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RJ Q&AAugust 22, 2005 This Month, "Ask the Experts" asks expert tuner, designer-savant and car culture wizard RJ de Vera for his views on the sport compact scene. RJ, what are you up to these days? Besides touring the event circuit and working on a show for MTV, I'm developing a new fashion business. More on that to come. On the performance side, I'm building two Mitsubishis for Pepsi. One is a Lancer Evo VIII Sweepstakes car with a performance theme. The other is an all-new 2006 Eclipse for the Pepsi Street Motion Tour with a heavy emphasis on audio, video, and music. Since Pepsi and Apple work so closely together through iTunes, expect to see some Apple design ethic and product in the car. I'm also working on a new Civic Si concept car for SEMA with which I want to merge the best of the American power-is-everything tuner mentality of companies like Roush with the philosophy of Type-R vehicles in Japan. I want to create a Concept Civic that feels like a factory performance edition with a touch of aftermarket HP firepower. This is a challenge, because the car has to be fast and functional yet stylish and a bit unique. It has to be cool without trying to be. All of these will be on BFGoodrich g-Force tires. Do you think the Sport Compact movement is still growing, standing still, or shrinking? The Sport Compact movement is still strong, but is currently not growing exponentially as it was in the past few years. Car culture seems to be developing more and more segments, so people are getting into different types of things. Of course, the sport compact movement is staying strong because there are so many segments in this culture from drifting, to drag racing, to car shows to time attacks. What's your prediction of the Sport compact scene in the year 2015? I think that there will be a huge move in developing clean cars that produce lots of power. I believe hybrid cars can be developed to produce tons of power, drive fantastically, and be clean-burning. I'm very interested to see how electric motors powering different sides and wheels of a car can affect the driving dynamics of a vehicle. I believe that, even in 2015, sport compact cars will still be modified even if we are flying around with flux capacitors. What's your guess as to the next big thing in tires? It seems that size is always the next big thing with tires, but I think we are getting to a point that we're over-doing it. If we want bigger wheels and tires, the design of the car has to accommodate the bigger wheel and tire package. The BFGoodrich g-Force Sport was designed for sport compacts and already, in its first year, it is the best-selling g-Force tire. Is that a testament to a really strong sport compact market? I believe it's a testament to BFG understanding just what sport compact consumers need. I've already mentioned that I believe the sport compact market is a strong market and a majority of the people in this market will buy products that really perform and are well- priced. So it's a little bit of the market being strong and BFG offering just the right product at the right price. Photo courtesy RJ de Vera |
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