I've got more reason to hate Edmunds than anyone at TTAC. After all, they recruited me away from both here, Jalopnik and a good day job, then 4.5 days later fired me for having an unpaid speeding ticket (55 mph in a 35 mph) and saying dirty words on my old movie review site. A month later, I was contacted by an Edmunds recruiter and asked if I was still in the job market, as they were hiring for an Associate Editor. The very same position I was canned from. Talk about piling it on. Another Edmunds employee (that I stayed friendly with) said one of the rumors floating around the office was that I was fired for a DUI. Which is not only totally false, but in this business a death sentence. So, I don't like them very much. However, there ain't nothing wrong with taking a Nissan GT-R out and seeing what it can do. First of all, high speed hijinks are why people read about cars. It's the vicarious experience, stupid. Seriously– I owe the IRS $3,000 because of all the money I make writing about cars and I can't even get into a GT-R, let alone run one (nearly) flat out. Second, since our dear leader admitted to traveling faster than 170 mph in a $400k Porsche. Is RF admitting that video is more relevant than text? Thirdly, since when is speed dangerous? Especially in the hands of an experienced driver, such as Ed Hellwig? As Clarkson said after showing the video of Hammond's 300+ mph crash, "And remember, speed kills."
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Second, since our dear leader admitted to traveling faster than 170 mph in a $400k Porsche. Is RF admitting that video is more relevant than text? I did no such thing. My high speed ride in the Carrera GT was a fantasy, and stated as such. And that's the truth. And yes, if I had done such a thing and allowed it to be videotaped, I would consider myself more than irresponsible. I'd 'fess-up to being an idiot.
Not to be a stickler, but Hammond’s crash wasn’t at 300+ mph, it was in the high 200 mph range… just sayin’….
My sentiments exactly. Lieberman is the Zach de la Rocha of automotive blogs.
I did no such thing. My high speed ride in the Carrera GT was a fantasy, and stated as such.
Well, for the sake of the blood on my hands, I will cop to hitting pretty damn close to 165 mph in the RS4.
Well, my curiosity has been satisfied on the whole Edmunds/Liberman affair.
Taking a step back from the right or wrongness about driving stupid fast, if we are all supposed to keep our speed down why does almost every automobile made allow us to exceed all of NA’s speed limits with speed to spare?
I am not advocating speed limiters and an OnStar-esque telematic monitoring system but it seems to me that both government and manufacturer are asking us to exercise a little personal judgement.
I haven’t seen the Edmunds video but if road/weather/traffic conditions favoured high speed and the driver is fully capable of handling a vehicle at these speeds (as in, “I’ve been trained to do so” not “hoo-doggies, I’ve been faster!”) then he excercised that personal judgement.
Better still, did the Edmunds driver have experience on the road? Did he check the weather? Was he physically and mentally capable of the high-speed run? If so, then what’s the big deal?
Now posting the proof of such a blatantly illegal act on a website…
“first of all, high speed hijinks are why people read about cars.”
Yes!! The man gets it!!
That old movie review site would get anyone fired. Let us say it “reviews” some of the more prurient creative endeavors. Businesses are very paranoid about such things. Heck, people are getting fired nowadays for wearing a bikini on their myspace page…
It’s not a crime for an auto journalist to drive very very fast. A DUI is generally considered a crime. However, there are shades of gray to every story, even a DUI incident. I’m not convinced those breathalyzers are all that accurate. And WHO can recite the alphabet backwards, even when sober??
My intention here is not to break the TTAC TOS by flaming Mr Farago, but why are TTAC pages going down the path of “the UK’s anti-speeding jihad?”
Our little hobby of fast cars has this intrinsic disconnect with social order – we sit here and analyze, debate and wax poetically about how modern cars handle, hoon and hammer down, but when auto journalists or Hero Cam YouTube-rs show off the same characteristics we talk about continually on a public road, we begin speaking about criminal indictments?
We could continue the congnitive dissodance of saying that people buy Ferraris, Porsches, Black Edition Mercs, BMW Ms and Audi RSs (…etc) so that they can go to track days but who are we kidding? Real track day addicts can go out and spend a fraction of the cost of one of the latest-n-greatest road rockets and buy a Radical, Arial, Forumla car or previous gen exotic with the streety bits ripped out. All the track action + more safety + higher performance + no risking the $$$ grocery getter = better idea then tracking your $70K E90 M3 daily driver.
Hooning through traffic is one thing where I think the vast majority of us will agree is probably a bad idea (even though I am assuming we’ve all done it when we were young and dumb). Driving a fast car fast on empty, lifeless, public roads where – beyond a shadow of a doubt – the only lives at risk are those of willing participants… where exactly is the problem?
I don’t know when it happened, but we have conflated the idea of justice with dogmatic, rigid adherence to codified law. They are two very different things. Speed laws are intended to keep roads safe for travel by the entire community. When that community is at zero risk, I don’t see the need to crucify folks for breaking codified laws.
boy, i found this site, then jalopnik, then JL leaves jalopnik to come over here after having been at both before he was at edmunds…damn!
It’s all about the context. And there’s nothing about the 165mph GT-R video that indicates where and under what circumstances it was made. I was clearly a greater danger to myself (and others) when I did ninety in my ’66 Ford pickup on the freeway than doing 140 in the W124 out in the desert.
I’m not going to weigh in on the legality/morality issue any more than I already have. But I will say that the biggest vicarious automotive pleasure I’ve had in years was an article in wired sometime in the last 4-5 months about a guy who broke the coast to coast car record, driving x-country in 32 hrs and change. I often read magazine articles on the stairmaster, to divert my attention from my athletic efforts, and this article was so much fun I stayed on the stairmaster 10-15 minutes longer than usual.
Holzman:
That was by friend Alex Roy.
And it was 31 hours, 7 minutes.
JL’s case is, like, 3.14 times more convincing than RF’s.
It’s amazing that RF feels entitled to ostracize a driver when he knows nothing more than one fact: the speed.
Since when is one’s speed the ultimate and final determinant of safety?
That’s right. It was great!
I just finished my afternoon session in the “library” with the new issued Automobile pilfered from the front lobby…
“The LS460L was completely unfazed at 130 — and so was the cop I flew past” sez the editor.
“It’s a good thing the styling is so innocuous, or I’d have been put in jail.”
Hoonage indeed!!
Me — I’d be under the jail.
nuclearay:
The Lexus LS600h L is even more unfazed at 130.
Or is that unfazeder?
hoonage on an empty road when your by yourself (or with others who know the risks) is one thing, alex roy was just a glory-grabbing putz who put other peoples’ lives in danger with speed and lack of sleep.
creamy: I can only counter with the fact that more people are killed by sting rays than by people making the transcontinental record run.
That’s the fish, not the Chevy.
Touché
for those of you saying: no harm done…
It’s no harm done until you have a single car crash or other unfortunate incident. Then, your ‘stupidity’ uses emergency response resources; people and resources that may or may not be taken away from other, more ‘legitimate’ emergencies…
“Or is that unfazeder?”
Most unfazzz…-dest.
I was a passenger in Lexus doing a 100mph… I felt like the Grand Mufti on his stack of pillows.
It certainly didn’t feel like hoonage.
“I can only counter with the fact that more people are killed by sting rays than by people making the transcontinental record run.”
that’s an argument for the transcon run how exactly?
more people die by lightning strikes and more people die by drowning in pools, too. so what? the difference is, when you are playing golf in a storm or running beside a pool – you know the dangers and bring the potential of death upon yourself. with the transcon run, speeds well in excess of 100 mph and lack of sleep bring the risk of death to others as well as yourself.
that’s what makes him a glory-grabbing putz while edmunds is just stupid for the way they handled your firing and potential rehiring but not for their burst of speed (assuming an open, clear desert highway).
Already posted this in the original blog entry on the topic, but this is perhaps the better place. Sorry about the double entry!
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170mph? Yes, reckless. 100? Not at all. Heck, traffic rolls at 140km/h in rush hour in Toronto and it’s safe, because we’re going against traffic and there are few cars on the road. Same road at 3PM when it becomes the direction of traffic… sheer madness!
So you see, speed limits depend on more than just roadway conditions, but also traffic density (low) and lane discipline (very good when there’s little/no traffic). When laws begin to reflect these other factors, they will be obeyed.
Of course, now with the 50km/h over the limit law where they impound your car and fine you thousands, I’ve never been past 145 km/h.
Likewise, if speeding REALLY killed as the OPP claims, they would do the same for going anything over 5km/h above the limit (to compensate for differences in speed reading devices – speedometers on vehicles and radar detectors used by the police). But it isn’t, and everyone knows it.
Rant over.
I think that criticism was fueled by jealousy and hate. Whatever happened to objectivity?! “Let he who has never sinned cast the first stone.” I think if they posted how they were driving on the Autobahn and doing 200mph, no one would object… yet here in America, on some of THE MOST deserted freeways, if someone did that it would be wreckless and dangerous? I’ve been on freeways/ highways where everyone did well over 100mph and its easy to see why… empty wide stretches of straight nicely paved road. Bravo, Jonny, for maintaining your objectivity…