Waching daily Jul 30 2017

Welcome to Critic\'s Notebook, a quick and off-the-cuff car review consisting of impressions, jottings, and marginalia regarding whatever The Drive writers happen to be driving

Today\'s edition: the 2018 Genesis G80 Sport

In this day and age, if you\'re a automotive manufacturer looking to punch into the profitable luxury vehicle market, you need to pump a little sportiness into your cars

The era of floaty, leather-lined boats on wheels has been dead and gone for decades; nowadays, every high-end carmaker is tripping over itself trying to bake driving excitement into its wares, even if they\'re building soft-roaders targeted at stylish Starbucks-sipping soccer moms

The Genesis G80 Sport—fresh out of the box this summer for the 2018 model year—is designed to be the performance-minded contender for Hyundai\'s still-fledgling luxury nameplate

On paper, it seems to pack much of the sort of hardware needed to hold its own in the increasingly-competitive middleweight, mid-sized sport sedan class typified these days by the likes of the Mercedes-AMG E43 or the Cadillac CTS VSport: a twin-turbo V-6 (in this case, making 365 horsepower and 376 pound-feet of torque), a sport-tuned suspension, rear- or all-wheel-drive, and a bougie interior with plenty of room for four full-grown adults

(For more on the latter part, see the video embedded fat the bottom of this post

)But if you just grabbed your keys to dash down to your local Genesis showroom with visions of buying a bargain-basement Audi S6 with a 60,000-mile bumper-to-bumper warranty

slow your roll

In spite of what the specs might suggest, the Genesis G80 Sport is less sport sedan than \"sport\" sedan

The regular G80 and the larger G90 both firmly occupy the softer end of the luxury car spectrum more commonly associated with Lexus and Lincoln; while the G80 Sport certainly has a sharper edge than either of its relatives, it still leans more towards long-haul cruiser than Nürburgring terminator

(Nürburgstürminator?)And there\'s absolutely nothing wrong with that

The copper accent on the headlights is a nice touch

It may hail from Korea, but the Genesis G80 Sport feels more than anything like a great interpretation of the classic American sedan

It\'s the sort of car that seems made for the sort of cross-country road trip we in the U

S love, capable of eating up hundreds of miles with the same zeal its occupants attack their Big Macs

It may not be in its element slicing and dicing up canyon roads, but when the highway turns twisty, it\'s still able to have some fun

It\'d be a solid all-around luxury car at $65,000; at 10 grand less, it\'s a steal

So what if it\'s not really all that sporty? If slapping a vastly-overused descriptor to the end of the car\'s name is what it took to bring it to market, then let the G80 Sport use that word

After all, it\'s hardly the least-deserving vehicle on sale to use the name

For more infomation >> The 2018 Genesis G80 Sport Is a Sport Sedan in Need of Some Air Quotes - Duration: 3:28.

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IS claims deadly attack in Syria against US-backed force - Duration: 3:35.

IS claims deadly attack in Syria against US-backed force

BEIRUT (AP) — Islamic State militants have carried out a deadly attack on U.S.-backed forces in Syria, killing and wounding many fighters and civilians, Syrian monitors and an IS-linked media outlet said Friday.

The assault took place on Thursday near the northern city of Raqqa — the Islamic State groups de facto capital, where U.S.-backed Syrian fighters are battling to rout the extremists from their stronghold.

The Syrian Democratic Forces have captured wide areas from IS in northern Syria since late last year, and on June 6, the U.S.-backed forces launched an offensive to capture the city of Raqqa.

The fighting recently has been concentrated inside the city but IS staged Thursdays surprise attack on a village about 17 kilometers (11 miles) away from Raqqa.

The Aamaq news agency said the attack killed 53 SDF members and damaged two armored vehicles. It added that IS fighters returned to their base safely afterward.

Nisreen Abdullah, a spokeswoman with the U.S.-backed SDF, said IS has been carrying out attacks against the SDF but strongly denied the high number of casualties given by Aamaq.

Daesh is trying to boost the morale of its fighters, Abdullah said by telephone from northern Syria, using the Arabic acronym for IS.

Daesh is facing collapse, she added, referring to the loss of the group of almost half of Raqqa in the fighting so far in the city.

Rami Abdurrahman, who heads Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said IS fighters used motorcycles in the Thursday attack. He said they were able to kill and kidnap dozens of SDF fighters and civilians.

Meanwhile, near the Syrian capital of Damascus, members of an al-Qaida-linked group opened fire at protesters who demanded that the hard-liners leave the eastern suburbs known as eastern Ghouta.

Members of the powerful Hayat Tahrir al Sham militant alliance — Arabic for Levant Liberation Committee — shot toward the protesters but did not cause any casualties among them, according to the Observatory and Ghouta-based activist Anas al-Dimashqi.

The al-Qaida faction is also known as HTS. Al-Dimashqi said HTS fighters tried to tear down the tri-color flag of the Syrian uprising, adding that no one was hurt in the shooting.

He said members of the Syrian rebel group known as Failaq al-Rahman protected the protesters.

Earlier Friday, the al-Qaida-linked HTS issued a statement saying the rebels shot dead a jihadi near his house in Ghouta and calling on Failaq al-Rahman to hand over those who shot and killed the fighter.