Nov 27th, 2012
The nights growing long and the weather is getting cold yet the JCW Roadster continues to soldier on. When we originally pitched the idea to MINI of running a Roadster on longterm, the idea was to see if it was plausible as a year round car. While the snow hasn’t hit the ground yet (in Chicago) we can report that our love affair with the soft top hasn’t slowed. continued →
Oct 31st, 2012
Last December MINI introduced the factory optional Recaro seats across most of the range. And after years of waiting and hoping, the US finally got them in March builds. For one glorious month all was well. Until MINI noticed some unusual wear spots on the Recaro seats of some Roadsters. Production was stopped and the seat belt anchor was supposedly being redesigned. continued →
Oct 28th, 2012
Top down. Exterior temp: 53F. This was the beginning of what I was billing as a “Weekend for Men.” A glorified guys weekend of brewery visits, football and cars. And I was determined to make it the full three hours from Chicago with the top down.
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Oct 8th, 2012
Our JCW Roadster arrived just in time for Todd, DB and Axel to bask in
the sun during MINI Takes the States earlier this year. But our real
test wouldn’t begin until late August, starting with a call that the
car was in Chicago and ready for it’s day-to-day duty.
2,000 miles later it’s safe to say the Roadster has been one of the
best MINI experiences we’ve ever had. Until we literally hit some
issues earlier this week.
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Sep 4th, 2012
MINI USA reported the best August ever with sales of 5,718 automobiles, an increase of 83.9 percent from the 3,109 sold in August, 2011. What’s driving this increase? The volume leaders are (as expected) the R56 hardtop and the R60 Countryman. In fact the Countryman broke the 2,000 unit barrier for a month in August which would have normally surpassed hardtop sales if it wasn’t for an almost 50% increase of sales for MINI’s stalwart model.
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Sep 3rd, 2012
Our first 12 days with MotoringFile’s long term JCW Roadster have been nothing but eventful. The first two trips (both to Road America) were spent top down and fully packed. From there it was daily commuting duty into and out of Chicago. Then just days later, we were off to western Michigan for a long weekend. Again, top down 100% of the time. In all, we’ve gotten to know our Roadster better and quicker than almost any other car we’ve tested. All of it. The exceptional? The not so exceptional? The questionable? What’s what? Read on.
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Aug 26th, 2012
So you’re curious about the MINI Roadster but a little concerned about the apparent lack of space? We were until we got to drive the car at the launch event last January and we got a glimpse at the trunk. And then the space behind the rear seats. When pressed for luggage duty at the Portugal launch, we were genuinely surprised at how versatile the car was. But it’s one thing to experience it once with a few bags of luggage; it’s another to make it your daily driver. This past weekend we started that process with a road-trip to ALMS at Road America. But the real first test was packing for our entry into the 24 Hours of LeMons the day after (at the same track). And as many of you likely know, racing requires stuff. Stuff that needed to somehow fit into our little JCW.
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