Ten things we learned this week

A slew of recent classic car auctions have fetched tens of millions of pounds, with the Old Desirable Car market booming right now. And evidence lands this week that you don't even need a meticulous servicing record and an Auto Glym loyalty card to make a ton of money from old cars.

How so? The hammer fell this week at the Salon Retromobile auction on this Ferrari 250 California at $18.5 million - around £12 million.

A lot of money, especially considering this particular 250 wasn't a gleaming, perfectly preserved period piece, but rather one dug out of a barn find and therefore in less than lovely condition. Farmers of the land, bee-line for that ramshackle abandoned barn pronto...

F1 is (nearly) back. Which is great news for those of us who like to shake off our Sunday hangovers grazing on salty snacks to the slightly hypnotic whining of a field of race-cars. It's less good news for those who shudder at the sight of awkwardly staged and rarely relevant press shots featuring the sport's big stars (and Pastor Maldonado).

We secretly love them, however. A shot like this - of Ferrari helm-masters Kimi Raikkonen and Sebastian Vettel looking overjoyed to be used as Fiat crossover-selling mannequins - is oddly absorbing. We could stare it for hours (well, minutes) imagining the conversation that soundtracks such an image:

KIMI: Well, this is the last time I let you book the hire car.
SEB: Sorry. Christian always used to make Mark do it...

Mercedes F1's crushing dominance of 2014's Formula 1 season ran with a slightly uncomfortable sub-plot - the rapid deterioration of the friendship of its star drivers, Lewis and Nico, who'd been firm mates since their karting youth. As the pressures of battling each other for F1 glory built, so did the frostiness of their relationship.

Which makes us all the happier to see Lewis'n'Nico gleefully snapping selfie after side-by-side selfie at recent F1 testing, photographs of them taking photographs of themselves littering the sport's picture agencies alongside more predictable images of 2015-spec winglets and spoilers.

Suspicious types might see this as the outcome of a mildly horrifying meeting in which PRs instructed them to act as mates in a cloyingly 2015, social-media sort of way. TG, of course, would never be so cynical.

Last month, the TG office, and no doubt any office with a healthy count of petrolheads, collectively swooned as Ford pulled the wraps off its wonderful looking - and Brit-designed! - GT supercar. From its vaguely retro silhouette to its afterburner rear lights, each detail in turn dropped our jaws to our keyboards.

Think swapping searing blue paint for a shade of grey would diminish its presence? Think again. If anything, silver flatters its complex shapes even more. But then we'll take one whatever colour it comes in, Ford. Thanks.

We already know a GT3 racer version of the super Mercedes AMG GT is coming. We know that it will be developed in 2015, ahead of competition in 2016.

And we now know what we'd always suspected: that it will have a MASSIVE REAR WING. These are official sketches of the AMG GT3, set to land at next month's Geneva show, battling the Cayman GT4 and Ferrari 488 for our attention and camera memory card space.

It looks evil. We can't wait.

...says Nissan, though equally its marketing team could have taken a crash-course in Photoshop. Anyway, rather than being the latest in attention-grabbing liveries, it's a publicity stunt to shout about how the electric-powered Leaf can be powered by the sun if you plug it into solar-powered mains, its paint as UV-fed as its batteries can be.

In keeping with the Leaf's planet-loving ethic, the glowing paint is made of entirely organic materials, one of which is Strontium Aluminate (not a spell from Harry Potter, apparently). While it's not yet available to buy, if it makes it to production Nissans, it would last for 25 years, we're told.

If you struggle to find your car in the dark - or simply want to better advertise your charging EV to unplugging tykes - it's time to pester your dealer.

That's because Jaguar has announced a new racing series, centred around its pre-1966 models, including the C-Type, D-Type and early E-Types.

The Jaguar Heritage Challenge Series will take place over five weekends. And while UK-based rounds at Donington, Silverstone, Brands Hatch and Oulton Park are exciting in themselves, the sight of loads of lovely old Jags slithering their way around the Nurburgring Oldtimer Grand Prix in August makes us giggle at our desks in anticipation.

Can we have a go, please?

It's well known that Dubai's police force doesn't settle for some blues'n'twos diesel Astras and undercover Skoda vRSs. Proof comes in a comparatively mild new addition to its fleet, the 467bhp of its Lexus RC F placing it someway down the pecking order from the Dubai rozzers' McLaren, Ferrari and Bugatti.

Nonetheless, it looks unconventionally cool in its white and green livery, and we'd still think twice before any ill behaviour on Dubai roads. Job done, then.

Staying in ‘super coupe does odd jobs on the side' news, here's Moto GP's latest safety car. The sport's long association with BMW's M Division continues, last year's M4 getting an update.

As well as showing off a startlingly cool livery, M's tricolours stretched across matte black, it also debuts a water injection system that should make it to BMW's production cars in the near future.

In bald terms, a boot-mounted tank sends a fine spray of water to the engine, lowering its operating temperature and therefore ensuring the turbo six is looked after when it's being worked hard, particularly on track. Memories of old Mitsubishi Evos with water spray buttons on the dash have come flooding back.

We treat people who don't want to drive a 6x6 over some sand dunes with the same suspicion as those who don't drink tea or coffee. And proof of the Big G's universal, Tonka-toy appeal comes in the form of an American classified ad, where a delivery-mile 6x6 is listed at just shy of a million dollars (£635,000).

One of just 60 built, this 2014-registered example is described by seller Mirabella Motors as something that "can compliment any collection of 458s, Aventadors, Phantoms, or private aircraft". We'd been wondering how to fill that final space in the TG garage. Phew.

It also represents a mark-up of nearly 100 per cent, new G63 6x6s originally listing at the equivalent of £335,000...