Lifestyle
Tesla Model 3s dominate Pikes Peak Exhibition class with twin podium finishes
This year’s Pikes Peak Hill Climb initially had three Teslas slated to take on the legendary and extremely dangerous mountain. But just like everything in the world of Tesla and Elon Musk, things usually do not turn out as expected. One by one, the treacherous mountain seemingly picked off the Teslas, until there was a day when only one Model 3, driven by two-time Pikes Peak winner Blake Fuller, was running in the qualifiers.
Yet, as Sunday’s event would show, Fuller and his near-stock Model 3 Performance were not fated to complete the Pikes Peak Hill Climb alone. Thanks to a near-inhuman effort, another Model 3, piloted by veteran racer Randy Pobst and modified by EV tuning house Unplugged Performance, would rise from the dead and get ready for the mountain in time for the race. By the end of the day, the twin Teslas stood at the number one and two positions in the Exhibition class, and the competition was not even close.
Blake Fuller and his Model 3 Performance completed the Pikes Peak Hill Climb in 11:02.802, cementing his place at the top of the Exhibition class. At a close second was Randy Pobst and his repaired Unplugged Performance Model 3 Ascension-R, which completed the run in 11:04.131. The closest competitor was Scott Birdsall, who ranked third in his 1949 Ford F1 with a time of 11:24.065.
A community-driven victory
What is rather remarkable was that Blake Fuller’s first-place win at Pikes Peak’s Exhibition class was a community effort. In a post-race interview, the veteran racer stated that funding was tight due to the pandemic, but thankfully, the Tesla community rallied together to provide him with a car for the event. A couple donated their Model 3 Performance, and the rest of the expenses were raised by about 150 individuals and private businesses who were willing to help out.
As noted by Fuller in the interview, the Model 3’s amazing feat this year would not have been possible without help from the Tesla community. Help from notable individuals such as Zac and Jesse from the Now You Know YouTube channel, who spread the word about the community-driven effort, also provided great momentum for Fuller and the Model 3’s participation at this year’s Pikes Peak Hill Climb.
A comeback from the dead
Unplugged Performance went on a roller coaster ride this week. With the father of Track Mode behind the wheel of its modified Model 3 Ascension-R, the UP team and driver Randy Pobst dominated the Exhibition class on the first day of qualifiers. However, tragedy struck on the second day after the Model 3 hit a big bump on the road at speeds that were too high to recover. The car was practically totaled because of the accident, and all signs pointed to dreams of climbing Pikes Peak in the Model 3 Ascension R being over. But this was not to be the case. With sleepless nights and round-the-clock work, the Unplugged team and numerous Tesla community members pitched in to revive the heavily-damaged Model 3. Despite all the odds, the Unplugged team pulled through, and a race-ready Model 3 was ready for Sunday’s event.
The Model 3 Ascension R blazed through the first section of the mountain seven seconds quicker than its sibling, but over the course of the climb, the vehicle experienced battery heating issues that throttled its output. This unfortunately resulted in the Model 3 Ascension R climbing the majority of Pikes Peak at half power. Despite all these headwinds, Randy Pobst was able to complete the run just 2 seconds behind Fuller. That’s pretty admirable for a car that was totaled just a couple days before, and a car whose performance is severely reduced. In a post-race interview, Pobst noted that there is so much more that the Model 3 Ascension R could do, and he hopes to drive the vehicle up the mountain again. “I’ve never driven such a great car at Pikes Peak,” Pobst said.
The veteran racer is right. In 2019, Pobst took a 2019 Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat up Pikes Peak, finishing second place in the Exhibition class. His time with the over 700-hp Hellcat was 11:57.874, over 50 seconds slower than his throttled, repaired Model 3 Ascension R.
A warning to gasoline cars
With the impressive performance of Tesla’s electric cars at Pikes Peak this year, the auto industry’s transition to EVs has never been more evident. After all, if a near-stock Model 3 Performance and a repaired, reassembled Model 3 Ascension R could dominate Pikes Peak’s Exhibition class, then there is very little doubt that high-profile motoring events would likely become more and more populated by all-electric cars in the near future.
Watch Blake Fuller and Randy Pobst’s post-race interviews in the videos below.
Lifestyle
Tesla hit by Iranian missile debris in Israel
A Tesla in Israel absorbed a direct hit from missile debris, and the glassroof held.
On March 30, 2026, Lara Shusterman was in Netanya, Israel when Iranian ballistic missiles triggered air raid sirens across the city. While she remained in safety, her 2024 Tesla Model Y did not escape untouched. A heavy piece of missile debris struck the car’s massive glass roof, leaving a deep crater but without shattering. In a Facebook post to the Tesla Israel community the following morning, Shusterman described what happened: “The glass did not shatter into dangerous shards. She stopped the damage and pushed the metal part to the ground.” She closed by thanking Elon Musk and the Tesla team for building what she called “security and a sense of trust even in extreme situations.”
Netanya is a coastal city in central Israel, roughly 18 miles north of Tel Aviv and has been among the areas most frequently struck during Iran’s ongoing missile campaign, following coordinated U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iranian military infrastructure. Falling shrapnel from intercepted missiles is a common occurrence.
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- Tesla Model Y glass roof shattered from a piece of falling Iranian missile debris
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- A piece of Iranian missile debris that struck Lara Shusterman’s Tesla Model Y in Netanya, Israel on March 30, 2026, after being intercepted by Israeli air defenses.
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- Tesla Model Y glass roof shattered from a piece of falling Iranian missile debris
Source: Tesla Israel Facebook Group
The incident is a testament to Tesla’s structural engineering. Tesla’s glass roof is designed to support over four times the vehicle’s own weight. That strength has shown up in real-world accidents too. In 2021, a Model Y in California was struck by a falling tree during a storm, with the glass roof holding firm and the cabin remaining intact. In another widely reported incident, a Tesla Model Y plunged 250 feet off the cliff at Devil’s Slide in California in January 2023, with all four occupants, including two young children, surviving.
Disturbing details about Tesla’s 250-foot cliff drop emerge amid initial investigation
Tesla officially launched sales in Israel in early 2021 and captured over 60 percent of Israel’s EV market in the first year. The brand’s foothold in Israel remains significant. Tens of thousands of Teslas are now on Israeli roads, making incidents like Shusterman’s easy to corroborate. On the same week her Model Y took the hit, the U.S. Space Force awarded SpaceX a $178.5 million contract to launch missile tracking satellites, a separate but fitting reminder of how intertwined the Musk ecosystem has become with the realities of modern conflict.
Elon Musk
NASA sends humans to the Moon for the first time since 1972 – Here’s what’s next
NASA’s Artemis II launched four astronauts toward the Moon on the first crewed lunar mission since 1972.
NASA’s Space Launch System rocket launches carrying the Orion spacecraft with NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, commander; Victor Glover, pilot; Christina Koch, mission specialist; and CSA (Canadian Space Agency) astronaut Jeremy Hansen, mission specialist on NASA’s Artemis II mission, Wednesday, April 1, 2026, from Operations and Support Building II at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. NASA’s Artemis II mission will take Wiseman, Glover, Koch, and Hansen on a 10-day journey around the Moon and back aboard SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft launched at 6:35pm EDT from Launch Complex 39B. (NASA/Bill Ingalls)
NASA launched four astronauts toward the Moon on April 1, 2026, marking the first crewed lunar mission since Apollo 17 in December 1972. The Artemis II mission lifted off from Kennedy Space Center aboard the Space Launch System rocket at 6:35 p.m. EDT, sending commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, mission specialist Christina Koch, and Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen on a 10-day journey around the far side of the Moon and back.
The mission does not include a lunar landing. It is a test flight designed to validate the Orion spacecraft’s life support systems, navigation, and communications in deep space with a crew aboard for the first time. If the crew reaches the planned distance of 252,000 miles from Earth, they will set a new record for the farthest any human has ever traveled, surpassing even the Apollo 13 distance record.
As Teslarati reported, SpaceX holds a central role in what comes next. The Starship Human Landing System is under contract to carry astronauts to the lunar surface for Artemis IV, now targeting 2028, after NASA restructured its mission sequence due to delays in Starship’s orbital refueling demonstration. Before any Moon landing happens, SpaceX must prove it can transfer propellant between two Starships in orbit, something no rocket program has done at this scale.
The last time humans left Earth’s orbit was 53 years ago. Gene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt of Apollo 17 were the final people to walk on the Moon, a record that stands to this day. Elon Musk has long argued that returning is not optional. “It’s been now almost half a century since humans were last on the Moon,” Musk said. “That’s too long, we need to get back there and have a permanent base on the Moon.”
The Artemis program involves 60 countries signed onto the Artemis Accords, and this mission sets several firsts beyond distance. Glover becomes the first person of color to travel beyond low Earth orbit, Koch the first woman, and Hansen the first non-American astronaut to reach the Moon’s vicinity. According to NASA’s live mission updates, the spacecraft’s solar arrays deployed successfully after liftoff and the crew completed a proximity operations demonstration within the first hours of flight.
Artemis II is step one. The Moon landing and the permanent lunar base come later. But after more than five decades, humans are heading back.
Elon Musk
Tesla Optimus Gen 3 is coming to the Tesla Diner with new ambitions
Tesla’s Optimus robot left the Hollywood Diner within months of opening. Now Musk is planning its return with a bigger role and a major Gen 3 upgrade underway.
![Tesla Optimus Gen 3 [Credit: Tesla]](https://www.teslarati.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/tesla-optimus-gen3-diner.jpg)
Tesla’s Optimus robot was one of the most talked-about features when the Tesla Diner opened on Santa Monica Boulevard in Hollywood on July 21, 2025. Dubbed “Poptimus” by Tesla fans, the Gen 2 robot stood upstairs at the retro-futuristic, drive-in theater and Tesla Supercharging station, scooping popcorn into bags and handing them to guests with a wave.
The diner itself had been years in the making. Elon Musk first floated the idea in 2018 with a tweet about building an “old-school drive-in, roller skates & rock restaurant” at a Hollywood Supercharger. What eventually opened was a unique two-story neon-lit space, with 80 EV charging stalls, and Optimus serving as a live demonstration of where Tesla’s ambitions were headed.
If our retro-futuristic diner turns out well, which I think it will, @Tesla will establish these in major cities around the world, as well as at Supercharger sites on long distance routes.
An island of good food, good vibes & entertainment, all while Supercharging! https://t.co/zmbv6GfqKf
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 21, 2025
But Optimus did not stay long, and was gone by December 2025.
Now, the robot is set to return with a more demanding job. Musk has ambitions for Optimus to take on a food runner role in 2026, delivering meals directly to cars at the Supercharger stalls. While the latest Gen 3 Optimus is likely to initially take on its previous popcorn-serving role, it wouldn’t be out of the question for Optimus to see a quick promotion. With improved hand dexterity that features 50 total actuators and 22 degrees of freedom per hand, and significantly more powerful processing through Tesla’s latest AI5 chip that includes Grok-powered voice interaction, Musk described Optimus at the Abundance Summit on March 12, 2026, as “by far the most advanced robot in the world, Nothing’s even close.”
Back to work
See you at Tesla Diner tomorrow pic.twitter.com/H3tTajrUbu
— Tesla Optimus (@Tesla_Optimus) March 30, 2026
That confidence is backed by a major manufacturing shift. At the Q4 2025 earnings call in January, Musk announced Tesla would discontinue the Model S and Model X and convert those Fremont production lines to build Optimus. “It’s time to basically bring the Model S and X programs to an end,” he said, calling for a pivot that reflects where the Tesla’s future lies.
Tesla broadens most-wanted Model Y to eight new markets
Tesla hit by Iranian missile debris in Israel
