Nothing about this suggests the sponsorship is in any danger. Doesn't even mention it. It's a car review by a car reviewer who sounds like he's never been to Asia or been in a factory ("lunch at 10am?!").

And if the trainwreck that was Tesla during its early days can become successful in the US, so can VinFast. I would never bet against the deep pockets of an Asian conglomerate even if their first models aren't perfect. They only started selling cars in 2019. But that's a topic for car forums, anyway.

I don't feel like I got a true review towards the car as much as he talked about hating the trip and the vehicles. He also doesn't seem to understand electric vehicles so I wonder what he's directly comparing his actual driving experience too? For instance, it might not be the engineers limiting peak horse power. That might be limited by battery efficiency loss due to them heating up during operation. The engineer could've explained that as well and perhaps discussed other battery manufacturers they are testing or program updates being written? I'm not giving Vinfast a valid excuse as they need to figure it out, but he doesn't seem to understand what questions to ask (doesn't understand electric vehicles).

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http://www.sfuelsgolonger.com

I know bashing Ironman has become a popular pastime around this forum, but this is a serious reach. You’re grasping for straws.

The Car and Driver article on the pre-production models was a bit more muted by comparison. Still issues, but more on the fit/finish side (e.g., seat controls were reversed) versus ride, handling, and power delivery.

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Editor-in-Chief, Slowtwitch.com | Twitter

I haven't read Jalopnik or any of the other Deadspin-family sites in years. Thanks for the link. I very much enjoyed the article and the writer -- he seems to be a recent grad and comfortable mixing reviews of the automotive world, narrative, reporting, and cultural criticism. It looks like we get a healthy dose of all of these in the Jalopnik article. (If it seems odd that I poked around about this writer: I teach writing at The University of Illinois, and when I looked at his brief bio I saw that he's an OSU grad. I got a little curious about him because he is on a path I hope many of my students will follow and read a couple of stories. I thought they were pretty cool. Were they by-the-numbers reviews? No. But I liked the writing).

Lots of other reviews of this product are positive, or at least optimistic, by the way, and echo this article's main observations about the ambition and unfinished nature of the car, if in another mood.

Andrew Moss

If Coca-Cola were having PR / financial problems, would you be criticising the FIFA World Cup? I guess not, you'd be focusing on the corruption.

Same for IM - focus on the bad event management, lack of respect to athletes and pure money-driven decision making. Leave the sponsor's issues for the sponsor itself.

If you have been around a while, IM has a history of being bad for sponsorships. They don’t last. It’s a kiss of death.

I just think that this savior of a company (or at least that’s how it’s was presented in Kona) is a well funded train wreck so far.

Triathletes are early adopters, but I believe it’s quality over quantity. Who here would choose a VinFast over a Tesla. Not me

I mean it sounds like Vingroup is loaded and really want to get cars into the US, so no matter if the car sucks or not I think they'll continue dumping money to try and get success here. Doesn't sound like a problem to me, but maybe they'll bail at the first sign of failure.

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My Strava | My Instagram | Summerville, SC | 35-39 AG | 4:41 (70.3), 10:05 (140.6) | 3x70.3, 1x140.6 | Cat 2 Cyclist

To be fair, it's slightly amusing to watch the FTX fallout, like with the Golden State Warriors.

I'd choose one over a Tesla. But that's because I refuse to give dollars to Elon. And those cars *still* have fit/finish/quality issues.

But we'd probably look at a VW iD.4 or a Mustang Mach-E first.

I'm reserving judgment on a VinFast until they get a fully vetted production model out to the U.S.

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Editor-in-Chief, Slowtwitch.com | Twitter

If you have been around a while, IM has a history of being bad for sponsorships. They don’t last. It’s a kiss of death.//

Most sports title sponsors are not meant to be forever, so getting a few good years out of the companies is not that uncommon. As for kiss of death, I think Budweiser, Ford, Gatorade, and a few others would say they are doing just fine. But you are right in that some of the endemic sponsors have overreached and never gotten their monies worth. Got too caught up in the we won mentality, and never really penciled out the numbers of what success would or should look like. This latest sponsor seems to have come on board very early in their lifecycle, so will have to wait it out and see if it was a good or bad decision for them..

My take away was, "We flew 6000 miles for hookers and fine wine but instead were expected to test cars. Then we tried to go into town for hookers and fine wine but they stared at us and told us to return to the compound. This company is horrible."

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http://www.sfuelsgolonger.com

I never even knew Vinfast were electric cars up until this article! A big miss on the marketing side, but now that we are in the market for one a they will be considered

I came across Vinfast a while and was really unimpressed.

Aesthetics were meh, pricing was wierd and I was deeply suspicious of an EV maker coming out with full size SUV's when none of the other major automakers had done that yet.

We're you sleeping during Kona coverage? Lol

No, saw all the advertising but just don't recall them saying anything about being electric?

My mistake. I read your post with emphasis on "cars" instead of "electric." I knew they were electric but not sure how much that was emphasized. To your point, seems they didn't emphasize it enough then.

My wife refuses to give money to Elon, so I just got in the queue for an ID4, but really I want the ID3 which won't be sold in North America (bummer)

We're driving the Mrs. Sportwagen 4Motion (nickname: Angela, after the PM) until we get done paying off ST Tundra Division's truck -- we're not doing two car payments again, and considering the truck is currently no interest, there's zero reason for me to get in advance of that.

But something with about 300-350 miles of range and roughly the same size would be perfect.

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Editor-in-Chief, Slowtwitch.com | Twitter

The e-tron has been a pretty good success for Audi since 2019. The Rivian R1T and Hummer look pretty good too 😀.

I watched the coverage last night on YouTube. The VinFast advertisements do not specifically mention that they are electric cars.

Here another article that pretty much echoes the impressions in the OP - https://www.motortrend.com/...w-coming-to-america/

A $55k EV without the battery being included for the price? Clearly going after the market segment with the luxury beliefs.

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Next races on the schedule: none at the moment

This is true...

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E-DUB
Chief Janitor @Slowtwitch
Life is short. Dont be mad all the time.

We have had our Tesla since 2018. Zero problems with 35k miles. Upkeep has been replacing a cabin filter. Like most things, you hear about problems (like Ironman lately) but don’t hear about the thousands of very happy customers! But the best thing about Tesla is the number and placement or Supercharging stations.
We did buy ours before Elon was Elon. So you have a great point there!
I hope VinFast does well. I think many companies will step up. Charging infrastructure must be addressed for non Teslas.

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Team Zoot So Cal