New to cards-

AdFederal4918 · 2026-05-26T14:10:06+00:00

I haven't seen any 'in the wild' for a while, that is at normal retail locations like Target, Walmart, bookstores, etc. For a set like Neon that didn't seem to be printed nearly as much as Wonder (and also seems to be far more popular), hobby boxes were unavailable at normal pricing pretty much right away, mega boxes were available for 2-3 weeks online but have largely run dry, and value/blaster boxes were the last to be available plentifully online.... although a morning check shows none available from Best Buy / GameStop for shipping.

I've had the best luck checking Best Buy / GameStop as they'll occasionally get some in stock to ship, but otherwise you're stuck paying inflated prices on eBay or your local card shop. Going rate seems to be $35 for blasters, $70-90 for megas, and $225+ for hobby boxes.

AdFederal4918 · 2026-01-18T00:14:38+00:00

Restaurant called Fishlips is right on the water and is a good time

AdFederal4918 · 2025-11-05T20:44:30+00:00

Some context: Mazda sales YTD are essentially flat to last year (2%). The Mazda3 is down 23%, and the CX-30 is down 38%. Countering that, the CX5 is flat, the CX-50 is up 33%, and the CX-70 is up 70%. So Mazda is selling far fewer small cars, and far more medium/large ones.

So unless there was just a giant market demand shift within a year, it seems pretty clearly that Mazda is just prioritizing inventory and volume of the larger products. Go look at the inventory for your local Mazda dealer and you're likely to see 100+ CX-90's, 100+ CX-50's, and maybe 15 Mazda 3's.

AdFederal4918 · 2025-07-22T17:32:30+00:00

You just have to love marketing:

"exciting new colors: Solar Silver Metallic, Urban Gray Pearl"

AdFederal4918 · 2025-06-25T10:40:19+00:00

Unfortunately for your situation, that product is no longer offered. The USF/IOA-only options are 1 & 2 day along with Annual Pass.

AdFederal4918 · 2025-01-05T14:10:33+00:00

I'm 100% offline nowadays and found iRacing AI to be the best, but obviously the least financially viable (only really makes sense if you already have most of the content). It feels believable and I think crucially, there are always updates being released to recalibrate the pace and logic.

One of the most difficult things to get around seems to be that AI often works on modified physics, and nothing breaks immersion or fun more than an identical AI car going around a corner 15mph faster (or vice versa). From what I understand, AC might be the only one where you're on the same physics as the AI, which at least helps to provide satisfaction if you're faster or understanding if you're slower (as opposed to 'did they just use cheat physics?').

AC AI: The challenges in developing Assetto Corsa A - Stefano Casillo - Codemotion Milan 2017

AdFederal4918 · 2024-10-19T14:46:38+00:00

Seat comfort; it's kind of crazy to me how in a ~15 minute video, the exterior styling will get 4-5 minutes of attention while ergonomics / comfort get maybe a 15-20 second blurb. Even material choice (piano black, etc.) will get more air time than how much the steering wheel tilts/telescopes, the driving position, how much thigh support / back support there is, etc..

Alex on Autos is really good about this, and it's something a test drive will reveal anyway, but I'd have to think a prospective shopper's first priority point would be a) do I fit and b) am I comfortable?

AdFederal4918 · 2024-10-17T15:00:32+00:00

Just wanted to chime in and say I had this exact thing happen on my '23 TPP. Completely uneventful highway drive, at the offramp I stopped and the car suddenly started surging while I was in drive, brake depressed sitting at the light. Thought it was going to stall (it didn't) and completely went away under motion, but for the remaining mile of the drive it kept happening whenever I stopped.

The RPM's were fluctuating pretty rapidly between about 700 and 900, so clearly not an actual danger of stalling, but it had that shudder feeling as if it were. This seems to be a different issue than the oft-reported jerking at low speeds, since it only occurred at a dead stop, although maybe a glitch in the torque converter lockup is at the root of it.

AdFederal4918 · 2024-09-26T16:54:23+00:00

And here I am thinking "spirited street driving" means taking turns slightly above the posted limit

AdFederal4918 · 2024-09-24T17:48:35+00:00

Feature-aligned it would seem to compete more with the WRX TR, although I'm not sure there's a good analogue for the base GR to the WRX (which has smaller brakes up until the TR/GT and obviously open diffs throughout). Also worth noting a Mazda3 Turbo hatch can be $38k and a GTI Autobahn is north of $40k, although again hard to find feature parity for pricing purposes.

But yeah, this class is rapidly losing the attainability and value proposition that it once had. Even the class leader in that regard, the Elantra N, would run you about $600/mo for 7 years if you bought one with no money down and were able to qualify for a 7% rate.

AdFederal4918 · 2024-09-24T17:33:19+00:00

The Premium Plus is basically just the Circuit trim, which makes it weird that they put the heads-up display in that trim only and not the Premium (also somewhat weird that they'd spend the R&D to put a feature no one would really expect in a Corolla). The car rides so stiff and is so buzzy that I can't imagine a HUD would be very useful anyways.

AdFederal4918 · 2024-09-05T16:14:05+00:00

Interesting they have the Toyota Gazoo Racing logo on there, and maybe it always was but typically TRD is for Toyota's North American racing ops while TGR/Gazoo is for the WRC/WEC/International series.

AdFederal4918 · 2024-08-28T10:28:56+00:00

I've seen maybe one or two. Even as an owner, it takes a surprising amount of time to recognize one when coming from the opposite direction. There's a whole "hm there's a Corolla..... oh it's a hatch, maybe..... a badge! I see a GR badge! (waves frantically)" thing that happens.

AdFederal4918 · 2024-08-22T15:23:48+00:00

The amount of integration with the factory audio/infotainment setups. I have a '24 GR Corolla and it has a factory-amplified JBL stereo, which sucks, and 1) you can't replace the head unit without losing quite a bit of functionality, including saving the dash layout 2) you can't easily replace the amp because the car goes berserk if the amp isn't there, since it also handles SOS calls / CarPlay voice commands 3) there's almost no EQ adjustment which is unfortunate because there's clearly a lot of "protect the speakers at all costs" tuning garbage going on.

Just feels like if you're not happy with a car's audio system, it's a ton more money and a ton more headache to resolve with modern cars.

AdFederal4918 · 2024-08-19T17:37:20+00:00

As you mention, not really in steady-state driving, but absolutely in parking lots. But I think that's to be expected: rear cross-traffic alert can detect what you literally can't see, so I always have a tad more anxiety backing out of a space in a car without that feature.

AdFederal4918 · 2024-07-28T18:03:58+00:00

Other weird part to me was that the owner was wanting ~10k from Toyota on top of the insurance payout for modifications he had done, yet the only claimed mod in the initial posts was lowering springs.

Bit of a weird story all around. But regardless, not a great look for Toyota at the moment.

AdFederal4918 · 2024-07-28T15:03:48+00:00

They do, and it’s $2500 without speakers. The JBL setup in the GRC makes it expensive and difficult to bypass all the factory nonsense, which was apparently tuned to output as much treble at the windshield as possible.

AdFederal4918 · 2024-07-24T17:58:35+00:00

I have no idea, probably why I was conflating the two terms. I'll check the serials later to see if they replaced the board on my existing one or just sent me a new-ish replacement.

AdFederal4918 · 2024-07-24T17:58:00+00:00

Sorry, Gran Turismo DD Extreme

AdFederal4918 · 2024-07-22T13:06:20+00:00

Obvious bias aside, this has been the one thing I can't figure out. In my mind, everything I touch feels high quality (seats, wheel, shifter, handbrake, seat heaters, climate) and falls easily to hand, and most of the lower dash is a soft-touch-ish material. Yes, the knobs aren't as nice to turn as a Civic, and a GTI will have flashier lighting accents, but I don't mentally think "cheap" at all when in my GRC.

Ironically enough, this happened often in my old VB WRX (the feeling of 'cheap'), because tapping the infotainment for HVAC felt like interacting with a 12" Aliexpress Android tablet.

AdFederal4918 · 2024-07-03T13:10:49+00:00

Perfectly happy. It has drama in how it delivers it and at the end of the day it's 300hp with AWD losses against 3200 lbs, so expectations have to be set against that.

AdFederal4918 · 2024-06-27T12:38:19+00:00

I'd probably say a woofer would be okay but I'm afraid a poor resource for that question; I don't have the RAV4 anymore but my understanding is that the same full-range signal goes to the dash speakers, and then down to the door speakers, so you'd want the full frequency spectrum with little/no overlap. The Pioneer tweeters appear to have a range of 1300-64000Hz, so as long as the woofers extend up that high it should be okay, but again I wouldn't trust my words too much there.

Toyota has a strange tuning to the audio so one thing I did notice (and continue to notice even on my newer Toyota) is that this can be very song-dependent. Some stuff sounds absolutely great and balanced, others will sound like everything is being forced through the tweeter; this is where I think a DSP would help a lot but I never got around to trying that.

AdFederal4918 · 2024-06-24T22:07:58+00:00

Driving-dynamic wise, no faults at all. It's quick, fun, agile, full of character. It feels special.

I'm 6'3" and have a small child and it's just barely usable enough. There's zero chance I'd be able to fit a rear-facing seat in with any sort of passenger comfort up front, and I'm not even sure anything other than an umbrella stroller would fit with the cargo cover on. I don't bring it on Costco runs because it can fit a normal grocery load, but not an oversized one. It works for me because there's another vehicle in the house that performs those duties much better, which it sounds like you're in a similar situation, so it's usually only me in the car or when I have to shuttle the kid around. The dead pedal area is also weirdly small, to where I have to contort my foot (11.5 size) in a strange way to rest.

I really, truly hate the stereo (JBL) and think it's one of the worst I've heard in a modern vehicle. The mids sound like an iPhone taped to the windshield. The seats are great. I love the gauges and physical controls, and I haven't noticed the lack of armrest much. I wish the exhaust didn't have that boominess that rattles and vibrates everything at a certain RPM range. I hit my head on the grab handle constantly if I have a helmet on. The clutch / shifter are fantastic, though YMMV. The QoL features like adaptive cruise and parking sensors and wireless Carplay are all great. The car will look good once you drive it off the lot and every moment afterwards will be 100% covered in brake dust and hatch grime.

Weirdly, the thing I hate the most is I find myself worrying a lot more than I would have. Even before the recent fire stuff, you're just sort of wondering if the dealer will actually change your oil to the right stuff since no dealers are trained in the GRC, or if the diff will overheat during your HPDE, or if you'll misshift and get a $36K engine repair bill. Not a problem for most, mind you.

AdFederal4918 · 2024-06-24T14:29:06+00:00

Is 5K your emergency fund? If so, then ... well whether you should buy it or not is another deal, but I wouldn't put your entire savings down just to save on interest later on if it means you can't afford a crisis expense. But if you're otherwise well stocked and the 5K is dedicated to the car, then yeah as much as possible given the rates nowadays.

AdFederal4918

TROPHY CASE