yes. it is dangerous. driving fast is dangerous. but people do FAR more dangerous things on their commute to work every morning and after happy hour.
how do you compare a dedicated, concentrated driver + spotter/navigator pair with $20k of equipment and performance/safety modifications in a BMW M5 to: your typical groggy office worker fatass drinking coffee, listening to an audio book, eating an egg mcmuffin and texting on his phone doing 85mph down the interstate on his morning commute, in a shitbox Saturn with drum brakes and an under-inflated tires that couldn't brake from 85mph in a mile's distance?
you're surrounded by far more dangerous things on the road every day, it just looks boring and pedestrian like some guy going to work instead of exciting and dangerous like 2 guys with sunglasses in an M5 speeding down the highway.
"yes. it is dangerous. driving fast is dangerous. but people do FAR more dangerous things on their commute to work every morning and after happy hour."
Yeah, and driving a pen into your eyeball is FAR less dangerous than shooting yourself in the head with a .45. I'm not sure why I should care about the distinction, though. Your shithead texting at 85mph and Mr. "I'm Too Rich To Obey The Law" here are both assholes endangering innocent people with willful carelessness. Fuck 'em both.
If anything, Gumball is a proof that it can be done safely. There are hundreds of contestants every single year and statistically it's one of the safest motorsport-events in the world.
Actually I think the bar for safe motorsports events is far higher than public roads. Nürburgring is considered one of the most dangerous and deadly courses to race on and it has had 68 fatalities since 1928. Per mile driven I believe that is probably an order or two of magnitude below the fatality rate of most highways, let alone ones that have been around since the 30s.
I don't particularly care to crunch the numbers or look up the figures, but I am going to go ahead and guess that one deadly incident for hundreds of drivers driving several thousand miles, for several years, is in the general ballpark of the standard fatalities per mile in America. Doing some quick "fermi-math" here, I'm guessing it is about the same.
Again, that is irrelevant for this case, where the guys racing are out on the street with its curbs, lamp posts, uneven paving, manholes, etc, and where they choose to be on the same 'track' as people who aren't volunteering to be in such a racing condition, and who aren't all, at the moment, physically or mentally prepared for it (in many cases, they aren't even capable of being physically and mentally prepared for it. Not everyone is born a racing driver, and those that are, grow old, too)
Formula one is relatively safe nowadays because all cars are safe, the drivers have superhuman driving ability, are physically prepared, and wear safety gear, because the circuits are smooth and without things you can hit that will kill you, and because medical assistance is close by when needed.
>I would hope this is obvious, but "driving in the dark at 50 mph over the speed limit" has a high risk of causing a fatal collision
To which I call BS.
How come German highways (that do not have such BS low traffic limits as Interstates, and are actually unlimited in large stretches) are safer than the interstates?
Because people expect that style of driving. This race thing would be fine if it was all on closed roads, but what happens when he blows by me 16 year old daughter, doing 95 in a 25 when she lacks the experience to deal with his behavior?
95 is great as long as we all agree that that is what the road should be driven at. But you don't get to unilaterally decide the speed limit.
A controlled access highway (e.g. interstate), even with a 55 mph speed limit and most traffic at 60-70mph, is probably far safer at 165mph than a 25mph city street with intersections is at 75mph. Cars you can see are relatively easy to predict (particularly when you're going 3x faster than them); pedestrians, other vehicles emerging from hidden alleys, etc. are a lot harder. It's still irresponsible, but tech, training, and such can mitigate risk at absurd speeds on an interstate, but not so much downtown.
(I used to do 140-160mph in UAE, Kuwait, etc. pretty frequently, on roads which were 60-70mph speed limits, but would never exceed the speed limit in cities. Then I discovered camels.)
The more immediate problem is 16 year olds going at such speeds. Driving fast on the German highway requires a good driver and a good car. I am not a good driver and have a tiny car, so I go slow (130-160 km/h).
Technology can mitigate the risks, but not eliminate them altogether. I've nearly skidded off a road a few times when misjudging the curvature of unfamiliar onramps or offramps (and taking them far too fast). I've seen a couple of other highway features which, if taken too fast by an unfamiliar driver, could easily lead to calamity. Technology also can't compensate entirely for driver fatigue or bad snap judgments, both of which are a real threat for any traveler (not just these guys).
The article makes it clear that he plans ahead, relies upon support, and tries to stick to straight stretches of highway. Good for him, and if he wants to risk his life doing 130 down a deserted highway at 2 in the morning so be it. But honestly, from the article, it looks like he has a habit of weaving through traffic at unsafe speeds, and as someone who's nearly been killed by insane drivers trying similar stuff...well, honestly, I'm not impressed.
I think for me being impressed may be more closely coupled to approval than most people. I wanted to express my disapproval but I didn't think I could do it in a way that wouldn't degenerate into a personal attack. So, my intent was not particularly clear. Sorry.
From a technical perspective, I guess I'm impressed by the fact that he was able to marshal together the resources, time, and support necessary to make this happen. He's done similar stunts without killing anyone, so I'm somewhat impressed by his driving skills (although there's also the advanced safety technologies in his car, as well as the intrinsic chance you'll find yourself in a situation that could result in an accident). His endurance is also admirable - it must have been very difficult racing the clock for hours on end while maintaining extreme concentration. But then, there are also people who drive drunk, drive while distracted, or drive dangerously badly-maintained vehicles regularly, and nothing happens to them, so I guess that makes the 'reckless driving' aspect slightly less impressive.
Does it count if my level of impressedness is fairly low? It's not 100% uninteresting, but it doesn't seem like a particularly amazing feat, either. I can believe that if you disregarded laws and drove fast, with some planning, you could do this, so the result is roughly what I would've expected. It requires some execution, but it doesn't give me the "wow! that's really possible?!" kind of awed feeling.
