I’m John Davis – and this is MotorWeek!

• Let’s talk about the origins of John Davis the petrol-head. Were any of your family members into cars? What attracted you to them? Was there a certain/specific make/model that got you excited about the automotive world? 
• You went to school to become a mechanical / aerospace engineer. What was your plan there? How did you end up in the automotive world? And more importantly transition to Broadcasting?
• Many people are familiar with the show, for some of us, it’s always “existed” there’s never been a time without MotorWeek – How/Why was MotorWeek born?
• For those that might be learning about MotorWeek for the first time, what is the shows format, segments, how are reviews conducted (the criteria).
• We all get things wrong, have there been any reviews that just didn’t go quite right? What are some of the memorable outtakes from MotorWeek? What are some of the “best of” memories from MotorWeek?
• You’ve worked in recent years with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to promote public awareness of alternative fuels. What are your thoughts on the EVolution as we call it here on the show?
• You’ve owned a variety of high performance cars, including several vintage Ford Mustangs, Chevrolet Corvettes and a DeTomaso Pantera. What’s in your garage these days? What does John Davis daily drive? Is there a bucket list vehicle (new or old) you’d still like to review for MotorWeek?

and much, much more!

Crew Chief Brad: [00:00:00] BreakFix podcast is all about capturing the living history of people from all over the autosphere, from wrench turners and racers to artists, authors, designers, and everything in between. Our goal is to inspire a new generation of petrolheads that wonder How did they get that job or become that person?

The road to success is paved by all of us because everyone has a story.

Crew Chief Eric: Our guest tonight is a mechanical and aerospace engineering graduate, as well as an MBA from NC state and the university of North Carolina. He’s been on commercial radio and television programs nationwide for over four decades. He is a sought after speaker and frequently addresses automotive executives, consumer groups, automotive enthusiasts, and students interested in the field.

His weekly program offers him that rare chance to bring the enjoyment of a hobby to his professional life and to use his broadcasting, engineering, and analytical expertise [00:01:00] to supply information and insight to those who enjoy cars. Tonight, we are proud and honored to let our guest’s distinct voice introduce himself to our audience and share his story.

So without further delay.

John Davis: Hi, I’m John Davis, and this is the break fix podcast.

Crew Chief Eric: Welcome John. So like all good break pick stories, there’s always a who, what, where, why, and when some sort of superhero origin story. So tell us about your petrol head origin story. Were you from a family that was into cars? How are you attracted to them?

Were there certain makes and models that it got you excited about the automotive world as a kid? Transcribed

John Davis: Well, you’re talking a long time ago, uh, Eric, and basically, you know, a Southern boy that grew up in the 50s and 60s, basically, you grew up with gasoline in your vein and, and it had been pretty prevalent through my family, my father, his brothers.

They were all car aficionados. I will say it was pretty much almost entirely a Ford family, which [00:02:00] wasn’t unusual. We were there sort of the birth of NASCAR and we followed the people like Fred Lorenzen in the sixties during his NASCAR peak days. So yeah, it was kind of a natural, but I really went into school at NC state to become a.

An aerospace engineer, although about halfway through when I realized how expensive it was going to be to get a pilot’s license. Cause I really wanted one very badly. I even gravitated even more towards automobiles. I mean, I was driving my grandfather’s 1953 DeSoto with a, you know, three on the tree up and down his driveway.

Gosh, from the time, probably I was 12 or 13 years old, just going forward and back and forward and back. So it wasn’t an unusual thing that cars became a fascination, but I did not expect to make my career in it. And I didn’t for a long time. I mean, after [00:03:00] engineering school into the Vietnam war, there weren’t as many jobs for aerospace engineers.

Those that were there, they wanted you to go get a business degree. So I went ahead and got my MBA before, by that time I had set my sights on going to wall street, which I did move to New York for about a year, but I had worked my way through college and radio and television, just as a way to make some extra spending money.

Weekend disc jockey and then, uh, with a couple of the local TV stations, just, you know, weekend fill ins for the news desk and the sports desk and so forth. I, uh, ended up having an opportunity to go to, uh, Maryland and Maryland Public Television to work on the pioneering financial series, Wall Street Week with Louis Rukeyser, which really started financial television as we know it today.

And I was the chief. producer of that from 73 until its demise about 30 years on. But during that process, when I had become executive producer, I [00:04:00] was charged by my boss at the time to basically do a couple of pilots to see whether or not I was a one trick pony or had some other talents. One of the pilots I did was Motor Week because being an automotive enthusiast, and by that time I had owned a DeTomaso Pantera and a number of Mustangs and a Corvette.

I mean, I basically was putting my money where my enthusiasm was. We did the show in 78, a pilot. It sat on the shelf for three years. And then in 81, when we got a hint that another big public TV station was going to do an automotive series. And the idea for the series was it would be a national series from the get go.

When we got that idea that they were going to do something, uh, we jumped into action and finally got it on the air. So it went on in the fall of 81 in October. Thought it would be fun to do for about five years. And here we are, uh, 42 years later.

Crew Chief Eric: So for many of our guests, they’re obviously familiar with the show.

It’s been on for 42 years. And if you’re not,

John Davis: if you’re not, you should be ashamed of yourself. If you call yourself a gear [00:05:00] head and you haven’t stumbled across us on YouTube or something, shame on you.

Crew Chief Eric: Absolutely. And what’s beautiful is you guys have said. started to also bring back some of the old motor week tests, which are fantastic to watch online.

John Davis: We do a lot of that. That’s our retro reviews and that’s all done by an ex staff member who is not my son, even though he was often accused of it. Ben Davis. He, uh, basically does that after he’s moved away and couldn’t work for us full time anymore. He works for us part time and he puts together one of the retro reviews for our, uh, Motor Week listing on YouTube.

com slash Motor Week. He tries to do one a week and then every time there’s a holiday, he’ll do a whole weekend marathon where you can call in. And sometimes I’m there, sometimes some of the old staff like Lisa Barrow show up. So, he’s turned the retro reviews into a real thing. Thank you, Ben.

Crew Chief Eric: And you know, what’s fun is you guys really set the bar, not just here in the United States.

Once those retro reviews came out, I started to see that in [00:06:00] publications, even overseas where they’re like, well, motor week started doing that. We’ll start doing that too. And some Italian magazines were doing it, bringing back old trials and nineties. And I thought that was really, really neat.

John Davis: It’s interesting.

I didn’t know that. Well, nobody has got our library. I mean, it’s just that simple. There really isn’t any other depository except maybe some commercials of video going back in our offices. We’ve actually got old tapes, cassettes, and we have, we still have some machines that will play them, of manufacturers B rolls that go back about 30 years.

And I’m sure those manufacturers don’t even have that stuff in their archives anymore.

Crew Chief Eric: We actually recently had Dennis Gage on who has the second longest running automotive program in the United States. My classic car. And when he was here, we actually asked him about how he constructs his episodes and his are a little bit more free form and things like that.

But I wonder after 42 years of doing motor week, how do you guys figure out? [00:07:00] What you’re going to talk about next and what cars you’re going to review next. How do you put all that together?

John Davis: If you’ve watched the show for any number of years, you know, the format has basically remained unchanged and indeed It’s really similar to what we did with the first episode 42 years ago The idea was it is a magazine it is designed with short segments that can be taken out Others put in their place, or you take them out to run commercials because our show is not only its first run on public television station around the country, but we also basically run the show as a second run on cable systems.

Right now, our partner is Mav TV. The auto sports racing network. We have to be able to leave them time to make their money with a magazine style. So you can pull out segments, leave time and not basically destroy the entire program, which is harder to do when it’s not formatted. So we’re very highly formatted.

Our show came along about the [00:08:00] same time as two other magazine style. And that’s really is the concept for motor week is an automotive magazine for TV. But you had a series on commercial tv for many years called evening magazine It was done by the westinghouse stations. It sort of pioneered the magazine style segment after segment for Television and also back in those days Entertainment tonight was fairly new very new and that was the format they used so it has a lot of great Possibilities now the downside is you got to know what you’re going to put in there You And you’ve got to do it to time.

Time is what we live by. As far as what we cover, it’s really simpler than you would think. There are always new cards coming out, and you’re basically trying to keep up with the newest stuff that’s there. Our idea was, from the beginning, we want to be as timely as the major print magazines, back when they were king.[00:09:00]

So if they would have something in their magazine on a certain month, Whatever the cover month was. Well, during that month, we would try to have it on the air. And the idea was they couldn’t show as many pictures. So you got a lot of the technical data from them, and you got more of the pictures from us.

Now, today, of course, it’s much different. Everything’s up on the internet almost instantaneously. So now what we spend most of our time with is more in depth. But we do think the one thing that sets us apart from so much of the video that’s out there today is we actually do test cars. We don’t just write about them.

We just don’t just talk about them. We don’t just look at the press kit and kind of regurgitate it. We’re at the track every week with whatever we’ve got in. And we run through our regimented tests, just like we have for four decades. So when you hear what we’re doing, you know, it’s firsthand experience and we’ve got the miles to prove it.

We are public televisions. We are lucky [00:10:00] enough to have that shine on us because they hold us to a very high standard and we’re very happy. That they do, and we think that makes us still very unique.

Crew Chief Eric: It’s got to be challenging, especially getting cars in to do the tests and things like that.

John Davis: Right now it is.

Ordinarily, we have two cars in a week for two weeks that we test, and that’s a long time. Most car makers don’t want to give you a car for two weeks. When you figure how much videotaping we have to do, and we have to deal with weather, that’s That’s what it works out to be right now, though, because of the shortage that everybody hears about the supply change.

There’s no cars on dealerships. Sometimes the cars show up for far less than that. We just have to work faster when a car comes in. If you watch the show, I’m usually standing up next to the vehicle to do my little introduction. That’s usually a dealer car. Dealers don’t have cars. So right now, the moment that car comes in, I have to do whatever I need to do with the car while we’re testing it because that car will likely will not be able to get one back for a [00:11:00] second taping.

So the pandemic and the supply chain shortage has had a big impact on us as well.

Crew Chief Eric: So what would you say was probably one of the hardest cars to attain and bring in for a review?

John Davis: Oh, it’s always one of the exotics. Right now, some of the newer manufacturers, you know, it’s tough to get a Tesla. It’s tough to get a Lucid.

We managed to do it. What we’ve always done with a lot of the exotics and now we do it with some of the new brands is if the manufacturers don’t have a car in our area and they’re small and they try as best they can, but it doesn’t always work out. We’ll get an owner’s car. We have lots of owners that come to us and say, You know, I noticed you haven’t done one or you haven’t done one in a while.

I’ve got one. Would you like to do it a little more careful with their vehicle? Shall we say a lot more careful, actually, to be honest, but we’ll still, if they’ll let us take it to the track and do our evaluations, but the newer brands, exotics, we’re very fortunate that Porsche works with us very, very well.

Lamborghini does as well. Some of the other exotics. [00:12:00] a little harder to get to and but if we can’t get it from a manufacturer, we’ll get it from an owner and that’s kind of standard throughout the automotive media business many times in the over the decades when you would see a car being tested an exotic by one of the big buff books.

They’d often tell you it was an owner’s car. So that really hasn’t changed

Crew Chief Eric: over the course of reviewing thousands of cars. There’s probably episodes that just didn’t go right. I personally remember as a kid, the Zuzu trooper slalom exercise and how that all went down. And, you know, the reviews that came from that later, it’s true.

It happened. What are some of those memorable outtakes for motor week? And what are some of those Best of memories for you after the last four decades.

John Davis: Of course, you always remember the stuff that doesn’t quite work out. Right. I am thankful to say knock on wood. We’ve had very few accidents over the years and no one has ever gotten seriously hurt.

And I hope that continues a hope way beyond my tenure. You have to be careful. Cars are [00:13:00] lethal, if you will pardon that. I hate to use that word, but they’re big machines and they move fast and they weigh a lot and you can get into trouble if you’re not what you’re doing. Safety is something that we live by day after day.

We did have one car, and I’m not going to mention the name, but let me just say it was a large European made, top of the line sedan. And we were at our testing facility doing low speed slalom, which we only do at 35 miles per hour. And the bottom of the engine let go, coated the track with engine oil and the car ended up on a truth.

Crew Chief Eric: Oh no.

John Davis: You think, you know, you can roll a car at 35 miles an hour. Yes, you can. You can actually roll a card about. 15 miles an hour. And it turned out that we discovered that the engine had a fault. So after the automaker finished getting very upset with us, about two weeks later, they let us know that we had done them a favor.

I had another situation where we had another European [00:14:00] sedan. We were driving it to a Roebling road in Savannah, Georgia, which is our winter testing ground. And we had almost gotten to Fayetteville, North Carolina. It was a cold day. Had stopped for gas, cranked it back up. The pulley on the front of the engine on the crankshaft exploded and left us stranded.

And then once again, carmaker of course was very upset. Car had to sit there for like two weeks because they had a freak snowstorm right after that. But we had discovered a manufacturing fault. Every five years when we do an anniversary, we show some outtakes. We used this one for a while, but we sort of stopped.

But it was where we caught a vehicle. It was a compact SUV. Again, I’m not going to say which brand. And we rolled it at our test track. We discovered that the suspension had a harmonic. That if you got it going back and forth just properly, the car would literally jump off the ground. And turn itself on its head.

These are all old stories. I mean, these go back [00:15:00] 25 years to 30 years. I’m happy to say the cars today are much, much better and quality is so much better. We really don’t have these instances. Now it tends to be something like the screen doesn’t work on the infotainment system or something electronic. We don’t tend to have mechanical issues because cars today are designed so well.

But over the years, you know, we’ve had our share of mishaps. There are few and far between, and I want to keep it that way.

Crew Chief Eric: Probably plenty of great memories to combat all of those. So that’s awesome.

John Davis: Oh, yeah. I mean, you know, every day you’re driving somebody else’s pride and joy. Some engineer has spent, you know, the better part of the last three or four years on it.

I feel bad for them in one aspect, because you love it, you love it. But suppose you don’t like Cars are not all designed by one person, suppose. You get in a vehicle, I can remember back in the oh, nineties, when in dash stereo systems were starting to get really, really complicated, [00:16:00] lots of small buttons, and we really would take some of the manufacturers to task because the buttons are so small.

You a regular hand. You couldn’t hit. The button you were ended up two and three buttons, and I used to think after we had scolded some brand on that poor engineer that was designing that he probably was told to put all those controls on there probably knew better, but that’s what you get. And we are enthusiast when we point out something that we don’t like on a car, which people know is fairly rare.

We’re pretty positive most of the time. We wanted the car to get better. That’s the whole bottom line. We’re trying to give them feedback that maybe they’ll take to heart. Over the years, though, there have been so many wonderful situations, so many accolades, so many anniversaries, so many great cars we’ve driven.

Crew Chief Eric: So, John, along with that line of thinking, what is one of the most memorable cars that you’ve reviewed in all these years on Motor Week?

John Davis: The answer is, and it’s an exotic, is the Enzo Ferrari. Oh. And the reason is, [00:17:00] it was the first exotic car that I felt, number one, was designed for a six foot tall American, versus Italian anyway.

It was super comfortable. It was the easiest car I had ever driven, insanely fast in, and felt comfortable. And there was something about the way they designed from start to finish. They wanted the most refined Ferrari they had ever developed in memory of Enzo. Yet they wanted it to uphold all of his performance standards.

And they did it. And they did an incredible job. And that combination of all the parts working together perfectly and ending up with a vehicle that is just a joy to drive both at 30 miles an hour and 130 miles an hour is very, very rare. And the only other vehicle that comes to mind that we [00:18:00] walked away from feeling about the same.

The bullet, not the first bullet. I believe it was bullet number three, Mustang bullet number three. That was Just a perfect combination of parts engineering and build and was just an amazing car. And those vehicles just don’t come along very often.

Crew Chief Eric: So I have to ask one of our famous pit stop questions, because I think a lot of our guests are going to be interested to know.

And like you said, you have a pretty sorted past when it comes to your own personal cars, but you’ve reviewed Thousands of cars over the last 42 years. If you had to pick from all those cars and all the ones, you know, about what’s the most beautiful car of all time.

John Davis: That’s an easy one for anybody. My age, there is only really one answer and that’s the Jaguar XK8.

There is no more beautiful automobile that has been designed in my lifetime than the XK8. So that’s easy. That’s the easy one.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, the hard one is then, [00:19:00] what about the ugliest car of all time? Or the worst car of all time?

John Davis: That’s not

Crew Chief Eric: hard either. That’s not hard. That’s not hard at all. It’s the Yugo. Oh, really?

You know, you’re the second person to say that now. That’s awesome.

John Davis: Absolutely. Oh, I mean, we tested one. We drove one. We picked it up by its bumper and carried it across the parking lot. And one of our ex writers, Martin Peters, he actually owned one. No, he didn’t own that. He owned a Trabant. Sorry. Just as bad.

He owned a Trabant. Well, we knew quite a few people actually that owned a Ugo’s at the time, which really isn’t very fair. I mean, it was a little fiat that basically it was just And I have to say, it’s probably not the absolute ugliest. I could throw in a couple of, Oh, I mean, a lot of people like to pick on the poor Aztec from Pontiac, but I think it’s In my book, the Aztec, I guess, would be right up there with the, the Yugo.

There were a couple of during [00:20:00] the 80s and 90s that deserved all the scorn that you could reap upon them. But I’m sure I’ve now upset at least one or two of your listeners, because if you know anybody that owns an Aztec, they love them. That’s very true.

Crew Chief Eric: That’s a very true statement. You said the E type of all time.

Are there any future classics, any that you see coming on the horizon that really gets your interest?

John Davis: Well, we just finished testing the Audi E tron GT, which is based on the Taycan from Porsche. It’s one of the most beautiful automobiles I’ve ever seen. It is stunning. It is so gorgeous. With so many SUVs on the market, Finding a real beauty is getting harder and harder.

The Taycan, which is one of my personal favorites, and then seeing what Audi has done to the basic shape. I would say if I had to pick today, the prettiest car, certainly that’s come through our lot in the last two years, it would probably be that e tron GT. It’s a gorgeous car.

Crew Chief Eric: So [00:21:00] I have another question about the construction of Motor Week, and it’s pretty important for those people that, again, I’m questioning where they’ve never heard of Motor Week before, but I often when I say, Oh, did you catch Motor Week?

And they go, Auto Week? No, Motor Week, you know, the show. You mean Auto Week, the Peterson? No, no, no, no. It’s like the old, old, old Top Gear. And they go, Oh, so where did the name come from? And how did you kind of decouple the confusion between AutoWeek, which has been around forever as a publication and the show itself?

John Davis: We never really get confused with AutoWeek. The obvious confusion comes with MotorTrend, which for several years, we were actually on the MotorTrend cable network. Basically what happened was back in 1978, When we were doing the pilot, I did a name search. And in those days you had to basically go down to Washington, start looking around, talk to lawyers that had access to all of the copyrighted names.

Well, you couldn’t copyright a name, but you could copyright a logo. We [00:22:00] came up with MotorWeek. Oddly enough, We came up with it at the same time somebody else did. So when we went on the air in October of 81, in January of 81, I got a call from some folks at Turner television in Atlanta and they were launching a show called motor week.

And they want to know who we were. By that time, we had already done whatever preliminary registration of the name you needed. They had done the search the same time we did. They added the name illustrated, so they were MotorWeek Illustrated. Their logo was very different, and that’s all you can really copyright at that stage is the look of the logo.

So we coexisted for a long time, but they were on the air, then they were off. And then they were a production company for quite a while. I think I had gone in with a long list of names and it was the best one that came out that it was available. So it wasn’t magic at all. Motor pretty obviously. I will say the week was.

Because I had been producing Wall Street [00:23:00] week for so many years, and I wanted the show to be a weekly. I didn’t want it to be a limited run series. I wanted it to be on week after week after week year round because I wanted stations to leave us in a time spot. And if you’re on for 13 episodes or 26 back in those days, and you finish running new shows or going to reruns, stations would tend to move you to a less great time spot.

I wanted us to be new every week and basically hold on to our time spots and that has worked.

Crew Chief Eric: Growing up in the DMV, it’s always just been one of these things. When you watch Motorweek, especially as a kid, you realize the testing was always done at 75 which has been closed now for many, many years. It reopened, it closed again.

John Davis: Well, officially that’s true. The track did close as far as to be open. This is a Dragstrip that, for those that don’t know, they’re Mount Airy, Maryland, in a little community called Monrovia. [00:24:00] And it was owned for, um, many years by Bill Wilcom. Bill was, uh, a dear, is a dear friend, I should say. I believe his son didn’t want to take the track over.

So, as Bill got older, he first farmed out the operation to someone else. It was briefly closed to the public, then it opened again. During all of this time, though, we continued to use it as a test track. So legally, it was not closed. It did not close for absolute good until two years ago. And even then, the new owners, because it was finally sold, have shown interest in reopening it.

They haven’t managed to do it yet. But at that point, we were fortunate enough, Bill had introduced us to the folks behind Mason Dixon Dragway in Boonesboro, Maryland. It’s a very nice track, a beautiful setting. It’s up in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. So it’s a good another 45 minutes for us, but it’s a beautiful track.

And we’ve been very [00:25:00] fortunate to go from 7580 up to Mason Dixon. But yeah, for 7580, we started using them in the 80s and stopped, what, two years ago. So.

Crew Chief Eric: But more importantly, for many of us here, we pilgrimage every weekend, after weekend, after weekend to summit point motor sports park where motor week also tests.

So that’s always an exciting thing to see. Oh, there’s, you know, that’s term 10 at summit. It’s always super exciting when you guys are there.

John Davis: Yeah. Again, personal relationship, the longtime owner of summit was a dear friend. We had a little bit to do when they built the Jefferson circuit. Which really is used, I think, a lot by motorcycles, but we tend to use it a lot because it’s a short, fast, and it’s easy to shoot, but we’ve been able to continue to use Summit, and we also use Dominion Raceway down in Fredericksburg.

That’s been relatively new. We don’t tend to go back to Pocono much anymore. We used to do that quite frequently as well. We’re lucky enough [00:26:00] that summit is, you know, within the easy drive as is Mason Dixon and Dominion. So we’re very, very fortunate. They’re not right next door, but they’re not that far away.

Very nice people. I mean, the owners of these tracks are just really great people. That’s all I can say.

Crew Chief Eric: So switching gears a little bit, many people may not know that you’ve worked alongside the department of energy to promote. Public awareness of alternative fuels. So I wanted to ask you another one of our Pitstop questions, which is, what are your thoughts on the current, what we call evolution and the birth of these EVs and the change from internal combustion to these electric vehicles?

What are your thoughts? And are there some that stand out at you right now as some up and comers?

John Davis: I’ve got gasoline in my veins and I wouldn’t say I’m a contrarian. I’m a realist. I think that The governments are pushing a little too hard for EVs in everybody’s garage too quickly, but that is what governments and politicians tend to do.

We’ve been lucky enough to be [00:27:00] intimately involved in the entire alternative fuel. A world actually, since the show began, but for the last 20 years, working with the U. S. Department of energy, looking at alternative fuels and not just electric, but natural gas and propane and biodiesel and you name it. We probably done something about it because we found it really goes back to 2001.

I was at a conference with the Department of energy folks, and they had asked me to come give a little. chat about what we do. And I realized that it would be great to find some kind of soapbox, purpose, something we could focus a lot of the energy on the show on that wasn’t already mundane. I mean, everybody and their brother talked about safety and even fuel economy was just everywhere.

So it struck me after listening to a number of these speakers. All of these amazing fuels. And we had done shows on coal powered car. The GM came up with back in the eighties. I mean, [00:28:00] we’d done electric conversions. We’d done all sorts of stuff, turbine cars. We’d done it all, but we hadn’t really looked beyond the surface, beyond the vehicle, after talking to these folks that ate, slept and drank alternative fuels, we realized there was a great story there and a lot of success stories that our audience would like to know about.

And so I’m very thrilled that we’ve been able to work with them so closely over two decades. They’re great folks. They have lots of wonderful ideas. Most people don’t realize that an awful lot of the technology that’s going into battery electric vehicles and just the It’s about everything you can think of the lightweight materials that all comes from laboratories that are run by the department of energy.

So in other words, it’s your tax dollars at work and just like NASA and it’s forerunners create things to make air travel better and then airframe manufacturers and airlines get to basically use it for free. It’s the same really with [00:29:00] the DOE labs. So when you get into that battery electric car, There’s probably some of your hard earned tax dollars help get it to where it is today.

Getting back to what you ask. I think the push towards going all electric, even by some of the brand manufacturers like General Motors by 2035. I think it’s a little fast. I think it’s going to happen. Everybody knows the major problems for public acceptance are range and infrastructure, charging infrastructure.

The range is continuing to climb. I mean, we’re very fickle in our business. First, it was, well, when they get to 200 miles of range. We’ll think that’s maybe enough and then it was 300 now I think most of us are holding out for 500 and it’s coming I mean the new silver auto is probably going to have 500 mile range or 400 anyway to start the lucid It’s got 500 of course, it’s pricey But my point is when you get to the point where these vehicles can be used On fairly long trips where [00:30:00] people can view them as if not their only car, a car, they don’t have to worry about getting where they want to go.

If they have an emergency without stopping for 30 or 40 or 50 minutes, then we’re there. Where are we now today? We’re at the level where many of these vehicles are terrific for the second car or commuter car. We’re seeing the prices come down. GM’s Chevrolet’s new Equinox CV, 30, 000 with a 250 mile range should be very, very successful and not only looks great, it’s going to do what people need to run it to work.

Charge it once a week, either at work or at their home with a relatively slow charger, a 240, you know, like a dryer circuit charger, but to take it on the road, you know, you’re going to need more fast chargers. Either if you’ve got a Tesla, you’re ahead of the game because they’ve got their chargers in more places right now, but brings me home and why this is not ready for prime time is two weeks [00:31:00] ago.

On my way to Vermont, we always stop in Rutland, Vermont and gas up. And we pulled into a station and here’s a row of Tesla chargers and I’m there and gone in about seven minutes. And the three or four Teslas that were there, they were there when I got there. People reading magazines and newspapers and there were tablets and they were there a long time after I left.

And I don’t think most Americans. are willing to take two hours out of their day if they’re making a long trip for this. The other thing is, while the Tesla’s, their charging system is well done, they plug in, it knows the car, it charges it, you’re gone. The commercial systems out there right now, they’re not quite plug and play yet.

It can take you 15 minutes to get them to work. If you’re unlucky, you may have to call their 800 number. It can be enormously frustrating. When they work, they work great. When they don’t work, they’re frustrating. And you roll up and there’s [00:32:00] four of them, and three of them are occupied, and one’s vacant, but that one doesn’t work.

There has to be some maturity along with just not only more infrastructure, but it has to work better. It’s coming. It is the future. I hope it doesn’t displace all internal combustion engine vehicles anytime soon 2050. I think that’s a very realistic time frame to where they could become total. Shall we say 2035 is pushing it.

In my opinion, I’m being honest with you. I really don’t like politicians telling people what they can and cannot buy when it comes to automobiles. It’s never worked. Back in the 70s and 80s, when they tried to make everybody buy small cars, what did everybody do? They discovered the loophole, and they went into SUVs and pickup trucks.

And so I sort of feel like I’ve lived through this kind of forcing you to do things against your will. And I don’t think it’s going to work this time any better than it worked last time. Who knows? California certainly is at the forefront, as [00:33:00] are the other states, including the state of Maryland, who are likely to follow.

But even there, there’s a loophole. They’re still going to allow some plug in hybrids, which have an internal combustion engine. So, I think plug in hybrids have been largely overlooked because to me, that’s the best of both worlds. The Chevrolet Volt, V O L T, that was a fabulous vehicle. 65 miles of battery and enough gas.

To get you anywhere you needed to go in an emergency and keep going. That’s a great solution. My ideal electric vehicle is a plug in hybrid with a about a hundred mile range on the battery and a small engine that will either charge the battery or give me direct power and let me do my 500 mile trip.

Right now, the Europeans seem to be a little more interested in that than the American manufacturers, but I actually think that’s the perfect solution. The other perfect solution is if Lawmakers would sit back and just look at facts. If you want to demand something, [00:34:00] demand manufacturers make all their vehicles just regular hybrids.

Small battery, doesn’t have to be a big electric motor, gives you help when you start out, when you use the most gas. That would cut the carbon footprint of automobiles in half almost overnight. And a couple of manufacturers, notably Toyota, they’re working towards that. Almost everything new they bring out.

The standard vehicle is either hybrid or it’s just barely one up from the bottom. So standard hybrid today is possible and would really alleviate the carbon footprint more than some pie in the sky that’s going to inconvenience people. Because most people with hybrids don’t even know what they’re driving, except for the fact that they get great gas mileage.

Crew Chief Eric: In the DMV especially, we talk all the time about how speeds are up, driving seems to be extremely erratic, especially after COVID. And I came to find out that you’re actually the spokesperson for the Smooth Operator Program, which a lot of us see on the digital billboards, [00:35:00] like on 695 and places like that.

John Davis: That was a long time ago. That was years ago. They were nice enough to ask me to contribute to that campaign, but so that’s, that, that is in my, I mean, I haven’t done anything with them for years, so I’m delighted that somebody still sees it.

Crew Chief Eric: They still pop up. I see them as I’m going down the road.

John Davis: Funny.

Crew Chief Eric: I’m putting these two together, but do you think it’s changed? Do you think it’s still the same? What are your thoughts on the way people are driving in the big cities now?

John Davis: I think people are driving like crazy people. COVID has done more damage to highway safety Then speed, I think, ever did, because unfortunately, when people weren’t going to work and are still not going to work, the people that were out on the roads, they just felt like, hey, there’s no traffic.

I can go as fast as I want. A lot of the law enforcement were staying home because of Covid. What little decorum there used to be on the roads around, you know, the Maryland, Washington, Delaware area, I think it’s pretty much gone out the window. I mean, [00:36:00] you have to drive defensively much more now than you did, I think, even three years ago.

I’m not trying to pretend that, you know, I don’t take liberties with the speed limits too, but what I see on the roads these days is a total disregard. for safety and for your fellow man. And I find it’s really sad. COVID has done that in a number of ways, but one of them that’s most recognizable is, um, driving.

Crew Chief Eric: We often bring that back to a conversation around motor sports too, because people will poo poo on the racers quite often. So you guys don’t know what you’re talking about. You know, you’re addicted to speed and this and that. And if you talk to most racers, they’re like, well, We’re some of the calmest people on the road.

We have very high situational awareness, but I think the track kind of gets it out of your system. And oftentimes I recommend to people, you should go take an advanced driver course and see what it’s like, because I hate to say anybody can go. Fast in a straight line, but it’s really different when you’re taking a turn at 80 miles an hour on a [00:37:00] racetrack, like you guys do when you’re testing cars versus what you do on the street.

So I can’t recommend it enough for people, you know, spend a couple of hundred bucks for that advanced training and you will learn so much and your driving will change.

John Davis: To be honest, they don’t even have basic training. I don’t think you ought to start with advanced training. You know, if I had children, I don’t.

The first thing I would do when they became legal so they could drive would stake them to get Barbara has it. There’s a summit point does it all the time. They’re basically skid break and skid schools.

Crew Chief Eric: Yeah, tire rack street survival,

John Davis: street survival, learn how to break and steer, learn how to steer.

Bertle Roos, who, um, is gone now, there’s still a school up in Pocono with his name. Bertle taught, and he was the most important instructor that I ever learned from. He called it ocular driving, and what he had done is he had brought over from Europe the concept that you basically had to use your eyes, look as [00:38:00] far into a corner as you could look, look as far down the road as you could look, trying to anticipate What was going to happen?

And I have stuck to that to this day that when I ever I’m driving either on a racetrack or just on an interstate to try and look as far as my eyes can see, anticipating either within that vehicle is going to do, or if there’s a crossroads, what am I going to do if somebody is coming out of it? And the other part of ocular driving that he taught, and it may sound stupid, but it’s, it’s not intuitive.

Look where you want to go in an emergency. Chances are you will get there. If you look where you don’t want to go, you’re going to get there too. So you have to train yourself that if somebody’s coming at you, find the escape route and do everything you can to get to that and stay focused on that. And chances are very good that will get you out of the fix.

Thanks. We do drive very fast on a track, and yes, we do get that [00:39:00] probably out of our systems, but safety is not just paramount. It’s the only thing we are concerned about. We preach to our drivers, never drive over your head. Never do something you feel unsafe. If the car is not responding to you properly, and you don’t feel that it can be pushed any harder, don’t push.

Because if you push the car beyond your limits, you’re in trouble. And unfortunately, when I see, oh, an older sedan and flying around the Baltimore beltway at 80, 85, 90 miles an hour, I’m wondering what kind of tires does he have on it. Or he or she, uh, has it been maintained properly? It wouldn’t take very much for that car to end up on a truth or worse.

And that’s what we see a lot of people driving like video games. That’s the thing that gets me. And I actually think video games maybe have done more damage to driving habits than any kind [00:40:00] of racing or competition. But yeah, if you’ve ever driven with a professional driver and I’ve driven with a lot of them, they’re the coolest people on the planet.

You may be frightened to death. But they’re as cool as a cucumber.

Crew Chief Eric: They do it every day. It’s their job. Take a step back for a moment. So when I first met you, you and I were both much younger. And I remember the day, like it was yesterday.

John Davis: I’m flattered. Thanks.

Crew Chief Eric: It was a Porsche club event. You were giving you were giving a talk and all this kind of thing and I’ll never forget because it was one of the most exciting and also traumatic experiences for me because you were taking questions from the crowd and this is at a PCA event where all they want to talk about is the latest 911 that’s coming out and the 968 and all these kinds of things.

And here I go. I raise my hand and I go, you know, Mr Davis. Can you tell me something about the Dodge Stealth and maybe this new Acura that’s coming out and you just heard the air gets sucked completely out of the room as all the heads turned and looked at me and you’re like, I must have blasphemed in church or something, [00:41:00] right?

To come back from that, I want to ask you about two cars that are hot right now. from the same manufacturer and get your opinions on those. And they are not the Dodge Stealth and not Acura Vigor. They are both from Toyota, the new GR Supra and the GR Corolla that is hitting our shores here in October. I want to get your thoughts on those cars as you’ve probably seen, tested and reviewed both of them.

John Davis: Well, we love the Supra. The only reason it didn’t get more awards when it came out is it had some real competition, but it’s a fabulous car. The rebirth of the Supra was far and away more than the original car ever could deliver. The GR Corolla, I think I applaud them because here you’ve got a company that on one hand is doing everything they can to promote a fuel economy, making hybrid standard almost across the board.

That’s their aim. And at the same time, they haven’t forgotten that Some people really want to enjoy driving even down to their most mundane product line. I think Toyota is a fascinating company. [00:42:00] A lot of it comes from, of course, their roots, but a lot of it is their U. S. management team, which most people don’t realize when Toyota was pretty young in this country, most of their management team were ex folks from Detroit automakers.

And they’ve over the years shepherd dual paths of performance, but also common sense when it comes to using fuel and how it impacts the environment. So I think they’re both very exciting vehicles. Toyota is unusual. They’ve got a lot of money so they can afford to kind of cover all the bases. But super is one of our absolute favorite cars of all time.

The new super Gazoo racing, however you want to pronounce it. Gazoo. They’ve got some very talented engineers. It reminds me not too many years ago when you used to see that kind of skunk works inside some of the Detroit automakers as well.

Crew Chief Eric: Even coming from brands like Volkswagen and others, where they were always throwing something out there to get the enthusiast based excited.

So it’s good to see that.

John Davis: That’s a great case in point. [00:43:00] VW, VW. How many times over the years have we said on motor testing some lowly golf product or Jetta or whatever, how they’ve instilled all the essence of some of the finest and most expensive European sports sedans in a vehicle that everybody can buy after all VW was the everyman’s car and they continue to do it.

I mean, Volkswagen’s one brand, man. That no matter what vehicle you buy, you’re going to buy a vehicle that it has above average performance, i. e. handling, braking, and reasonable acceleration. It’s part of their DNA. I’m not sure there’s any other automaker that I could say that about that makes affordable cars.

I mean, their good solid street performance is their DNA, no matter what they do.

Crew Chief Eric: So there’s one more car I want to ask you about because I talked about it a lot. I was super excited about it and everybody’s going to cringe and go, he’s going to ask about the new DeLorean Alpha five. No, no, no, no, no.

John Davis: I wanted a [00:44:00] DeLorean really badly until I drove one.

I have to tell you an acquaintance of mine who had been a writer was their PR person. And I followed John DeLorean, followed him at General Motors, I followed him in this new project. And when the DMC came out, we really wanted to get our hands on it. I wanted to buy one. They wouldn’t send them to the press.

And finally got one. And when we got one, we realized why they didn’t send them to the press. They were probably one of the worst handling automobiles ever built. It came with super wide rear tires, which told you something. It was never meant for that Peugeot Renault V6 that was in it. The engine was too heavy.

It was a worse pendulum car than the early 911s, as far as if you got in an off camber corner, you basically started to go into a slide. I cried. It was so terrible. Taking a corner at 30 miles an hour that was an off camber turn was scary. So the new car looks very promising. We followed a lot, the company behind it.

[00:45:00] We follow those folks and the folks that kept DMC alive for many, many years. We went down to Texas and did some stuff when they were custom building from parts left over. I wish him well, it’s a very exciting looking vehicle. Now it’s yours again. Ask me the question. I’m so sorry. I interrupted you.

Crew Chief Eric: The Nissan Z the new 400.

What do you think? I

John Davis: haven’t driven it yet.

Crew Chief Eric: Has anybody driven it yet?

John Davis: Uh, not to my know of, but we’ve been to two events, at least two events. One of our folks have been there, maybe three. You know, it’s one of those cars that it seems like it’s never going to finally get here, but it’s very exciting. I think it’s going to give the super run for its money.

I think that Nissan’s very serious about it being a new halo car for them. We may be looking at one of the last new sports cars period that’s not run with battery electric. So I’m very excited about it. I love Zs and always have.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, that’s a great segue because you have owned a [00:46:00] variety of high performance cars over the years, and you mentioned a few Mustangs, Corvettes, De Tomaso Pantera.

John Davis: A couple.

Crew Chief Eric: What’s in your garage these days? What do you daily drive?

John Davis: Nothing exciting. Nothing exciting. There’s only two cars that I’ve ever hated that I fell in love with when I drove them. One was the Mustang Mach E. Really? I hated the concept. I thought it was heresy what Ford was doing with the Mustang name.

Until we drove it. When we drove it, I thought Ford had done an amazing job. Cause I’m an old Mustang guy. I’ve owned more Mustangs than anything else. Old ones. I thought Ford had done a remarkable job of instilling Mustang DNA in it. Almost bought one, but wasn’t quite happy with the range for the kind of driving I wanted it for, but it was very close.

The other car though, I did buy back in 2001. We knew it had been coming the BMW rebirth of the mini Cooper. I spent a lot of time in England and in Europe riding around in the original [00:47:00] minis. I thought this new car was a terrible idea. It was too big. It was too modern, just not original until Ray Cuata, my videographer and I went to San Francisco for the introduction of the mini.

We got in the car, we spent all day driving in around the wine country on a lot of some very great roads. Fell in love with it. I said, this is not a commuter car. This is a two box sports car. That model 50 was the best handling front wheel drive vehicle that we had ever driven, with the exception of maybe a couple of early Saabs.

I came home. I called up the PR guy the next morning. I put in my order. I’ve still got that car today. Wow. It has all of 31, 000 miles on it and my wife drives it as her daily driver. Six months a year during the winter it stays in a nice warm heated garage. I have a very eclectic Not particularly interesting fleet.

We have an old Ford Ranger [00:48:00] pickup truck, you know, one that was the real Ranger, not the new truck. We’ve got the 2012 Subaru Outback, got a 2014 Mercedes SLK because we missed our Miata and wanted a little roadster back again. And we’ve got a 2020 Hyundai Palisade. I drive so many interesting cars at work.

That I really don’t need a garage full of really high performance or even classics, nor do I have the wherewithal to do it. I mean, we’re our public television, by the way, is that we were not commercial TV, no big bucks there, but that’s my garage. It’s not very interesting. I’m afraid the mini is this car that just today I put some charge on the battery and it was just so much fun just to go out and drive it for about an hour.

And just to remember what a great little handling car it is.

Crew Chief Eric: I’m sure people want to, what color is it?

John Davis: Blue and white, of course.

Crew Chief Eric: So did you defer your thoughts against the Mini to the Beetle and the Fiat 500 instead?

John Davis: I love the Fiat 500. I, you know, especially the Abarth. That was more [00:49:00] fun than a barrel of monkeys, too.

Great little car.

Crew Chief Eric: The Beetle, not so much.

John Davis: The Beetle, well, I spent a long time crunched up in the back. Seat of a beetle, uh, going up and down the East coast. When I was in college, I have nothing but admiration for the beetle. The only thing about the beetle I never liked was back in the seventies when they tried to put a, an automatic transmission in it, that didn’t work very well.

And I had a friend that had one that was nothing but trouble, but you know, the beetle, that basic chassis is, uh, has got a lot of performance in it, but I don’t have a problem with the beetle. I think the, the bill served its purpose for a long time. And it’ll be back. I’m sure somewhere in VW they’ve got an all electric Beetle.

If they brought the bus back, they’re going to bring the Beetle back.

Crew Chief Eric: Amen. And hopefully the Karmann Ghia too, so we’ll just leave it at that.

John Davis: That, there would be a treat. There would be a treat.

Crew Chief Eric: So is there still a bucket list vehicle, new or old, that you’d like to review for MotorWeek?

John Davis: Oh, I’d love to have my old Pantera back.

Crew Chief Eric: Do a retro review.

John Davis: I recently did a podcast [00:50:00] for one of the Pantera groups, and they asked me if I still had the VIN number, they could find the car for me, but I don’t have the VIN number anymore, which is too bad, but I laid under it every weekend to work on it to keep it running, but I did love the car.

It’s a very good question. Do I have a bucket list of cars right now? It’s odd. I like what’s new. I’m not a classic car guy. I don’t know a lot about classic cars. I know what I like. If I have a bucket list, it’s going to be for something new. I definitely want an EV. And I’m probably going to buy an EV as a commuter car.

I’m looking at the second generation, no surprise, Mini Cooper SE, when it comes out next year. It’s rumored to have, well, the current one’s a little over 100 mile range. It’s going to have 200, 250, so the rumors go. You know, that would be a great commuter car because right side, I’m sure it’ll still have all the things that Mini is noted for as far as its handling capabilities and use of space.

I think that’s an [00:51:00] interesting vehicle. I mentioned the Taycan. I think that’s just one of the most fabulous automobiles that’s ever been devised by any group of engineers and Audi with the e tron GT just made it better. It’s a pretty amazing car. You know, when you start looking at the stratosphere, you know, like the new Ferrari SUV and stuff with a V12, you know, I don’t know.

I do think that if I was going to go out today and buy something today, I probably at least try and buy something with a V8 because it’s not going to be around much many of those much longer and I think anybody that’s got one of the last V8s is probably going to have something that’s at least semi collectible even if it’s a pickup truck.

Crew Chief Eric: There’s that new Mustang dark horse coming, you know, that might have John Davis written all over it.

John Davis: Uh, you never know, you know, if this is indeed going to be the seventh generation, which they just showed in Detroit, the 14th of September, they unveiled the new, um, seventh generation Mustang, interesting looking car.

I’m not saying I’m not sure I’m absolutely in love with it. [00:52:00] But it is clearly a Mustang. And you know, it’s still going to have a V8 for a while. Could very well be end up one of those parked in my garage, right next to the Mach E, who knows.

Crew Chief Eric: John, as we wrap up here, any shout outs, promotions, or anything else you’d like to share that we didn’t cover anything about the future of MotorWeek that you’d like to share?

John Davis: Time marches on time is important to us on the show, and it’s important to everybody. And hopefully, even though television has changed a great deal, and a lot of people now don’t think they watch TV, but that’s what you’re watching on your tablets, whether you want to acknowledge it or not. 20 years ago, we were worried that there weren’t going to be enough automotive enthusiasts to keep automotive journalism alive.

Fortunately, we were wrong. All you have to do is go to YouTube and see that just about anybody with a camera has opinions on vehicles. I cringe when I hear some of them actually get some kind of remuneration for it, but there’s also a lot of great people out there giving very good, honest advice. The idea [00:53:00] of unbiased reviews for the second biggest purchase in most people’s lives is alive and well.

I like to think that being the first non conventional media, being television that covered cars, we had something to do with that heritage. I think it’s going to continue and grow stronger. So I’m very hopeful for the future. You know, more opinions is good. Fewer opinions is bad. I’ll give the same advice I’ve always given.

If you’re going out and buying a vehicle, Look at everything you can about that vehicle. Don’t trust one, two or even a half dozen reviews. Keep going until you think you’ve really gotten every side of it and then go judge yourself. And that will tell you who’s giving you the straight. Poop and who isn’t, but I think that we’re lucky that we live in an age where so much information is available so easily, including everything from motorway for all you folks out there that still haven’t watched us youtube.

com slash motor week or your public television [00:54:00] station or Mav TV. There’s no excuse. I do want to say one more thing before I wrap up my part, Eric. And that is, I want to thank the tireless team at MotorWeek, who really works seven days a week, 24 hours a day to bring this 52 week a year series into everybody’s home.

And I also want to thank all the folks that go back all the way to almost the beginning of Maryland Public Television, because they’ve allowed us to produce MotorWeek. It’s been the love of my life, easily. So thanks everybody for making all of this possible

Crew Chief Eric: as motor weeks host for the show now celebrating its 42nd season John davis has the opportunity to put all of the new car models through extensive road tests and to judge their practicality for buyers He also acts as final editor on all the new car road test segments and writes many of the test opinions as well As other portions of the program motor week is the staple in the automotive journalism world and countless of us You We’ll continue to enjoy the program [00:55:00] for many years to come as Emmy award winning producer, host, and creator of motor week television’s original and longest running automotive series.

John Davis can be seen and heard throughout the United States on PBS broadcasts and Mav TV cable networks. To learn more about John Davis, log on to www. motorweek. org or follow them on social at Motor Week. And don’t forget about those Motor Week Retro Reviews on YouTube. And with that, John, I cannot thank you enough for coming on Break Fix.

Sharing your story with us. And for me personally, you are an inspiration. Like I said, there has not been a time where MotorWeek has not existed for many of us. I hate to say imitation is the most sincere form of flattery.

John Davis: And

Crew Chief Eric: we try week after week to emulate some of the things you’ve done with MotorWeek, whether you realize it or not, you’re one of the heroes of the automotive world.

John Davis: That’s high praise, Eric. Well, you’re welcome. I hope it was a lot of string of consciousness in the air.

Crew Chief Eric: Absolutely. It’s good seeing you again, John. And let me know when you get [00:56:00] that Z400. We want to come see it.

John Davis: Thanks, Eric. It was a pleasure. Anytime. Just give us a call.

Crew Chief Eric: All right. Bye now.

John Davis: Bye bye.

Crew Chief Brad: If you like what you’ve heard and want to learn more about GTM, be sure to check us out on www. gtmotorsports. org. You can also find us on Instagram at GrandTouringMotorsports. Also, if you want to get involved or have suggestions for future shows, You can call or text us at 202 630 1770. Or send us an email at crewchief at gtmotorsports.

org. We’d love to hear from you.

Crew Chief Eric: Hey everybody, Crew Chief Eric here. We really hope you enjoyed this episode of Break Fix, and we wanted to remind you that GTM remains a no annual fees organization, and our goal is [00:57:00] to continue to bring you quality episodes like this one at no charge. As a loyal listener, please consider subscribing to our Patreon for bonus and behind the scenes content, extra goodies, and GTM swag.

For as little as 2 and 50 cents a month, you can keep our developers, writers, editors, casters, and other volunteers fed on their strict diet of fig newtons, gummy bears, and monster. Consider signing up for Patreon today at www. patreon. com forward slash gtmotorsports. And remember, without fans, supporters, and members like you, None of this would be possible.

Skip ahead if you must… Here’s the highlights from this episode you might be most interested in and their corresponding time stamps.

• 00:00 Introduction to Break/Fix Podcast
• 00:27 Meet John Davis: A Journey in Automotive Media
• 01:26 John’s Early Life and Automotive Passion
• 03:33 The Birth of MotorWeek
• 04:50 MotorWeek’s Legacy and Impact
• 10:09 Challenges and Triumphs in Car Reviews
• 16:47 Memorable Cars and Reviews
• 20:59 MotorWeek’s Name and Testing Locations
• 26:14 Thoughts on Alternative Fuels and EVs
• 29:11 The Push Towards Electric Vehicles
• 30:48 Challenges with Charging Infrastructure
• 33:10 The Future of Hybrid Vehicles
• 34:42 Driving Behavior Post-COVID
• 36:46 The Importance of Advanced Driver Training
• 41:18 Toyota’s Performance and Efficiency Balance
• 43:01 Volkswagen’s Consistent Performance
• 43:57 The DeLorean Experience
• 45:16 Excitement for the New Nissan Z
• 45:57 John Davis’ Personal Car Collection
• 52:09 The Future of MotorWeek and Automotive Journalism
• 56:23 Closing Remarks and Call to Action