Volkswagen of America, Inc. is pleased to announce that the Volkswagen Golf GTI has earned Good Housekeeping magazine’s 2017 Best New Car Award in the compact vehicle category. Teaming up with experts at Car and Driver magazine, engineers from the Good Housekeeping Institute (GHI) Lab rated its top picks on value, safety, handling, interior design comfort and onboard technology after driving the vehicles more than 1,200 miles on test tracks and open roads.

“We are extremely proud that Good Housekeeping magazine has honored the Golf GTI with the 2017 Best New Car Award,” said Hendrik Muth, Senior Vice President, Product Marketing & Strategy, Volkswagen of America, Inc. “The Golf GTI packs incredible value. Its combination of power, design, space, connectivity, and fun-to-drive nature represents the best of what Volkswagen has to offer.”

After an absence of 18 years, International Hot Rod Association (IHRA) drag racing action will return to ESPN’s networks in 2017.

The IHRA and ESPN have reached an agreement for two days of racing from events in the 2017 IHRA Summit Sportsman National Championship to stream live on ESPN3, ESPN's live multi-screen sports network. IHRA racing last appeared on one of ESPN’s networks in 1999.

ESPN3 will stream as much as eight continuous hours from the track on both weekend days for 13 events, much of it live, that will include on-track action, interviews and reports from the pits, features and more. The first event will be on the weekend of Feb. 4-5 from Immokalee (Fla.) Regional Raceway, with streaming on ESPN3 beginning at 1 p.m. ET on Saturday and noon on Sunday.

Faster Horses Festival will ride into its fifth anniversary year with a star-studded lineup in tow as Dierks Bentley, Luke Bryan, Miranda Lambert and more will descend on Brooklyn, MI for the "Party Of The Summer” on July 21-23. 

From the moment the first year shot out of the gate, a special vibe was created running through the festival and out into the unrivaled, spirited nature of the campsites. Known as a summer calendar staple, with fans continuing to fiercely return in the thousands, passes for the three-day, two-stage camping festival will go on sale on Feb. 27 at 10am ET at fasterhorsesfestival.com.

The return of the NASCAR PEAK Mexico Series will take the green flag in March in Monterrey, and the 2017 champion will be crowned in November at Mexico City, as part of a 12-race calendar announced today.

The schedule for the top racing series in Latin America features a challenging mix of six oval and six road-courses events, and includes stops at nine different venues throughout Mexico.

The NASCAR PEAK Mexico Series will open the season at Autódromo Monterrey, a 3.4 km (2.1-mile) road course in Apodaca, Nuevo León, on March 26. Daniel Suárez, a Monterrey native and the 2016 NASCAR XFINITY Series champion, is a two-time winner on the oval layout at his home track. The championship race for the NASCAR PEAK Mexico Series will take place on the 1.63 km (1.013-mile) road-course circuit at Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez in Mexico City on Nov. 12. The track has been a staple of the series since its inaugural season under the NASCAR banner in 2007.

“As we enter a new era in the NASCAR PEAK Mexico Series, the 2017 schedule is a terrific blend of the top venues throughout the country,” said George Silbermann, NASCAR vice president of weekly & touring series. “The fans will be treated with the exciting action that is the trademark of NASCAR racing, whether the drivers are speeding down the straightaways on the ovals or fighting for positions heading into the twists and turns of the road courses.”

Claude Molinari, general manager of SMG/Cobo Center, has announced that more than 3,500 people were employed during the 2017 North American International Auto Show in Cobo Center.

Included in that total are all of the union employees that come into Cobo Center to work during major events for security, janitorial, food and beverage and the construction of the exhibits and displays.

“We have doubled the annual number of stagehands hired to set up theatrical displays in event exhibits,” said Molinari. “And I had a representative from another union tell me rather recently that for the first time in many years, none of their members had to file for unemployment during the summer because of the work available in Cobo.”

-- Press release courtesy of Cobo Center

Toyota Motor North America (TMNA), Inc., today reported its U.S. January 2017 sales of 143,048 vehicles, a decrease of 11.3 percent from January 2016 on a volume basis. With the same number of selling days in January 2017 compared to January 2016, sales were down 11.3 percent on a daily selling rate (DSR) basis. 

Toyota division posted January sales of 127,476 units, down 9.2 percent on a volume basis and DSR basis.

“Coming off a record December and year in 2016, the industry in January took a bit of a pause with volume down slightly vs. a year ago,” said Bill Fay, group vice president and general manager of the Toyota division.  “Much improved Light Truck availability helped RAV4 and Highlander begin the year with record January sales.”