Last Friday, Secretary of Defense James Mattis ordered reviews of both Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program and Boeing’s development contract for the Air Force One replacement program. But apparently the DOD and Lockheed were able to fix any problems with the program over the weekend, as President Donald Trump declared the F-35 program was now in “good shape” at a Monday meeting with small business leaders, which was broadcast by CNN.

Speaking of Lockheed, Trump said, “We’re cutting the price of their planes by a lot.”

Trump said that he had been working on the F-35 program since after the election, and “I was able to get $600 million off” the next block of F-35s being built.

Jim Resnick

It was a day I dreaded at the last minute, but not for any expected reason. Driving BAC’s single-seat track-day weapon, the Mono, on a course I’d never seen before was child’s play compared to the filter through which I’d have to do it. I threw my back out 36 hours prior, with the long muscles in my back clenching up stiff and unyielding like mandolin strings. Merely walking upright required an unsightly posture for which I was both embarrassed and pissed off. There wasn’t enough ibuprofen in the world.

But the Mono didn’t care, and that’s what mattered. Much more race car than road car, the BAC Mono comes from that specialized region of the automotive fringe that seeks the closest thing to an actual thoroughbred professional race car, but for mere enthusiasts who missed the professional racing driver boat and have normal careers as bankers, lawyers, software engineers, or journalists. The demographic for track-day specials like the Mono is nonsensical until you realize that the entire family of car diseases—and the track-day strain of it in particular—cares not for demographics. Cater to the passionate and the passionate will come.