Hi, I'm John Davis and this is MotorWeek !

Join us as we bring a "Superscreen" sedan to your screen, the new Mercedes-Benz CLA... Then, we rally up at a high-performance gathering for Vets... Dan Maffett picks up where we left off on patch panel repair... And we'll head for the horizon in the latest Audi Q3... So, come drive with us, next!

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JOHN: Like many brands, Mercedes-Benz has had multiple strategies over the last decade, as much uncertainty remains about the role of full battery electrics in the near future.

But one thing is for certain: Flexibility will be key going forward, and an all-new generation of their entry-level CLA delivers just that.

♪ ♪ It is a crazy time in the car biz.

After years of focusing R+D efforts into EVs, suddenly, sales have slowed and priorities have shifted.

That's why cars like this 2027 Mercedes-Benz CLA are important, as this CLA 250+ Electric sedan is full battery electric.

Yet, the CLA platform is designed to handle electric as well as internal- combustion-based drivetrains, giving Mercedes-Benz the flexibility to meet customer demand.

It's the EV that goes on sale first, and this fast-roof 250+ is the starting point.

A single motor powering 17 inch rear wheels with 268 horsepower and 247 pound-feet of torque.

The 350 4MATIC adds a smaller motor up front and sends a combined 349 horsepower to all four 18 inch wheels.

Both use the same 85 kilowatt hour battery, with the 4MATIC rated at 312 miles.

This 250+ jumps up to as high as 374 miles.

But, our test car was rolling on optional 19 inch AMG wheels which theoretically drops range to 317 miles.

We say "theoretically" because we did our usual drive loop, on pace for 407 miles, which seemed quite high.

So, we did a second loop expecting to come back with a lower number, and the opposite happened, as we were at the 432 mile pace with that one.

Go figure!

Using 31 kilowatt hour of electricity per 100 miles also earns the 250+ a good efficiency rating.

For DC Fast Charging, there's a NACS port that will accept up to 320 kilowatt.

With an 800 volt architecture, it will charge to 80 percent in only 22 minutes.

There's also a J1772 for at home Level 1 or 2 charging.

We were more interested in charging down our Mason Dixon Dragway test track where the CLA also performed quite well, dashing to 60 in 5.8 seconds.

There was moderate power at launch, rather than the unrelenting rush of some EVs, which gives the 250+ a very natural feel.

Another familiar aspect is that this is one of the few EVs to make use of a 2-speed gearbox; and we could definitely feel that shift happen right around 65 miles per hour, where it went into more of a cruising mode.

We loved it, and will likely make a great impression on first time EV buyers.

One thing we're less a fan of is the noise that it makes along the way.

The drivetrain itself is very quiet, but Mercedes has added some kitschy sound effects to accentuate the experience.

We finished the quarter-mile in 14.6 seconds at 99 miles per hour.

There's no getting around the fact that EVs are still much heavier than ICE drivetrains and shuffling all that weight through our cone course was a handful, but in a fun way, even getting a little tail happy at times.

There wasn't a lot of body roll, and it remained very stable feeling throughout.

Things were smooth and steady in our braking test.

We call 105 feet from 60 a very good average.

Mercedes-Benz has clearly made the interior a tech showcase with screens everywhere and virtually no manual controls.

Still, we found function to be nearly as high its larger more expensive kin.

Front seat passenger space feels almost expansive.

The tradeoff is tight rear seat leg room, with that arching roof doing a number on headroom as well.

Materials are the best yet in a CLA, delivering a true Mercedes feel.

We also like the fact that Mercedes has finally gotten onboard with a frunk!

This 1.4 cubic-feet under-hood cubby is a nice addition to the 10.3 cubic-feet trunk space.

Mercedes evidently wants everyone to know this great looking vehicle is one of theirs, as they've integrated their star logo everywhere, including in the illuminated grille panel, headlights, and taillights.

There's more tech on display outside, from the fender-mounted cameras to the glass roof with SKY CONTROL which allows you to switch through seven layers of opacity and decide how much of the outside you let in.

Pricing for the CLA 250+ starts at $49,400, with a relatively small step up to the 350 4MATIC for $51,950.

The ICE CLA 220 Hybrid will undercut them both, starting at $45,350.

With its tremendous EV range, the 2027 Mercedes-Benz CLA 250+ Electric is an amazing feat of engineering, and we think the multi-power platform is absolutely the way to go.

This is an entry-level Mercedes-Benz that tries very hard to banish that label.

But that's always been the case with the CLA.

It is also very easy on the eyes, and will surely open up a whole new world of luxury, technology, and efficiency for first-time Mercedes buyers, which is exactly the point.

JOHN: For many military veterans, leaving the service creates an adrenaline void.

So not surprisingly, some of them turn to motorsports.

But the transition to civilian life isn't that easy for everyone, and this week our Greg Carloss goes "Over the Edge" with an organization that supports those veterans with speed and camaraderie.

♪ ♪ GREG CARLOSS: We're here at the "Rally4Vets Top Dog Championship," and it is going down here today at Dominion Raceway where the interservice military rivalry meets motorsport.

So, who's got the fastest drivers in the military?

GROUP: *Cheers* ROBERT HESS: Rally4Vets, it is the motorsports program of the Disabled Veteran Empowerment Network.

We host the only interservice military motorsports competition in the world.

GREG: Dubbed the "Top Dog Championship," drivers represent their military branch in a team trackcross competition.

ROBERT HESS: Whichever service team scores the most points becomes the official Top Dog team of the year.

GREG: "Top Dog" might just sound like a cool military term, but there's more to it than that.

ROBERT: One of the things we're particularly interested in is providing service dogs for veterans dealing with emotional issues.

So, we take these funds and we pass them off to another veteran charity called "Veterans Moving Forward."

GREG: "Veterans Moving Forward" works to provide service and therapy dogs to veterans at no cost.

And Woody, here, is the very first dog that Rally4Vets funded.

SUSAN SENKO: I was in the Nurse Corps with the U.S.

Air Force, and I was an E.R.

trauma nurse.

Woody has made an incredible difference in my life.

He can be literally lifesaving.

There's things that I can do now that I was struggling with.

GREG: Watching Susan with Woody provides powerful perspective for the competitors.

But after talking to some of them, I realize the event itself is a form of therapy.

VEN VALERIO: I'm here to support veterans' mental health, but also kind of going through my own mental health journey while being active duty, trying to find something that I really enjoy.

And this is it.

ERIC KREITZER: It's a very stigmatic area.

So, motorsports, adventure therapy, that kind of stuff, kind of breaks that stigma.

Met a lot of cool people, had a lot of tough conversations.

And it's just an awesome, fun event to kind of do that.

(cars revving engines) GREG: While most of the drivers are active duty or retired military, some are civilians who just want to drive fast for a good cause.

BILLY HOWELL: So, I didn't have an affiliation, and I just said to stick me with whoever has the least amount of people, and that ended up to be Space Force.

So, I'm on the Space Force team today.

(engine revving sound) GREG: Billy and his track-ready Supra put down some seriously quick times, but so does Team Navy's Mathew Kelley and his Caterham 420R.

MATHEW KELLEY: Yeah.

This is actually only my second trackcross at Dominion Raceway.

It's a fantastic track over here.

Really, especially when you're driving this car, it's super easy to feel the limits.

You can see the apexes, I mean, the wheels right in eyeshot, man.

It's super easy to make out all the corners.

I feel like, if we had the numbers the Army would be given, we'd be putting up better times.

GREG: In six years of the Top Dog Championship the Navy has never won.

The Air Force flew to its only victory in 2024, while the Marine Corps took home its second trophy in 2025.

The Army also has two wins thanks to experienced racers like Stephanie Bish.

STEPHANIE BISH: Started a lot with the HPDE, did a lot of HPDE stuff, then I moved out to Virginia and met my spouse, and we-- he got me into track stuff.

We're going to win.

My spouse and I are always number one and two for the last three years.

So, we're doing it for number four.

(laughs) AXEL COLLAZO: Right now, I'm battling it out with the Bishes, Dan Bish and Stephanie Bish.

But I'm hoping that the Marines bring in enough points to take this thing one more time.

CHRIS NICOL: So, I mean, we all we all talk crap, you know?

Army talk crap to the Marine Corps and to the Navy and the "Chair Force," you know-- Air Force, I meant.

But we all love each other, man.

One team, one fight.

But Army is the best team out here, you know, and we're taking that trophy home.

GREG: Indeed, Army did take home the trophy.

Fortunately, in this battle there are moral victories.

ROBERT: Our focus is gathering the vets together and giving them a way to continue to serve.

So, this is just another way that these guys can come together and support the, you know, their vets and people in active duty.

GREG: I'd say that's mission accomplished!

JOHN: Let's get back to the garage where Dan Maffett is wrapping up our patch panel install on MotorWeek's "Your Drive."

(car starts up) DAN MAFFETT: Hey, guys.

We're here with the '04 Dodge Ram and if you know Ram trucks, you know they're going to rust out in the bed.

Now, Giuseppe started this process for me, cut out the rust, and he did a step-lip.

There's not enough room to do a step-lip all the way around, we found out; so, I'm going to cut that step out today, we're going to trim the patch panel down, we're going to Cleco it in, and we're going to butt weld with this MIG.

So, we're going to fix this up, we're going to paint it and get it back as brand new.

(sound of spray painting) (sound of sander hissing) Alright, so, as you can see now, we've changed our approach a little bit.

So, we've decided to cut all the way down, around this lip to the spot welds because there was a lot more corrosion inside that lip than we originally thought, um, and I think that's the better way to go because we're going to get this nice factory seam here where this edge is going to be bent really nice and clean.

And then, we just throw a couple spot welds there and we'll be good to go.

Now, after we got that cut out, we cut all the extra panel from that patch panel that we don't need.

So, this, you know, remember, came out all the way to here.

Just extra stuff we don't need, but don't throw this away.

This is really good steel that you can use on other projects or if you need to do another repair on the truck, you can use it there.

Once we've got this trimmed down to size, we decided to do the butt weld up the sides and then keep the step weld up top because we got a good lip on that.

So, we're going to run the butt weld up to the sides and then this all down the top is going to be that lap weld.

We're holding them in place with Clecos.

So, Clecos are these little guys here.

You drill a hole, pop this through, and it holds two panels together super tight.

So, our next step is going to be tack welding everything, getting it nice and smooth, stitch welding in between the tacks, and finishing it out, and then we can be ready for body work and paint.

(popping sounds of welding) (sander hissing sounds) (popping sounds of welding) (sander sounds) (hammmer banging) Alright, we are all wrapped up on this metal repair on this Dodge Ram bed.

Last time you saw it we had Clecos holding it in place.

We went around and stitch welded the corners, made sure everything was nice and straight, then we plug welded the bottom and we went around and filled all the gaps with weld, ground them smooth, and got it nice, flat, ready for primer, paint, and all that.

Now, this took about eight hours.

At home, you can expect eight to twelve, maybe a whole weekend, but it's definitely doable if you take your time.

Now, the next segment you're going to see is going to be us prepping this for filler, primer, color and clear, to make it look brand-new.

If you have any questions or comments, hit us up right here, at MotorWeek .

JOHN: And now, let's head over to the studio where Stephanie Hart has the rundown on all the latest MotorNews.

♪ ♪ STEPHANIE HART: Tesla has finally unveiled the 2nd generation Roadster.

And, of course, it wasn't just a simple curtain pull.

It was introduced by Elon Musk and other Tesla employees at SpaceX's testing facility in Texas.

Quite befitting-- the Roadster launched off a ramp upside down, showing off the vehicle's "multi-mode suction system," which extracts the air underneath the car to create additional downforce.

Soon after, the Roadster leapt over Tesla's lineup of vehicles, demoing the available cold-gas thrusters.

They use compressed air to create the flying effect and launch the vehicle to 60 in under 1.0 second.

The thrusters aren't standard, though, and they will be limited in availability and regional access.

At its core it's still an EV, and Tesla is aiming for a top speed of at least 230 miles per hour.

How much of this will actually make it to production?

We should know more by the time it enters production in 2028.

And now for something way more grounded, the Porsche Mission S. The Mission S previews Porsche's future mid-engine supercar.

The goal is to create a permanent addition to the lineup above the 911.

The Mission S clearly takes design elements from across Porsche's history: The rear wing gives 959 vibes; the phone-dial wheels are 928 territory; and the front is definitely 911 inspired.

The cabin shows a mix of physical and digital controls but is mostly sparse; not even an infotainment screen is mounted, instead using a retractable phone mount.

The five-pod instrument panel will physically adjust itself to emphasis each drive mode; and the ignition is rightfully placed to the left of the column.

We're excited to see where this new direction takes Porsche.

And that's it for this week's MotorNews.

♪ ♪ GREG: Our 2026 Acura ADX may be small, but it has shown up big with our staff, delivering 8,500 miles of stress-free driving in six months' time.

It's certainly an attractive utility, getting quite a few looks when we're slow-rolling through parking lots or sitting in the drive thru queued up for our daily caffeine fix.

And it backs those looks up with a fairly sporty driving experience when we find ourselves on a nice curvy road amped up on all that caffeine.

Handling is definitely one of the best attributes of this ADX if you ask us.

Remember, this same chassis also underpins the Acura Integra, so despite being about 8.0 inches taller than the Integra, this ADX still has the suspension hardware to really carve up a corner.

For a small utility, it feels plenty roomy inside, which is a good thing, as the slightly larger RDX will soon be taking a gap year before it returns with a new generation for 2028.

Fuel economy from the very responsive 190 horsepower 1.5 liter turbo-4 is holding steady at 27.6 miles per gallon; and comments on its CVT have been relatively few, other than expressing appreciation for the substantial old-fashioned shifter.

We'll shift our focus to our Subaru Outback on the next MotorWeek Long-Term Road Test Update!

JOHN: The Audi Q3 has been on sale here since 2015.

And for many, the Q3 is best known as Audi's smallest utility vehicle.

To others, it's known as the Volkswagen Tiguan's more upscale sibling.

Well, wherever you're coming from, the Q3 is kicking off a 3rd generation for 2026, so let's all get to know it a lot better.

♪ ♪ Audi is clearly aiming high with this 2026 Q3 compact utility; claiming best-in-class performance with not just "luxury amenities" but "upper-luxury" levels of tech and refinement.

Bold claims all, but based on our experiences with recent Audis, it doesn't sound like too much of a stretch.

It helps that just one version of the redesigned Q3 is available here in the U.S., and it's the top S-Line quattro, meaning standard all-wheel-drive and a hyper 2.0 liter I4 turbo cranking out 255 horsepower and 273 pound-feet of torque.

New to the Q3 is a 7-speed dual-clutch automatic, and it's the thing that most of our drivers were quick to comment on.

The purpose in replacing the conventional 8-speed automatic was to deliver more of a street performance feel, and it does so at higher speeds.

But there is a notable lack of refinement at slow speeds, and proved jumpy in on/off throttle situations.

But that was the only thing that detracted from a smooth and otherwise fantastic driving experience.

It's a very quiet one too, with dual-pane acoustic glass added to cut down on wind noise at higher speeds.

Audi's transmission choice made a whole lot more sense at our Mason Dixon test track where it aggressively ripped through gear changes fast and furiously.

It even comes with an unexpected bonus of launch control which performed quite well, priming the car in full squat mode before releasing a flurry of low-end power to shoot us to 60 in 5.6 seconds; almost 2.0 seconds quicker than last gen.

After hitting third gear, things settled down a bit, and it was smooth sailing to the end of the quarter in 14.3 seconds at 94 miles per hour.

With standard quattro providing plenty of grip, it was very athletic in our handling course, with tight quick steering and even some decent feedback.

Body roll was minimal, as was understeer.

All of that had us pushing harder and harder, which eventually led to the safety systems abruptly stepping in to shut our party down.

And that's something the brakes also did quite well, aggressively bringing us to stops from 60 averaging just 108 feet, with great pedal feel and no fade.

(SUV whooshing by) Audi was instrumental in bringing all-wheel-drive to the masses as well as highlighting its performance potential, but their first true SUV didn't arrive here in the states until 2007.

As a stretched version of Porsche's Cayenne, we felt that Q7 combined the sophistication of a luxury car and toughness of a traditional 4X4, with added style and refinement to satisfy the most demanding luxury utility buyers.

That same spirit lives on here in the Q3, as like all luxury brands at this point, Audi now has a full lineup of utilities, though we'd say this Q3 is easily one of their best looking yet.

Standard 18 inch wheels can be upgraded to 20s.

More standard content is included inside, along with unique features such as the control stalks behind the steering wheel that aren't really stalks.

They are fixed in place with buttons and sliders on the end for wiper control and gear selection.

We were skeptical of the novel design, but they're actually quite ingenious, working well once you get the hang of things.

The combined driver display and infotainment screen array is massive, and puts lots of information literally in your face, but again with great functionality that makes it hard to find true faults.

Cargo capacity grows from 23.7 to 25.0 cubic-feet, doubling to 50.0 cubic-feet with the rear 40-20-40 sliding and reclining seats folded.

Government Fuel Economy Ratings are 22 city, 29 highway, and 25 combined.

We averaged a good 24.3 miles per gallon of Regular in our test loop.

That's an average Energy Impact Score; using 11.9 Barrels of Oil Annually, with 6.0 Tons of CO2 Emissions.

As mentioned, all Q3s are S-lines with quattro standard, but there are a few available packages to add to the $44,995 base price.

The 2026 Audi Q3 is a great-looking small SUV that's also quite luxurious; and despite our quibbles with slow-speed transmission operations, it's fabulous to drive on a daily basis; and to us, a new benchmark vehicle, and best fit for the entry-level luxury SUV lifestyle.

Well, that's our show, I hope you enjoyed it.

Now, for more MotorWeek , including daily news updates, podcasts, and even complete episodes, cruise on over to PBS.ORG/MOTORWEEK.

And I hope you'll join us next time.

We'll take stock of Mitsubishi's updated Outlander PHEV before checking out the latest Jeep Grand Cherokee!

Until then, I'm John Davis.

We'll see you right here on MotorWeek !

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MotorWeek is proudly sponsored by Auto Value and Bumper to Bumper, a nationwide network of stores and shops providing major brand auto and truck parts, and service from coast to coast, and in your local community.

Learn more at AutoValue.Com and BumperToBumper.Com.

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We test tires, then share our results.

We stock over a million tires.

We offer multiple installation options.

We do this because we believe tires matter.

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