Car Throttle

The Goodwood Festival of Speed is held in England every July, and while full-scale automotive launches don't take place at the event, many tuners come and announce their latest wares. Mugen is a Honda tuner, and has been showing off its CR-Z Concept for a while. The CR-Z has been a big disappointment to enthusiasts, mainly in the performance arena given its hybrid drivetrain. Mugen aims to tap into the car's potential and in doing so, to change its character completely. That's the CR-Z Concept's goal. But the CR-Z Concept isn't the only introduction by Mugen at the show though. The company has also announced a more track-focused concept called the CR-Z RR. Mugen calls the CR-Z RR Concept a "study model" that is

Toyota has set its sights on producing some exciting new vehicles that will help it to connect with enthusiasts. Vehicles from Toyota have been criticized as appliances that don't provide much in the way of excitement. For Lexus, the LF-A was introduced after a long development process, and the FT-86 Concept is destined for production at the Toyota division. Rival Honda has made waves with the CR-Z Concept that is in the works for production. Japan's Best Car magazine has Toyota planning a competitor by reviving a recent sports model - the MR2, but this time called the MR-S. The MR2 was seen as an affordable mid-engined sports car, but it didn't do very well in the United States in the years leading up to its demise.

While the spotlight at Tokyo was primarily focused on the Toyota FT-86 Concept and Lexus LFA, Honda made a performance introduction of it's own - the CR-Z Concept. The CR-Z has been shown before in concept form, but this new one is very close to the one approved for production, serving as a preview. It's CR- designation and styling clearly reference the inspiration for the concept - the CRX hatchback. To this day the CRX is mentioned as an example of a sporty, fun to drive car that gets excellent fuel economy. In fact, during the spike in fuel prices last year, the CRX was commanding high prices on the used car market . That leaves Honda with a pretty good basis for a new model, especially for