1st rule of going fast on the street is...

While most of us have likely done questionable things on public roads, it's important to realize that this board also has inexperienced-- newer drivers now as part of the community. We'd be doing these younger enthusiasts a disservice if we glorified hooning on public roads. Sure some of us have done it---- we'd all agree it's stupid--- so why discuss our past mistakes unless we are serving cautionary tales?

Think back when you were 17, 19, maybe even 22 years old. I sure as Hell know I didn't need a bunch of "fellow" enthusiasts getting me all riled up with tales of "street racing" and "time trails" through favorite sections of country road when I was that age.

What I needed was an outlet for my automotive enthusiasm. What I needed was someone to direct me to a local track, so I could get my "ya yas" out in a safe environment. I was very very lucky to have lived through my teens and early twenties. I'd rather not have others take the same path as me. I got lucky and beat the odds. The next guy may not be so lucky. (and yes, it was dumb luck---not my superawesome- God-like driving skill)

Re the discussion about d-bag comments begetting d-bag comments

Such as? Since you decided to head out into a public forum and NOT change this channel, i assume you REALLY DO want to talk about it?

carbon wrote: "you don't talk about it on forums" What's up with the whole "dont talk about going fast on the street" thing? Don't tell me that 90% of the people here dont go hard on the street from time to time. I mean I get it, keep it safe, keep it on the track and all that but, it seems like people are hypocritical about it. Are you really telling me you have a favorite road to creep down, going the speed limit, with non enthusiasts in smart cars up your ass wishing you'd get out of their way? I'm not saying that there should be a street racing section on here, just that people should lighten up a bit. It seems like every once in a while someone will say something and the next three posts are people going off on them " I know you're new here but we arent cool with people who go fast on the tail of the dragon". Who knows maybe I'll be ostracized, but it seems to me if you dont like what people have to say, change the channel.

Why? Because VW Vortex already cornered the market on driving like an idiot on the street. The GRM crowd doesn't feel the need to compete.

I was lucky enough to be a social outcast from an early age, which gave me some breathing room to figure out that everyone else was full of E36 M3 and social pressures are the insecurities of the masses seeking comfort/affirmation from me (how ironic!).

Go ahead and censor me, because i dont think what i do is stupid, and i do believe it's possible to do illegal things VERY safely once you've developed a good sense of judgment. How do you find out when your judgment is good? By being wrong and learning from it. How do you learn from your mistakes? By living through them. So, in that sense, there is one racer's adage that works great for the street. Go slow to go fast. Focus on reading the behaviors of other drivers and dont overcommit. Car control beyond 7-8/10ths rarely matters. Not reading your surroundings right can kill you every day and twice on sunday. Assume the world is trying to berkeley you. Once you learn to treat the entire world like a war zone and watch your back every second you are on the road for anything that could CONCEIVABLY kill you, you will eventually figure out what is safe and what isn't. Until you learn how to make that distinction, everything is dangerous, because you wont REALLY be paying attention.

Oh, this thread again. We get this about every 6 months, and it sucks every time.

Clearly, we don't learn.

Vigo wrote: ...a mind-reading road-genius like me...

You ARE a driving GOD!

Vigo wrote: I was lucky enough to be a social outcast from an early age, which gave me some breathing room to figure out that everyone else was full of E36 M3 and social pressures are the insecurities of the masses seeking comfort/affirmation from me (how ironic!).

Well in THAT case...You're totally justified.

It's ironic how people on one extreme are always so quick to point their finger at people on the opposite extreme, without realizing that they're really just looking at a mirror image of themselves.

Who needs justification? Do you even REALLY care? Because theres a 99% chance people like me drive around you every day and DONT AFFECT YOU IN ANY WAY. Somebody like me probably drove right past you on your way to wherever you're sitting this morning bitching at me, and just look at you now! Condescending all the way across the internet in perfect comfort, just like me. Just like them.

The thing i dont think people realize is that by backing this idea that we shouldnt talk about 'dangerous' things or impressionable people might try them, we're holding our 'impressionable' up and coming drivers to absurdly low standards, and then we see stupid, preventable accidents every which way because 80% of people are at their wits' end just trying to get down the road at the speed limit because we dont ACTUALLY expect them to learn anything more than that. Then we get on the internet and complain about the low standards our drivers are held to to get a license while in the same breath turning around and vilifying anyone who bothers to teach themselves if it happens to have anything to do with breaking a law designed to keep lowest-common-denominator drivers from stupid-ing themselves to death.

Dont read to your children, either!

You guys like to complain about me when i get like this but in the end what im actually doing is killing E36 M3ty threads. You're welcome.

Failing that everyone else actually gives up on this and lets it die, does anyone have anything to say about my posts that doesnt have something to do with them getting butthurt about my demeanor? Any substantive points of discussion? If not, perhaps you should all just begin 'abiding'.

I can't admonish anyone without going into hypocrite mode. My youthful backroads asshattery ended up in a head-on collision with another car. Thankfully he walked away with no scratches, and it was me who carries the scars. I felt so guilty about that, I didn't play with fast cars for 15 years or so.

Fast forward to my current life. I drive carefully and almost never hoon. I have been over-aggressive on backroads during vintage rallys, and swear that in the future I'll tone it down. But speed is an addiction. The basic rule of public roads should be "Don't exceed the speed at which you can proactively react to anything that can reasonably be expected to happen"

IMO the best thing that us speedheads can do is take it to the track. I always drive more safely on the street after bombing the track.

In reply to Vigo:

My memories of the $2009 Challenge do not include a driving god behind the wheel of an Aries.

Got any wins against real drivers to prove your point?

There was a reasonably intelligent conversation going on before you saw it as your calling to force this BS down everyone's throat.

Nice job- Don't be that guy.

Vigo wrote: Any substantive points of discussion?

There is no such thing with people who have blinded themselves to all but the opposing extremes.

I thought the first rule was to video it and upload it to youtube.

Vigo wrote: The thing i dont think people realize is that by backing this idea that we shouldnt talk about 'dangerous' things or impressionable people might try them, we're holding our 'impressionable' up and coming drivers to absurdly low standards,

I disagree that glorifying hooning, or otherwise irresponsible behavior on public roads helps younger drivers to learn. While operating a car at it's limits-- and beyond is key to learning car control skills--- I'd rather them do this in a controlled environment, not on the street. This is why I'd rather encourage driver education (street survival type courses) instead of blasting down country (or city) roads illegally.

Some kids are going to drive like idiots regardless of what we do and say. I'd rather not add fuel to the fire by re-telling glory days of narrowly escaping death / Johnny Law on this forum.

I'm not going to judge whether or not people break the law.

But I will point out that you never know who's reading this board.

Do you assume police are not car enthusiests? I know they have people who drag race- maybe some like to autocross and are here. Sure you want to let them know?

Do you assume that insurance people don't like cars? I'd say there's a good chance that some of them like cars, and I also know that insurance HAS been dropped for motorsports things.

It's safe to assume that car companies like cars- and I have seen it were someone autocrossing lost their warentee.

How about regulators- they must hate cars, right? Yea, outside of the fact that many of my autocrossing friends are regulators, and there have been some almost Challege car starts from a regulating agency.

So if you want to do "something stupid"- go ahead. I hope it's not around me, and I have to deal with me being risked. But just bear in mind, who's reading this board?

The general level of responsibility and maturity is one of the things that I like about this forum. Sure, most of us have done irresponsible - even stupid - things on public roads, but we recognize them for what they were. We don't glorify our past stupidity, or immediately condemn people who follow our same mistakes. We know what the responsible thing is and try to show people that not only are there safer alternatives, but that they are ultimately less costly and more fun!

Bragging about driving too fast on the street is like bragging about drinking too much.

One of the least mature things I've ever done on a public road happened over the weekend. In a nearby cul de sac, I demonstrated hoola-hoop use to my niece, nephew and friends. Not only was this display of immaturity on a public road it but it clearly influenced several children into trying the same thing.

In your faces!

Don't exceed the speed at which you can proactively react to anything that can reasonably be expected to happen"

Short and sweet!

My memories of the $2009 Challenge do not include a driving god behind the wheel of an Aries. Got any wins against real drivers to prove your point?

Ive tried to make the point in every one of my posts that conflating safe speeding on the street and car control on the track is a very dangerous mistake. Your post makes that mistake.

Besides, in 09 i drove a hulking FWD piece of E36 M3 with trashed tie rods around an autoX course faster then the GRM staff drove a brand new sport-package Miata of similar weight on similar tires. That's what you call 'good enough'.

There is no such thing with people who have blinded themselves to all but the opposing extremes.

If you don't want to talk, why are your e-lips moving? You think 'rising above', people who want to talk issues think 'evasion'.

WHY does anyone think you can learn how to drive safely on the street by driving safely on the track? This goes directly back to my comment about how 10/10ths car control on the street is like being able to accurately shoot a gun in a public place. The goal is NOT NEEDING to shoot the gun in the first place. Is it a good idea to know how? Sure! But the other 90% of being able to have responsible fun in public is knowing how to avoid going 10/10ths. Wheel-to-wheel racing is WAAAAY too expensive a hobby to be a practical suggestion for teaching people to use good judgment while driving quickly, and solo racing doesnt do jack E36 M3 in this regard. There are NO real-life training courses i can think of that come close to simulating the complexity of a typical day in traffic. You could spend a thousand dollars and be lucky if you got to interact with more than ONE other car in the training scenario. Would somebody please point out a better, more practical alternative than learning on the street as you go? Remember, this has to be practical for something like 200 million people in this country alone.

Vigo, dial it back man. The thread was doing pretty decent till you started going on tirades.

Honestly, I really like what Vigo is saying here. He makes me look GOOD by comparison and that's a really difficult task.

Think that I may hire him to hang around with me, grab up a bunch of really fat folks while I'm at it and just stand there among them, looking like the sane, slim one for once in my life.

Regarding the Tale of the Dragon, coincidentally someone on the Garage Journal board posted pictures yesterday of a Nissan GTR that someone wadded up there driving too fast. Apparently the driver and passenger were seriously hurt. http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=248171

The way I figure it, when you're on the racetrack all the cars are going the same direction (and none of them are texting or listening to the radio), there are no cross streets, there are (hopefully) no pedestrians or animals, and there's an ambulance on standby. None of those things are guaranteed if you're hooning around on the street.

The thread was doing pretty decent till you started going on tirades.

Well i wasnt going to say it in so little words (hah!), but i disagree.

I see some joking around which is great, but also a lot of people seriously subscribing to the idea that the mistakes that made them better were unnecessary and all future drivers should avoid speeding in the first place and simply hope that the skills they can pick up going the same speed as everyone else will suffice when all the speeds start changing suddenly. Or that autoX makes you safer on the street (marginally, sure. where's the beef?). Or that anything exceeding the speed limit is irresponsible. That people are SO unpredictable that it's not possible to be reasonably safe without cowering in velocity anonymity (autonymous cars for everyone!).

I mean, im sure a lot of people didnt mean for their comments to actually be drawn out to their logical conclusions, but hey, someone even took my road-genius comment seriously and turnabout is fair play.

I think the reason im so comfortable aggravating everyone on the internet with my interpretation of reality is that i know that on the road, where i can actually kill people and ruin lives at basically any moment, what i think and live by works and serves EVERYONE's interests just fine, and people like me can zip around making yall shake your fists at our arrogance and presumption while people who never bothered to stretch their comfort zone take you out in a cloud of tiresmoke at 37 mph because some stupid little thing went wrong and they couldnt handle it.

Vigo wrote: I see some joking around which is great, but also a lot of people seriously subscribing to the idea that the mistakes that made them better were unnecessary and all future drivers should avoid speeding in the first place and simply hope that the skills they can pick up going the same speed as everyone else will suffice when all the speeds start changing suddenly. Or that autoX makes you safer on the street (marginally, sure. where's the beef?). Or that anything exceeding the speed limit is irresponsible. That people are SO unpredictable that it's not possible to be reasonably safe without cowering in velocity anonymity (autonymous cars for everyone!).

You read all the posts and that was your "logical conclusion"? Did you just exit a phone booth with a pile of clothes around your feet?

Vigo wrote: I think the reason im so comfortable aggravating everyone on the internet with my interpretation of reality is that i know that on the road, where i can actually kill people and ruin lives at basically any moment, what i think and live by works and serves EVERYONE's interests just fine, and people like me can zip around making yall shake your fists at our arrogance and presumption while people who never bothered to stretch their comfort zone take you out in a cloud of tiresmoke at 37 mph because some stupid little thing went wrong and they couldnt handle it.

I gots to disagree with you here …. I've been there … thought I was the cats whiskers, and that no one else out there had anything approaching my mad skills (took me many yrs to figure out how stupid I was)

take this for what it's worth … it's my opinion and my opinion only ….

but I think the reason you're so comfortable aggravating everyone on the internet isn't what you think … (again it's my opinion) but I think it's just because you're the same young punk shiny happy person that I was 30 yrs ago …. take it for what it's worth

This forum is not public domain; it is GRM's house.

xflowgolf wrote: I thought the first rule was to video it and upload it to youtube.

and say it was filmed in mexico