Road Rage Phenomenon

[harveysalgadopix]

I have had my 1989 Esprit for 5 years now and I have noticed something strange with other Drivers on the freeway. I am cruising down the road at a nice zestful speed, and suddenly some Guy will go ripping by me like a total idiot. Usually in a Dodge.  This isn’t my imagination, this happens frequently. When I am driving my truck I don’t experience this….                                                              Is this something exclusive to the United States?

Edited September 29, 2021 by Bibs

[drdoom]

Totally.

[calvan]

You are not alone - I have seen the same thing here, north of the 49th parallel. And I agree that it is most often a Dodge, followed by BMW - usually an older 3 series with go-fast body kit - or a clapped out Honda Civic with a fart can exhaust.

They're a minority of drivers, even among those makes, but for some people out there the sight of a Lotus triggers a need to pass it even if it kills them. And it might do that. My experience is that for virtually all of these spaz drivers a reasonable description of their driving skill is that they couldn't find their own ass if they used both hands and a hunting dog.   

[harveysalgadopix]

Thanks Calvan, Lughing so hard my have tears in my eyes, in the San Francisco Bay I would say 70% Dodge and 30% imports with the “fart can exhaust “ you so eloquently described. 

[Escape]

I've had the same thing happen a number of times, mostly BMWs and a single Maserati.

[C8RKH]

Over here in the UK, my last encounter was with a retard in a Porsche Coxster.  Rolling down the motorway with cruise at 70ish mph, pulled out to overtake said Coxster and when I got level he just floored and disappeared into the distance. I just shook some coffee beans at him and pulled back over. 5 miles later, caught him again and just sailed past with no reaction from him, other than a look of shock on his face when I gave him the bird with a big smile on my face.

Usually I find it is Audi and BMW drivers, usually with the "normal cars" that are M Badged or S / "Sportline" badged. I find that they want to race on normal roads and to be honest, they just take reckless risks and I just can't be bothered with them and let them race off to hopefully just kill themselves, not anyone else.

[Sparky]

I live by a park entrance and often have 2 or 3, mainly Esprits, on my drive.  The local chavs get their benefit payment, fill up with gas, and visit the park in an attempt to impress the girls with subwoofers more powerful than their engines.  Despite failing for many years, they doggedly continue, believing very loud music and a straight-through exhaust act as pheromones.  Then, as they leave the park and spy the array on my drive, they reset their ballcaps to a jaunty 180 degree angle, give me a cool stare, open up their 1.2 GTi Turbo Nutter Bastard Corsas to full throttle, and accelerate to a full 45MPH before the end of the street.  They no doubt regale their mates with tales of leaving sportscars in their dust.

[jep]

I get this quite a bit whilst driving various sporty cars - particularly in Germany on derestricted 'bahns. Most are having a bit of fun, excited to see what is to them an unusual sight. 

Rarely is it bad mannered but it can be tricky on occasion to identify 'friendly fire' from 'incoming hostile'. 

Justin

 

[Djs44]

It will be a while before I have this experience in my Esprit - I look forward to it as it means it is running !!😜

[Rudi K]

Show them a clean pair of heals!

[Mark Blanchard]

It's van's with me.  They accelerate up fast and then are glued to the back bumper, really annoy.  

[Laika]

Porsche Cayman in the UK decided that on a long sweeping left motorway merge (M25 to M40) that he took exception to me passing him, so he sped up got himself into a mess and ended up on the hardshoulder throwing up dust as he realised his performance car was a VW beetle in disguise.

Edited September 29, 2021 by Laika

[Mysterae]

I've had a white Escort type van try to run me off the road while I was gently cruising up the M5 with a lass onboard. It was busy on the motorway, I was enjoying the company and keeping things easy when these monkeys in their circus van decided to try and make me crash by moving to the outside lane, overtaking and then abruptly swerving in to me with intent. I didn't work as I was aware of my surroundings of being boxed in by traffic and them hitting me would have been the better outcome, rather than braking hard and getting rear ended or swerving and causing a pile up. 

As I was overtaking a civic or something I thought the chav in the back was giving me the universal coffee beans salute with his hand out the window, perhaps couldn't wait 'til he got home for a wank and was looking for assistance finding his knob. On second glance however he was giving me the OK hand signal indicating cool car, or perhaps trying to pass me a blunt at 70mph.

It's definitely not just in the US it happens, insanity and jealousy are universal unfortunately.

[canamfan]

Here in Ontario Canada it's always pick up trucks that like to come up close & tail gate then quickly pull up to the side & cut me off whether in my Esprit or 911sc, but in my Audi they don't pay any exclusive attention to it & leave me alone. It's really annoying & absurdly unsafe what they do. Can't explain why they do it but it's "very" consistent with them

[Escape]

1 hour ago, Mysterae said:

I've had a white Escort type van try to run me off the road while I was gently cruising up the M5 with a lass onboard. It was busy on the motorway, I was enjoying the company and keeping things easy when these monkeys in their circus van decided to try and make me crash by moving to the outside lane, overtaking and then abruptly swerving in to me with intent. I didn't work as I was aware of my surroundings of being boxed in by traffic and them hitting me would have been the better outcome, rather than braking hard and getting rear ended or swerving and causing a pile up.

So you held your line and they backed off? The right thing to do for sure, but not easy! Instinct would be to move out of harm's way.

[peteyg]

Compared to a modern 2l diesel hatchback, my S2 is slow so not worth the embarrassment of even trying to have a go even if I wanted to. 

[Mysterae]

14 minutes ago, Escape said:

So you held your line and they backed off? The right thing to do for sure, but not easy! Instinct would be to move out of harm's way.

I had an inkling that something wasn't right when they past me, gorilla type gawping out the open passenger window checking the occupants as much as the car itself, so I suppose I was ready for it. I knew my options were limited and if they were going to take me out, better to take the bastards with me rather than innocent drivers around me. Just gave them a wide berth after that because what else could I do? Idiots like that are looking for a reaction/fight, don't give them what they want. It was in the days before dashcams.

[Barrykearley]

Get it all the time in any Lotus sadly. Actually the van is worse. There’s simply nothing I enjoy more than pootling slowly down our country lanes when I see an Audi trying to mate with my towbar. At the points where it’s possible to overtake I always find my van makes the most use of its 194bhp - and slows down to conserve fuel once the Lane narrows again. Had yet another one a couple of hours ago.

[calvan]

2 hours ago, Barrykearley said:

Get it all the time in any Lotus sadly. Actually the van is worse. There’s simply nothing I enjoy more than pootling slowly down our country lanes when I see an Audi trying to mate with my towbar. At the points where it’s possible to overtake I always find my van makes the most use of its 194bhp - and slows down to conserve fuel once the Lane narrows again. Had yet another one a couple of hours ago.

Am I reading this correctly? Are you actually lauding the self-entitled priggishness of intentionally impeding someone simply because you disapprove of their driving habits or choice of vehicle? Unbelievable. 

[Barrykearley]

Read again - “when I see an Audi trying to mate my towbar”

subtle I might have been - but there’s a clue !

[JusNoGood]

I’ve not had one negative experience so far in my S3. Pretty much the opposite. I’ve had a guy stop walking his dog and wave at me. While I was in the slow lane on the m25 I’ve had people drive past and honk from the fast lane, two lanes over, including a few chaved up 3 series BMWs . Had a American muscle car drive level and give me the thumbs up, and big waves from a couple in what I think was beautiful 60’s Merc Pagonda.

[calvan]

38 minutes ago, Barrykearley said:

Read again - “when I see an Audi trying to mate my towbar”

subtle I might have been - but there’s a clue !

I don't see how that helps. Ok, the Audi is being a knucklehead and tailgating you - so let them by and keep an eye out to avoid their debris field instead of holding them up and perhaps triggering real road rage

[Barrykearley]

I’d rather not witness yet another head on collision.

[Dave Eds]

Drive with your eyes closed then @Barrykearley

Edited September 29, 2021 by Dave Eds

[calvan]

I certainly agree with that objective, but not necessarily the method of achieving it. There can be some circumstances when you need to slow someone down if they are oblivious to a specific hazard but I have often seen other drivers take foolish and reckless risks to get around slower traffic.

Just this past weekend I was on a road trip through BC and saw at least three instances of impatient twits making extremely risky passes to get by other vehicles that weren't going fast enough to suit them. Two of the instances were people wanting to drive too fast for the conditions but the third was triggered by someone who was going slowly and doggedly refusing to let anyone past. Luckily, none of these episodes ended in disaster either through sheer dumb luck or good judgement by oncoming drivers

It seems that we have significantly different opinions on reacting to faster traffic.