Last weekend, US President Donald Trump said that his planned meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un could fail or result in “the greatest deal for the world” to ease nuclear tensions between the two countries.
“I may leave fast” if progress does not seem possible, Trump said at a campaign rally for Republican congressional candidate Rick Saccone in western Pennsylvania. Trump said he believes North Korea wants to make peace and that, “I think it’s time.”
A time and place to meet has not yet been set, although the meeting is supposed to happen by the end of May.
“Who knows what’s going to happen?” said Trump, who added that if the meeting takes place, “I may leave fast or we may sit down and make the greatest deal for the world.”
Trump made the shocking decision on Thursday to meet with Kim after the North Korean leader’s invitation was relayed by a South Korean delegation who visited the White House. The move abruptly reversed decades of U.S. policy aimed at preventing North Korea from developing nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.
Earlier in Washington, Trump sought to rally international support for a potential summit, saying North Korea had agreed to not conduct another missile test until after proposed meetings had taken place.
- The Philippine foreign minister condemned last weekend at the United Nations' human right chief for issuing “irresponsible and disrespectful” comments about President Rodrigo Duterte, warning such remarks could set a dangerous precedent. Duterte’s attacks against U.N. human rights activists suggest he needs to see a psychiatrist, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein told a news conference on Friday.
- According to PAGASA, the Northeast Monsoon will last until the middle of the week as the summer season in the Philippines draws near.
- The Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency encouraged the public not to vote barangay officials and councilors that are involved in illegal drugs operations. According to PDEA Chief Aaron Aquino, the said officials, which include 143 barangay chairmen and 146 conuncilors, do not deserve to be elected again and serve the government.
- Following the attack on a former Russian spy and his daughter with Nerve Gas last week, the health implications of the nerve agent attack on a Russian ex-spy and his adult daughter broadened Sunday after British officials said limited traces of contamination were found in a restaurant and a pub in the English city of Salisbury. Sergei Skripal and his daughter were found comatose on a bench near the restaurant and a pub on the 4th of March. Several hundred people would have been in the establishments that day and the day after, according to experts.
- Last weekend, a gunman named Albert Wong, a 36-year-old army veteran, killed three hostages at a Northern California veterans' home and later killed by authorities. In the latest report, the hostage taker in question have suffered from bipolar disorder, various physical ailments, and anger issues.
- The Lamborghini Urus SUV is becoming a strong seller for the Italian sports car brand as 70% of purchasers are new to the brand and more female buyers are attracted to it.
- Mercedes-AMG plans to send their Project One hypercar to the Nurburgring to smash the lap record set by Porsche's 991.2-spec 911 GT2 RS.
- The Camaro ZL1-based Hennessey Exorcist just literally exorcised the Dodge Challenger Demon on a drag strip with a 0-60mph time of 2.1 seconds.
- Actress Jessy Mendiola reveals that she's getting depressed due to body-shaming.
- Frankie Pangilinan, the daughter of Senator Francis "Kiko" Pangilinan and actress Sharon Cuneta, went to the prom last weekend.
Did you see the latest episode of Top Gear where Matt and Chris drove second-hand JDM sportscars they've obtained from the auction for their road trip to Enbu? That was a blast and that episode made us fall in love with Japanese cars again. Talking about here, I got a little playing to do as I tried the JDM cars that are almost similar to the ones the boys drove in the show.
Both the FD3S and the R34 are one of the all-time greats when they emerged in the 90's, which became the golden age of fun, fast, and affordable sports cars speedo boys love to drive. Even in today's times, these 90's Japanese sportscars like these remain a high-value target for speedo boys to smuggle into their homes without alarming their local Customs. Some are crashed, some got modified, and a few sold twice the price when it was in mint condition. Anyway, no time to explain what's going on with 90's JDM sportscars because time for some words about these machines.
I'm in love with the FD3S Mazda RX-7 ever since it got featured in Initial D as Keisuke Takahashi's car of choice but there's a lot more to it than that because it was the first and last to come with a sequential turbo rotary engine that churns out 255PS of power and the power to weight ratio is 5kg/ps. Yes, some people slammed the rotary engine as one of the most rubbish engines in the world due to poor fuel consumption but that doesn't stop purists from having one because it was far out one of the best sounding engines of all time and with all that purring noises, you just can't stop listening to it. You really can't.
The tenth-generation Skyline, dubbed the R34, is by no means one of the best Skylines in its six-decade history like I said but the best of this generation is the GT-R. Yes, that guy from Friends ended up with the lesser GT-T variant but no matter, at least this generation gave it a good show until it lost to the RX-7 at the race to the airfield. Of course, the R34 Skyline GT-R still has the bits and bobs from the previous R33 Skyline GT-R, a car Triads would love to mess around London Chinatown with it. There's the 280HP RB26DETT petrol engine, 6-speed manual gearbox, sport-tuned dynamics, and ATTESA-ETS Pro, among many others. Although macho by looks, it still works its GT-R magic like it should and it's like the cherry at the top of the cake for this generation. It really is.
So, with a little chit chat over, how about a little shootout between these JDM icons round the track, shall we?
The FD RX-7 did it in 1:30.580 while the R34 GT-R did it in 1:28.822. Plain and simple.
It's kinda sad that Japan is stuck in an era that kei cars and hybrids flooded the streets but despite the outcome, cars like these should never be forgotten because these are the cars Japan is mostly proud of and despite being flooded with boring and beige eco cars, the sportscar genre is slowly crawling back like the creepy lady from The Ring and I believe they're onto something here.
In the recent episode of Top Gear Season 25, the boys arrived in what is known to be the land of anime, robots, gadgets, painful game shows, J-pop, kawaii, sushi, and annoyingly, hybrid cars. That's right, folks. Top Gear is back in The Land of the Rising Sun, Japan!
Top Gear S25E03
On that episode, Matt LeBlanc and Chris Harris are on a road trip to Enbu with second-hand Japanese sports cars. LeBlanc goes for the ER34 Nissan Skyline coupe while Harris goes for the FD3S Mazda RX-7. Throughout their road trip, the boys are taking some kinds of challenges including sumo wrestler racing as well as a sampling motorway food, a trip to the deserted Fukushima prefecture, and then tandem drifting, not to mention a finale where only one will have its flight back to Britain to sell it.
While the two had their fun, Rory Reid, meanwhile, is in Tokyo to observe the wild and wacky car culture Japan possesses, from kei cars, Bosozoku, heavily modified Lamborghinis, to a road-legal replica of a Porsche Le Mans prototype.
Then, Chris Harris samples Japan's latest sportscars, the all-new Honda Civic Type R FK8 and the Lexus LC500. There's even a one-on-one shootout at the Ebisu Circuit as well with Harris in the new Type R up against The Stig's Japanese cousin in a Lexus. That's Ninja Stig to you. After the duel, both the LC and the Civic Type R recorded a 1:25.6 lap time at the Top Gear track.
And so, another IndyCar season has begun and one of the world's fastest motorsport series is going to be all out under the hard sun as drivers are giving it all to see who's going to be to the top and while everyone's joining the action, I'm busy doing some research, getting to know about the IndyCar on Project CARS 2.
Although it's mad to call IndyCar a mashup between NASCAR and Formula One because it has some oval action like you expect in America's favorite stock car racing series with machines look straight out of the world's most prestige motorsport series of all time, IndyCar is definitely one of the world's fastest motorsport series where drivers are pushing themselves to the limit. Dallara provided the chassis for the IndyCar machines where aerodynamics play a crucial role in this race. There are two kinds of IndyCar machines; one that is made for road course and the other that is made for oval racing parts of the series. The ones made for oval racing can go up to 240mph and that's even faster than a NASCAR going all out but just like NASCAR, oval racing is going to be very challenging for most drivers and sometimes fatal. I just remembered a certain driver who got killed during a race a few years ago.
The Dallara chassis is a standard issue for IndyCar but for most teams, they can either fitted with engines from either Chevrolet or Honda. Since IndyCar is as American as NASCAR, despite being a world-class race with world-class drivers, especially the one who used to drove in those races, I've decided to have a crack on a Chevrolet-powered IndyCar and because I'm at Long Beach to explain what I'm on about, I've gone for the more powerful but slower Road Course variant.
That said, a Road Course variant of the IndyCar produces a hundred more horsepower than the Oval variant but because it was optimized for road course use, it's heavier and slower than the Oval variant, resulting to over 200mph of top speed. But still, it's fast through the bends and it requires precise concentration to handle these machines with ease.
Anyway, how about a little flying lap to see how an IndyCar works as a racing machine that uses the full majesty of its aerodynamics?
Well, what do you know? That was a fast lap indeed and on a single lap, an IndyCar can take a minute to clear it. It's no wonder that IndyCar is one of the world's fastest motorsport series and its aerodynamics play a crucial part on these machines.
Although I done my quick research on how an IndyCar behaves on the track, I still want to dig deeper to understand more about this open-wheeled motorsport race series and now that this year's season kicked off, I got a lot to learn about IndyCar through different perspectives and for a person who loves to tackle all kinds of races around the world, I'd recommend giving a try with IndyCar and see if this kind of motorsport is your thing apart from the ones you know.
- Following US President Donald Trump's proclamation last Thursday night to impose tariffs on imported steel and aluminum, Canada and Mexico are exempted from the tariff.
- A leaked memo revealed that Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson is planning to strip its mission statement from phrases like "inclusive" and "free from discrimination." The news broke days after a certain advocacy group filed a lawsuit against the Justice Department and HUD to release documents that concern reported changes in HUD policy towards LGBTQ people.
- Watch as how the Savanna-Sabula Bridge that connects between Illinois and Iowa implode after 86 years.
- The official Gran Turismo twitter revealed a teaser for Audi's Vision Gran Turismo entry that will be included in next month's update.
