Jalopnik's Least Shitty Articles Of 2021 According to David Tracy And Jason Torchinsky

Some stories at Jalopnik will never be forgotten. The story about Jason interviewing Pixar creators, the story of Neal Pollack shitting in a Lexus, the story of Patrick George crashing a Camaro mule, the time Raph rolled his Beetle, the time I dyed my clothes in oil — you get the idea.

A lot of these stories are lightning in a bottle — things that happened in just the right way, and written with just the right tone of irreverence to make for a supremely entertaining story that will forever live in the annals of Jalopnik history.

I think Steve DaSilva’s “Here Are Five Perfect Cars To Buy During The Used Car Shortage” (a story idea inspired by veteran Raphael Orlove) has what it takes to be an iconic story, because it’s just so surprisingly hilarious and supremely shareable.

The topshot is so boring, the headline so generic, but when you open the article out of sheer boredom, you are bombarded with pure hilarity. The five perfect cars to buy during the car shortage are all purple Chrysler PT Cruisers, a vehicle that is itself a huge joke. Write this story the way DaSilva has — describing five PT Cruisers as totally different cars filling different needs — and what you end with is pure genius.

Bravo, Steve.

Lawrence Hodge’s story about how a California dealership detained his mom over a Chrysler Sebring is so messed up, it’ll make your blood boil. The infuriating story works well with Lawrence’s relaxed writing style drawing from his childhood memories, resulting in an article so compelling that hundreds of thousands of people couldn’t help but read.

Jesus Juice, Cleveland’s Finest — these are the two nicknames I have for PB Blaster, my favorite penetrating lubricant.

To some of you, PB Blaster might not mean much, but to those of us living in the rust belt, it’s an institution. It is our “right-hand tool,” as important as a flashlight or a flathead screwdriver. Without PB Blaster, unfastening bolts is often an impossibility. But with it, magic happens.

What makes this story worth including in this “Top Stories” list is its premise. Conducting a deep dive into a product that so many of us have used over the years, but really know very little about is just a great article idea. Relatable and informative — it’s a great combo.

In March of 2021, Volkswagen issued a press release stating that it was officially changing its name to “Voltswagen.” Well before April 1, and not too far astray from the wild name-changes and logo-alterations happening in the auto industry as electrification takes hold, the automotive press bought this April Fools joke hook, line, and sinker. In part, because Volkswagen PR had confirmed the press release’s veracity.

When VW later admitted that, actually, this was all a big joke, many car journalists were livid. They took the whole thing personally, writing scathing articles and Twitter posts about how their reputation had been compromised because VW had, in their minds, been deceitful, causing the journalists to believe that the joke — that Volkswagen had changed its name to Voltswagen — had been legit. (For the record, if an automaker says something is true, journalists can report that the automaker said it was true. If it ends up not being true, writers shouldn’t feel hurt about it. It’s no big deal. And yet it was.).

Rory Carroll, Editor-In-Chief of Jalopnik, didn’t buy the press release for a single second. Ferdinand Porsche could have come back from the dead, walked into Rory’s house, and told him “Actually, Rory, it is true. Vee ahr chenging ouher nehm to Voltswahhgen.”

Rory would have said “Nice to meet you sir, but please, see your way out of my house. We don’t like liars around these parts. You’re setting a bad example for my daughters.”

Rory was so confident, in fact, that he wrote an article titled: “If Volkswagen Actually Changes Its Name To Voltswagen, I’ll Get A VW Tattoo.” And while, in retrospect, this might not seem like a big deal since the whole concept of “Voltswagen” is laughable, you have to realize that pretty much every other outlet had believed the press release (because, again, Volkswagen had confirmed it).

I personally think Rory should have flexed a bit harder about being right, but instead of pointing at other journalists now mopping up the remnants of their egos (again, for no real reason), Rory took the high road. Good on him.

Adam Ismail is a seasoned journalist, having worked as a tech writer prior to Jalopnik. As such, his interviewing and writing skills are second to none. It’s this skill, along with a great story about a fascinatingly obscure car that was difficult to obtain and that has been even more difficult to restore, that makes Adam’s article “This Guy Is Restoring An Obscure Japanese Race Car In His Home Garage With The Help Of Internet Car Weirdos” so great.

There’s cool car tech, cool car history, an insightful interview with a primary source, and an interesting look at problem solving needed to get the car back on its feet. It’s no wonder that some of the top comments on that story read: “What an awesome story. Love it. Followed. More of this stuff Jalopnik. This is why I love this site” and “What a fucking awesome story. This guy rules.”

Have you ever heard of “Railway Spine?” I hadn’t either. If you read Elizabeth Blackstock’s article “Railway Spine, The Mystery Disease That Changed Our Understanding Of Psychology,” you’d have learned that it was a name that surgeon Sr. John Eric Erichsen gave in the 1860s to people experiencing physical symptoms after being involved in — and even just witnessing — a train crash. Even when there were no apparent physical injuries, physical symptoms like headaches and back pain plagued these people. Blackstock was at the time finishing up a master’s thesis (she was getting two master’s degrees while writing at Jalopnik — what a badass) that was a bit of a blend between psychology and literature, so this story was part of her studies. I’m glad she shared it.

Rory Carroll is a Michigander through and through. He grew up in Traverse City, lived in Detroit for a while, and has more Big Three ties than you can imagine. While he definitely has a well-rounded palate for automobiles (Rory owns two Volkswagen products, a Lexus, and an old Willys Jeeps), he definitely gets American cars — especially American muscle — better than damn near anyone I know.

It’s no surprise, then, that his review of the Cadillac CT4-V and CT5-V, titled “Cadillac’s Blackwing Cars Are The Last Combustion Powered Sedans That Matter,” was a beautifully-crafted work of art. A nuanced, thoughtful, emotional piece about two fantastic cars that will almost certainly be the last of their kind.

I love it when José Rodríguez Jr. talks about Mexican car culture in the Jalopnik chat room. Of Mexican descent and hailing from rural parts of southern Texas, José’s automotive experience is quite different than Jason and mine, and it’s always exciting to hear about Mexican cars that we never knew existed.

An example of a story in which José leveraged his background to enlighten the rest of us was his blog about the Ford Lobos, which means “Wolf” in Spanish. The Lobos is what Ford calls certain F-150s in Mexico. José spoke with Ford to learn more about that name, which he pokes fun at a few times in his story.

Sometimes it’s important to dig into the small nooks of history, identify stories that have somehow been lost or underserved, and amplify those tales in a way that gives credit to those who deserve it. It can be an important way of reframing a country’s identity by challenging a history that has been cherry-picked by our predecessors.

Elizabeth Blackstock’s story about Cheryl Linn Glass, the first black woman to race sprint cars professionally in the U.S., highlights a person who deserves to be a household name and a role model. “It is absolutely devastating that the racing world hasn’t remembered Cheryl Linn Glass with the reverence deserved of a Black woman who broke down the barriers placed before her to carve out her place as a racer, a scholar, and a businesswoman,” Blackstock writes.

It’s an amazing tale that I — and I suspect many of you — had sadly never heard. But I’m glad I have, now.

Few topics maximize the important to interesting ratio as well as the chip shortage does. After all, the supply chain bottleneck has caused enormous problems in 2021 and has in many ways defined the year for automakers, and yet it’s just not sexy. “Hey, anyone want to talk about the chip shortage” isn’t a phrase that’s been uttered anywhere outside of deeply nerdy circles.

That’s what makes Adam Ismail’s story, titled “I Asked Experts Why Carmakers Can’t Just Transition To Newer Chips In Stock. Here’s What They Told Me” so compelling. Adam asked a question that readers didn’t know they wanted an answer for, namely: Why can you buy state-of-the-art electronics without much issue while car sales are being held up by a chip limitation? Why aren’t electronics having chip shortages of the same magnitude?

The story provides us with insightful quotes like this one describing why cars use older chips to meet reliability targets: “Thus, parts for automobiles, including some chips, are often built on older, proven technology, rather than the latest available technology.” Adam goes on to say that “What automakers require is somewhat at odds with what chipmakers prefer and are tooled to produce: smaller, more densely packed chips, that can be manufactured at lower cost and yield more units.”

So cars and electronics use significantly different chip technology, which isn’t something that I, or most readers (if I had to guess based on how many folks read and shared this story) knew. Great stuff, AI.

In my travels to meet car enthusiasts around the world, I’ve noticed that lots of folks living in cities have been forced to substitute their car hobby for a bike hobby. The amount of overlap between car and bike enthusiasts is staggering, especially among those living in urban areas, which is why I’m glad Raph decided to pick up a pen and jot down some of his Bike Tales.

The stories have been well read, not just because they’re relatable, but because they discuss cool mechanical features, describe problem solving techniques that often require true craftsmanship, and get into the history of bicycle design. Though bikes are missing two wheels and an engine, they remain an important part of the global vehicular ecosystem. So I’m glad Jalopnik is covering velocipedes, and I’m glad you readers are taking it all in.

While we’re on the topic of two-wheeled contraptions, we’d be remiss if we didn’t show some love for Bradley Brownell’s motorcycle reviews. Like this story about the epic Honda Grom or “Two Days In The Desert On An Electric Motorcycle,” which about the all-electric Zero DSR Black Forest.

Say what you will about Brad’s tendency to go off on folks in the comments; the man will write the shit out of a bike review. And that’s great for Jalopnik, as motorcycles are an important but underserved (at least on Jalopnik) part of the world’s vehicular ecosystem. So it’s nice to see some representation.

Obviously, I’m going to include this article, because it’s about a road trip in an old Jeep, namely my own. But that’s not the only reason why; the way Bradley describes his road trip from Reno to Detroit is just fantastic:

I was in Potter, Nebraska, a hundred miles from any major town, and the rust-free Holy Grail 1993 Jeep Grand Cherokee I was delivering across the country to decrepit-Jeep collector and shaman David Tracy had decided it wanted to die. It had opened one of its veins and was letting itself of vital fluids. It wasn’t just a small leak, it was a massive wound, at idle streaming out of the side of the engine in a pulsing, throbbing gush.

Good writing, a long road trip, a creative repair to a rare vehicle — what more do you want out of a story?

Jalopnik has some great contributors who have done excellent work this year. I’m just going to point out a couple of contributors whom I had the pleasure of editing, but just know that there are many, many more, and Raphael Orlove deserves credit for editing their pieces.

My favorite story to edit was “How NASA’s Perseverance Landed On Mars: An Aerospace Engineer Breaks It Down In Fascinating Detail,” which my friend Brian Kirby — an engineer who played a significant role in sending a spacecraft into deep space — wrote about NASA’s successful Perseverance mission. The way that Kirby wrote this piece makes it clear that he not only intimately understands the chronology of the mission, but he has profound insight to share about the physics behind it. The fact that multiple members of the engineering team working on Perseverance chimed into the comments to offer compliments just goes to show the depth of Kirby’s knowledge on this topic and of space travel at large.

I also enjoyed editing “How All-Wheel Drive Works: A Ridiculously Detailed Technical Explainer” by longtime Jalopnik commenter Patrick Rich (Hammerheadfistpunch). Patrick loves off-road vehicles and his understanding of all-wheel drive is strangely detailed.

Okay, so some of you probably clicked this article to read some of Torch’s and my work, so we figured we’d include quite a bit of it, here. So get ready for us to brag a little about ourselves. It feels a little weird, but we’re doing it.

I’m an engineer, so you can always expect me to get nerdy about how cars work, but I’m also a bit of a nut-job, so those technical stories are always laced with really “out-there” weirdness. It’s my go-to blend.

I think the 2021 story that epitomizes my writing style more than any other is “I Visited Supercar Company Koenigsegg After Sleeping In A Van And Bathing In The Sea.” It’s a bonkers tale of me living in a $600 diesel manual Chrysler Voyager (which I fixed up), bathing in the Baltic Sea, and then chatting with engineers at one of the most prestigious automotive engineering firms on Earth. The story was fun because it allowed me to blend wrenching, traveling, entertaining, understanding complex engineering, and then wrap it all up with what I enjoy most: writing.

The Koenigsegg story was a continuation of “Project Krassler,” a series of articles about a rare diesel manual Chrysler Voyager that I bought, limped through German inspection, and used to provide readers with cool nuggets about European car culture. I traveled to Serbia and talked to a man who has owned his Yugo (which was built there in Serbia) since new; I discovered two young German brothers who are world experts on Chrysler minivans; I took you through the hell that is Eastern European border checkpoints; I used my basketball knowledge to get out of Bulgaria; I showed you just how absurdly expensive cars are in Turkey, where I also picked up a hitchhiker.

Want to see more technical nerdiness? Check out the static analysis I did on a wooden engine crane (which honestly probably wasn’t even an engine hoist). Also check out how I took a viral video about a Jeep engine blowing up after the vehicle was towed in gear, and turned it into an explainer about gearing and transmission lubrication.

Then there my super-detailed reviews of the Rivian R1T and Ford Bronco, along with a close look at why General Motors used beautiful blue anodized aluminum wheel cylinders that very few will ever see in old Saturns, Pontiacs, and Chevrolets (such a random article, but one of my faves). And then there was that blog in which I basically canceled myself by exposing some of my childhood car-related (and balding/muscle building-related) Yahoo Answers questions. So awkward.

Oh and don’t forget my nuanced discussion about the Ford Bronco’s thermal issues that two journalists experienced during press drives. I’m a former powertrain cooling engineer, so I enjoyed talking about the four-wheel drive system “derate” incidents with Ford engineers and with other auto engineers, and ultimately writing what I thought was a thought-provoking piece that included discussions about what exactly constitutes a failure in an automobile.

Last but not least was an example of my very favorite type of story to tell, a human interest tale. This one was about an older gentleman named Gary Rider, whose listing for an air compressor on Facebook Marketplace — a compressor that he was selling to make money for his liver transplant — kicked off an entire subculture of automotive weirdness in the form of a Facebook group named “a car club where everyone acts like boomers.” Talking with Gary, his family, and members of that group was an awesome experience. (Gary has since passed away; more on that soon).

The reason why Torch and I get along so well is that I’m a nerd infected with a bit of weirdness, and Jason is a weirdo infected with a bit of nerdiness. He’s an artist/comedian who appreciates engineering, and I’m an engineer who appreciates art/comedy. There’s a mutual respect there, where we both look at each other’s work and say “Damn. That’s amazing. I wish I could do that.”

Torch has a healthy appreciation for understanding how things work. He reached out to a transportation company to figure out what the little doors are on the back of truck trailers, and he wrote an explainer about the function of the black stripes on school buses. He also figured out why Ford F-150s still use old-school antennas. He also wrote a cool article about how the Opel GT has a brake master cylinder mounted ahead of its engine bay instead of on the firewall; and there’s his piece about the Lancia whose engine one could destroy by simply turning the steering wheel (load from the power steering pump had a tendency to break the timing belt that drove it). It’s all fascinating stuff!

Jason has also written lots of design breakdowns. These have become his specialty, because as an artist, he has an eye that catches even the most subtle styling features, which he describes vividly and often hilariously. Want a design breakdown for the new postal vehicle? Torch has you covered. What about the new Tundra? No problem. The Hyundai Santa Cruz mini-pickup? Jason will walk you through its weird front face. The new Nissan Z? Again, Torch is there for you. Always.

Hell, Torch has even done a design breakdown of the ubiquitous Check Engine Light found on modern vehicle dashboards, ultimately concluding that it is “Terrible and Due For an Update.”

Jason also has a great understanding of human psychology, and he uses that knowledge to help readers navigate the complexities associated with the widespread adoption, and with the user interface, of (semi)autonomous vehicles. Check out “Nobody Seems To Have An Answer To Autonomy’s Biggest Problem But I Have An Idea” and “The SAE Autonomy Levels Are Confusing But I Think I Have A Better Way” and “Lots Of People Seem To Completely Misunderstand The Autonomy Levels, So Let’s Clear This.” With so many convinced that Tesla actually has a self-driving car in production (it does not), and with so many issues inherent to semi-autonomous cars, Jason’s demystification of the tech is playing an important role in how we understand and evaluate self-driving car tech. He’s even written a book about this.

Jason, of course, still writes fun articles about taillights, including this one about an amazing Studebaker taillight and this breakdown of the new Hyundai Ioniq 5's amazing lighting.

And then there’s his supremely bonkers stuff. There’s his breakdown of a Reddit thread involving a parrot and dehydrating tomatoes in a Ford F-150 (honestly, even writing that out feels odd), there’s his amazing use of artificial intelligence to make an Austin Healey Sprite sing James Brown’s “I Feel Good” and to make the Fiat 500 from the Cars movie franchise sing Gloria Gaynor’s “I will survive.”

Actually, let me just stop there, because that article — specifically the videos in that article — is so shockingly disturbing that I think it might actually be considered “going too far.” Definitely read that story if you haven’t.

Also, do you realize that Jason wrote an article that proposed hooking three inline-threes together to make a straight-nine, and then installing that into an Iran-built first-gen Viper — all as a way to solve the Iran Nuclear deal impasse? You might think this is just silly, but then the CEO of a think-tank dedicated to Iran diplomacy weighed in:

How is this the real world? That’s a question that Jason’s articles regularly leave me contemplating.