Around the tracks: A glitzy Skoda Kodiaq, Tesla’s autopilot in action and Koenigsegg’s next hypercar

When we’re not creating it ourselves, the CarAdvice team spends a lot of time finding and consuming motoring content from all over the world.

Here’s a handful of the photos, articles, videos or social media posts that most caught our eye last week. Some of them are brand new, others have been online for a while.

Enjoy them – just not too much, okay?

Skoda had us doing a double-take this week when it posted a series of Instagram photos of a seriously blinged-up Skoda Kodiaq RS, describing it as "oligarch chic".

The stunt drew mixed reactions, from those enquiring as to how to purchase the diamante-covered Kodiaq, to those berating the carmaker for not focusing on its more impressive regular Kodiaq.

Fortunately, the gaudy Kodiaq was nothing more than a publicity stunt, with Skoda Australia confirming the design was a work of "pure fiction" created to draw attention to the Kodiaq's overarching mantra: "Performance that's not for show."

Is it bad that we don't hate it?

Swedish hypercar maker Koenigsegg is known for its creations which manage to miraculously tread the fine line between innovation and real-world purpose (particularly the 'family-friendly' Gemera).

And now, founder Christian von Koenigsegg and his team are plotting a new entry-level, lightweight hypercar – and they may have already given us a sneak peek at its design.

This week, the Instagram account of Koenigsegg's design division shared a video of a digital concept car designed by artist Esa Mustonen as part of his graduation thesis.

It was apparently created with approval of Christian von Koenigsegg himself and paints "an exciting vision of what a lightweight entry-level hypercar of the future could look like".

The three-seater would be powered by the same three-cylinder Freevalve TFG engine in the Gemera and would aim for a 1:1 power to weight ratio offering 700hp (521kW) from a 700kg body.

It also looks, well, awesome. But you probably saw that coming.

You've no doubt read plenty about Tesla Autopilot, the electric carmaker's semi-autonomous driver-assist system, but unless you own a Tesla, it's unlikely you've ever seen it in action.

Now, a video has surfaced online featuring footage of Autopilot's emergency automatic braking feature responding to the sudden appearance of pedestrians in the car's path – and it's pretty impressive.

Shared as part of a presentation conducted by Andrej Karpathy, Tesla’s head of AI and computer vision, the footage starts playing around the 3:10 mark in the video below. Check it out:

Sometimes the only way to cope with current-day stress is to transport oneself to a bygone era. These assorted snaps of retro petrol stations – most of them from '50s-era United States – certainly do the trick.

Original sources unknown! Credit for sharing this set with us, however, goes to CarAdvice contributor Peter McKay, who “got it from a mate, who got it from a mate, who…”

See the full set over at this link.

Plenty of car companies are getting creative in the time of COVID-19 and Mazda has joined the fray, offering up its own origami creations.

The Japanese automaker has created print-and-fold "paper craft models" to help you recreate your favourite Mazda cars at home. While they're aimed at kids, we could definitely see ourselves spending several hours creating a mini MX-5 this weekend.

You can download the paper craft models here.

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