#MiniVsPorsche

With Porsche refusing to take part in MINI‘s challenge to race at Road Atlanta (which was neither a real race, nor actually on the track at Road Atlanta), MINI decided to go ahead and stage the comparo anyway. And the plucky British automaker… lost?

That’s right, the MINI Cooper S couldn’t best the German juggernaut Porsche 911 – which comes as no surprise to anyone as the Porsche costs almost twice the price and has roughly double the horsepower. The autocross track the MINI devised to give the Cooper S an advantage helped, but not enough to secure a victory, with the Porsche still completing the course 2 seconds ahead. MINI likes to point out that each one of those seconds costs an additional $38,000.

Regardless, the entire marketing gimmick was a stroke of genius by the folks at MINI, attracting a ton of attention to the brand and drawing a comparison between the Cooper and 911 which reflects positively on MINI. (It’s a propaganda technique, read the section titled “Trasfer” here. Who said a philosophy degree was useless?)

To see how the whole thing went down and for several more videos about the event, see after the jump:

[Source: Facebook]

See the videos:

By now were sure you’ve heard about MINI‘s challenge to Porsche to come out and race at Road Atlanta. A genius piece of marketing no doubt, but it appears two can play at this game as Hyundai has just turned the tables on MINI in a new YouTube video, offering to step in for the timid German juggernaut.

Commenting that “We’d be happy to show you the line at Road Atlanta, where we laid down our Epic Lap” Super Bowl commercial, Hyundai has thrown down the gauntlet and, quite frankly, after the incessant taunting MINI has given to Porsche, we’re not sure the fun British brand can refuse.

Hyundai does admit that they won’t be able to make the planned June 21st even, stating that their hired-hitman racer Rhys Millen will be out attempting to set a Pikes Peak world record in a a Genesis-powered race car. Instead the Korean underdog has suggested July.

We’re sure MINI didn’t foresee this when they cooked up the MINI vs. Porsche challenge and right about now they’re probably regretting they did.

See the video after the jump:

It’s possibly the best 80’s montage of them all; yes, we’re talking about the training scene from Rocky IV where the underdog Balboa trains in a wooden hut in the Russian countryside while Captain Ivan Drago (aka, Dolf Lungren) pumps up on steroids and makes use of the world’s most sophisticated machines to tone his body.

Well, in MINI’s continued bid to taunt Porsche into a showdown at Road Atlanta, the fun-loving (and internet marketing savvy) folks at MINI have teamed up with the comedy geniuses at FunnyorDie to produce a parody of the epic montage that is sure to pump you up. It’s no surprise that the part of Rocky is played by a MINI and that those overly serious Russians are played by overly serious folks from Porsche.

And we thought the Ford Fiesta campaign was smart online marketing.

[Source: FunnyorDie]

See the video after the jump:

Exploiting social media for all it’s worth, MINI isn’t about to let up on its David vs Golliath challenge. As we’re sure you recall, MINI recently challenged Porsche to a race at Road Atlanta. Porsche subsequently declined, trading MINI’s fun jabs for biting disdain of the fun British brand. (Funny, we always thought German’s were known for there sense of humor).

Now MINI USA boss Jim McDowell is back, using Facebook and YouTube to once again coax Porsche to a race, offering better prizes than before to the winner – including a pair of Justin Bieber tickets.

We’re all but certain Porsche will once again decline, but it doesn’t really matter. Either way, MINI is coming out of this on top, with tons of publicity and lots of laughs. And even if Porsche accepted and MINI lost, it would still be a positive for MINI, just that Porsche would even acknowledge that MINI is a competitor.

It’s for that exact reason that we can’t ever seen Porsche accepting. In fact, we can already predict the response will have something to do with Porsche’s recent class win at Le Mans.

See the video after the jump: