Zooming with DRIVEN iHeartRadio New Zealand

Zooming with DRIVEN Car Guide is back for a limited-run series thanks to our sponsor, Winger Motors! If you're not up to date, check out the first episode here , the second episode here, the third episode here and the fourth episode here!

This is the big one: today we announce the overall winner of the 2023 AA DRIVEN Car Guide New Zealand Car of the Year, as well as all the individual category winners.

This week Sam, Dean and Damien are in the studio to run through each of those category winners before the big reveal of the overall winner! Not only that, but we also reveal the lucky winner of the Peoples Choice award who will take away $5000 fuel or charge credit.

Of course, this week's print issue of DRIVEN Car Guide out tomorrow will have deeper coverage of the COTY winners, so make sure to check that out too.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Zooming with DRIVEN Car Guide is back for a limited-run series! If you're not up to date, check out the first episode here , the second episode here and the third episode here.

Our 2023 AA DRIVEN Car Guide New Zealand Car of the Year programme, this year sponsored by Winger Motors, is now reaching the really exciting bits. Just one week to go until all is revealed!

This week Sam, Dean and David are in the studio to look at the finalists for the LCV, Luxury and Safest Car categories, as well as the Peoples Choice award that gives our readers (that's you!) a chance to have your say and go in the draw to win $5000 fuel or charge credit.

As always, we also take a look at this Saturday's print issue, which showcases Cadillac's return to NZ with the very grand Lyriq electric SUV.

And look out for Zooming next Friday, December 1: it's the grand final, with class victors revealed and announcement of the overall winner.

And if you're keen on winning $5000 of fuel or EV charge, vote in our Peoples Choice award. You can do that using the voting form here - but be quick, because voting closes at 10am on Monday November 27.

 
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Zooming with DRIVEN Car Guide is back for a limited-run series! If you're not up to date, check out the first episode here and the second episode here.

Our 2023 AA DRIVEN Car Guide New Zealand Car of the Year programme, this year sponsored by Winger Motors, is now well under way.

This week Sam, David and fellow COTY judge Avon Bailey from the AA are in the studio to look at the finalists for the Sports/Performance and Passenger categories, as well as the Peoples Choice award that gives our readers (that's you!) a chance to have your say and go in the draw to win $5000 fuel or charge credit. We also take a look at this Saturday's print issue, which is a RIDDEN motorbike special and also features a road test of one of our COTY finalists, the BYD Dolphin.

Look out for more Zooming each Friday as we count down the COTY finalists - all the way to the grand final and announcement of the overall winner on December 1.

And if you're keen on winning $5000 of fuel or EV charge, vote in our Peoples Choice award. You can do that using the voting form here. Good luck and keep listening!
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Zooming with DRIVEN Car Guide is back for a limited-run series! If you're not up to date, check out the first episode here.

Our 2023 AA DRIVEN Car Guide New Zealand Car of the Year programme, this year sponsored by Winger Motors, is now well under way.

This week Sam, Damien and fellow COTY judge Allister Wade from the AA are in the studio to look at the finalists for our three Clean Car categories: Small SUV, Medium SUV and Large SUV. We also take a look at this Saturday's print issue, which features the supremely silly-fast MG4 XPower.

Look out for more Zooming each Friday as we count down the COTY finalists - all the way to the grand final and announcement of the overall winner on December 1.

And if you're keen on winning $5000 of fuel or EV charge, vote in our Peoples Choice award. You can do that using the voting form here. Good luck and keep listening!
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Yes, we're back! Zooming with DRIVEN (now DRIVEN Car Guide, of course) has returned for a limited-run series - as is the fashion in the streaming age - as we kick off our 2023 AA DRIVEN Car Guide New Zealand Car of the Year programme, this year sponsored by Winger Motors.

This week Sam, Dean and David are in the studio to look at the finalists for our first three categories: Small SUV, Medium SUV and Large SUV. We also take a look at this Saturday's print issue, which features the Porsche Rennsport Reunion.

If you'd like a bit less talking and a few more written words, please check out our online stories for those first three COTY categories. You'll find Small SUV here, Medium SUV here and Large SUV here.

Look out for more Zooming each Friday as we count down the COTY finalists - all the way to the grand final and announcement of the overall winner on December 1.

And if you're keen on winning $5000 of fuel or EV charge, vote in our Peoples Choice award. You can do that using the voting form here. Good luck and keep watching!
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Sam's away, but Zooming with DRIVEN carries on! But, somehow, with no less talk of Sam's muscles...

Anyway, in Episode 121 David and Damien tell us of their trip to Hamilton to check out the new ride of Police dogs around the country - the Skoda Superb Police Dog Unit. The Superb is rolling out around the country to replace the old Holdens (currently a mix of VF Commodore utes and Equinox SUVs) and is a very high-tech replacement indeed, with full temperature monitoring and automated systems to keep the doggos cool and comfortable, as well as a very clever feature that lets the handler remotely release the hounds. Sorry, but you knew we were ALWAYS going to slip that one in somewhere...

Anyway, moving on from the bad jokes and Good Boys, Dean tells us about how there are now 50 more awesome Honda Civic Type Rs available after it initially sold out in record time, and that the latest ballot for the next wave of 50 equally-awesome Toyota GR Corollas has opened as well!

David then segues smoothly into his visit to the recent Toyota Festival held at Highlands Motorsport Park in Cromwell, where he got to revisit the GR Corolla (we were lucky enough to already have played with it on track, which you can read about here) and see the GR Sport Hilux for the first time (which, incidentally, Toyota has just revealed pricing for).

Damien then takes us into the virtual world with a spin around the block (well, many, many times around a wide selection of race tracks, at least...) in Gran Turismo 7 using Sony's new PlayStation VR2 - which is utterly spectacular - and news that Skoda New Zealand has become the first territory outside Europe to adopt the company's virtual reality showroom that allows customers to check out different colours, options and even body styles on cars they are interested in, but that a dealer may not have on hand.

It's being trialed with the new Enyaq iV all-electric SUV and you can head to your nearest Skoda dealer to try it out for yourself.

We then round things out with a rant from Dean about Formula One tracks and a confusing game of "Easter Rebate Road Trip" where all three had to choose a car that would get a rebate under the Clean Car scheme to go on an Easter road trip in, using the rebate money to fund the holiday. Of course not everyone took it seriously...

Don't forget to check out more DRIVEN videos on our YouTube channel or subscribe to the Zooming with DRIVEN podcast, if you aren't into the whole moving pictures thing.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.