply be in the presence of it.

Simply beautiful in every way.

 

For iron ore yes.

For Ferrari's no.

Ferrari sold 300 Ferrari's in China in 2010.

They sold 1500 in the US.

 

+1

I'm in the same boat and couldn't care less about green cars or whatever crap people think they are doing to save the environment. All my cars will be stick shift and my dream car is very anti-green...McLaren F1 GTR, lol. Exact opposite of slow and good for the environment. Road converted, please, and leave the race livery on it.

 

The allure of the super car will never die. When I brought my 360 home, my 19 year old son could ot wait to bring his friends over to see it. I had to wipe the drool off the car. When I started the engine, one said "OMG, that is absolutely orgasmic". Another said "I just creamed in my pants".
I think this generation will be more practical in terms of there daily drivers but none of them will aspire to own a Prius.

 

Well...

(1) Who is going to buy a stick shift if it's slower, more work and less efficient than a modern gearbox? A stick shift today is getting to be the equivalent of a rotary phone: it does take more skill to dial one fast, but who cares. I agree with the youngsters on this. Stick shifts belong on classic cars, and are anachronistic on the new stuff. That said, classic cars are a pleasure and mechanical indulgence that I wish more people would recognize. Technology stole the sports car from us, in many ways.

(2) With traffic and speed cameras and insurance premiums, most driving is dull. Including the brainless oval racing in the U.S. I don't see much reason for younger people to get involved in cars other than for the empty status symbol value (see Porsche Cayenne, Ferrari FF, BMW X6, Cadillac Escalade, etc.) encouraged by rap/bling culture.

(3) Technology has been taking over cars for the last decade. If you visit a car dealership, notice how no one actually looks under the bonnet, but everyone plays with the tech toys. My Audi doesn't even have a dipstick. Mechanical interactions have been offshored and out of fashion for a while. Insert a joke here about old British cars, but the mechanical involvement they required also endeared them to a lot of owners, and taught many how to use profanity more effectively. You really don't have to own a wrench anymore, and OBD-II isn't the sort of thing you hook up for fun.

(4) The definition of the sports car has been creeping for decades. The Lotus Elise/Exige is probably the only potentially road-ready car that defines the category. Everything else has become big and luxurious -- Porsche 991, Ferrari 458, Jaguar XKR are all fast, opulent rides but would need a lot of work to be raceworthy. They are trophies of marques with racing glory, but they are not tools by which to attain further glory. Racing used to be cheap and accessible for amateurs -- not so much anymore.

(5) Not wantonly trashing the environment is something that Gen Y is smarter about than my generation has been. If they want cars that are quick and clean, they are better consumers than most of us. Take a sniff of the air in China and savor all of those unregulated tailpipes. In hindsight, a car culture built on internal combustion is kind of like smoking in airplanes -- it seemed OK at the time, but the more we learn the dumber it became.

 

The other thing that is killing the "super sports car" is too much nanny technology. Electronic nannies do nothing but help bad drivers think that they're better drivers. The visceral driving experience (the butterfly in the stomach feeling that this car may kill you) is gone.

Flappy paddle semi-automatic trannys, all wheel drive, dynamic stability control, variable assist electronic steering, blah.. blah.. blah..

I love my Lotus Exige and Elise because they have none of this crap. Not even power steering. The better driver I become, the better car they become.

 

Off topic, but I would bet the Elise and Exige hold value well now that they've been discontinued. They're the only modern cars in their category. Sorry to see Lotus winding down production (and potentially winding down, period...)

 

Fully agree.

What about the Porsche Boxster / Cayman?

 

Yep. Ironically, it's the rawness of those cars that killed them. The cost to develop all of the technologies required to meet government requirements to import such a low production vehicle into the U.S. (and other countries) is profit prohibitive.

My two cars have no side airbags, no 5mph bumpers, no DSC, no "pedestrian safe front end", etc... etc... Lotus had exemptions on a few U.S. requirements, but those exemptions have now expired.

I'll probably keep the Exige for a long time. It's the last of a dying breed. I can only hope its value increases because of that. But it's a shame whats going on with Lotus.

 

And it's painted... red. The way all Super Sports cars should be!

Congratulations - it looks great!

 

The crux of this argument is what constitutes a 'super sports car' ?

Even a Lotus Elise and Corvette exceed the driving prowess of 99% of the public so the 'super' sports cars performance is superfluous.

Thats not to say i want to deny anyone from having one. Just saying that if no car ever performed better than an Elise , 99% of the public wouldnt even know it.

Anyway...as long as there are wealthy people there will be supercars. Maybe not as many as there currently are (which is the most EVER), but at least a few to choose from for the very few people who care about such things.

 

Absolutely not, just a small chang in direction.
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