CJ German road trip: Day 3, the IAA
Our second day at the IAA, we headed out to Mercedes, Honda and the tuners.
Ward and I were tired when we headed back to the IAA but not as tired as the heavily equipped media teams. You could see the painful faces when lifting the cameras on to their shoulders, yet again. Mercedes was still pretty crowded, yes even the 3 floor display can get crowded during press days. The AMG C63 Coupe, the IAA concept and S-Class convertible were the highlights.
Honda
We couldn’t resist stopping by the Honda stand to look at the 300 horsepower Civic Type-R. The car looks and feels the part, that is until you start to look at the finish. We hobbled on to the Project 2&4 on which you can find an interview here.
Tuners
In the same hall as Tesla and JLR we found tuners/customizers. Brabus had a massive stand, and I mean massive. Rivalling big manufacturers size-wise. The C-Class and AMG GT with 600 horsepower were both present at the booth, but our favorite was the 4×42 500. Reaching as high as the normal model, the V8 has been pushed up to 500 horsrpower.
Startech has us giggling over a pickup Range Rover Sport and some carbon for your F-Type. The most impressive stand however was a collaboration between Vredestein and Mansory. Both delivering the highest quality on all terrains. I know not many people get near Mansory cars, but the precision and fit of the Mansory parts are way above the rest. Vredestein joins in on this by creating ultra-high performance tyres for these models and even apply a carbon like pattern on the side of the tyres. Find out more about our visit to the Mansory/Vredestein booth after the click.
Tired, but happy, we walked back towards our car, but didn’t we forget something? Ah yeah, the new BMW M6 GT3 hidden away in a corner on the BMW stand. She’s a looker and of course complies to all FIA regulations. R.I.P. Z4 GT3.
