Also, I almost thought it was sidebar ad when I was reading something else on the main page until I noticed what the writing on the car actually said. Funny how we visually book those ads out.

It's all to do with the way front page posts are 'queued' for this site. Once one of the editors submits something, the amount of time it takes to reach the front depends on the time of day and the number of queued articles.

The average time between articles appearing is an hour and a half; it may be less than an hour if there's breaking news, or well over 2 hours if it's a slow day (eg. during Blizzcon's morning hours). There's a 12-hour gap on most nights, starting in the evening and continuing to the next morning.

AA and WoW Moviewatch are oddities in that their content is viewable well before the articles are due to be posted (you can't write the article and post it if the content isn't already on the server). Being able to see this picture 9 hours ahead of schedule probably means it was posted late at night, in the site's quiet period.
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*Top Gear theme*

TONIGHT!

Hammond and May go undercover in a drag race with the infalliable Skyshatter!

We have a world-exclusive test on the upcoming v8 [Riding Crop]!

And I (Jeremy) give the Flame Leviathan a run for its money with the Titan's new head-themed number!

Mainman, I love you.