really good read ... laughed like mad too !

Without wanting to blow AndrewRs trumpet for him too much , this was the second post I was referring to:

oppressive forces

Thanks to everyone for their comments.

Unfortunately the simple idea of not reading about something does not solve anything. If we choose not to read about famine or natural disasters it does not stop people dying does it?

Opinion is obviously divided and I am no crusader so if it stays, it stays. However, I see no harm in trying to promote safe and responsible driving.

If we 'grumpy old men' manage to save one life by getting a message across then it is worthwhile is it not?

For those who think they were born to race please just think about it a little and drive safely - and try a trackday.

As I said, not a crusader so no more posts from me on this thread.

Chris,
I cant see how removing the coupe vs section will promote 'safe driving' ?
There will still be the traffic light grand prix and dual carrige way encounters that we all come accross now and again, even us older more sensible drivers will still have a little play but so long as you know your own limits then thats just part of being a red blooded, car owning guy.

I say keep it, if people want to post in there then let them do it, I dont post in there but I do read it (only to moderate it though)

I think we need to define "racing" because more often than not these encounters aren't a race in the truest sense of the word. If Joe Bloggs in front puts his foot down on the outside lane of the M4 and I decide to follow suit is this really constituted as a race? There are those that take it a little further but for the most part I think we have got the measure about right. There are plenty of fast cars on the road and if we are honest there shouldn't be because the law states we can never go faster than 70mph. The simple act of pushing your car may incite others to "go faster" so unless we find deserted roads which have been deristricted there is little point to owning a performance car.

There I was, starting from the back, but I knew what I was doing,.. I was weaving in and out, and finally I got right in front of all of them! I knew I was faster than the lot of them,... when I heard an old geezer from the back...

"OY!,. get to the back of the bloody queue"...damm I hate queuing in post offices!

Don't you love political correctness,..I think we should all wear brown clothes, as all the other colours hurt my eyes

Joe

The 'coupe vs' section is wide open for discussion, everyone has an opinion, and most of them are valid.

If the section was shut down, would it save a life? It's possible. On the other hand, promoting track days could also cause someone somewhere to lose a life. Should these be shut down? City planners don't stop building houses on busy roads because there is a higher chance of someone getting run over.

Opinions and arguments that state death as a possible outcome are widespread, it is the most emotive way of getting an opinion across, as no one wants to be thought of as disregarding life. Everything is life threatening, to a degree. You only have to read those amusing reports that are released every now and then, stating that 43 people died last year from falling over whilst putting their underpants on, or how 268 people were admitted to A&E in 2003 after choking on a cheesey Wotsit.

Simply owning a coupe instead of a Micra probably increases your chances of death. Owning a car fullstop increases your chances of pushing up the daisies by a mile.

Shutting down the thread is seen as a solution, but a solution to what? What is the problem? Will shutting down the thread REALLY solve the problem?

To my mind there isn't a problem to solve.
Me, I couldn't care less, I don't even read the thread, and in 5ish years of forum posting I don't think that I've ever contributed to the thread. If it was shut down today I wouldn't even notice.. but to start saying that it is killing people, or promotes death or comparable to world famine is a bunch of arse.

The thread is not about road racing, it is 'coupe vs', which could be track based encounters. If people want to post their dangerous public driving stories in there they will, if the thread wasn't there they would elsewhere.

Jesus, I really am rambling on now. My head hurts... going for a lie down...

Hee, hee, I'm one of these:

Quote:

---

And some of us are old gits who have the odd race and then put their slippers back on

---

Leave the Coupe vs Section alone

It's a bit like those "adult" Sky TV channels where there are loads of scantily-clad ladies shaking their booty, I just don't ever look at them

Hmmm....some good points made for and against. Nice to see such a lot of well thought out arguments. Suspect you wouldn't get that on the Citroen Saxo forum (if there is one)
From my own point of view, I think that the moderator's have a duty to delete posts which feature behaviour which is clearly irresponsible/illegal/likely to encourage others to do the same. Racing on the road is stupid,illegal and morally indefensible. Everyone has probably had a rush of blood/red mist moment at some time during their driving career, me included but it doesn't make it right.
The forum should encourage responsible driving and for me the "if you don't like it, don't read it" argument doesn't wash. Would you be happy to take this view if I started a thread on how to "groom" children on the internet for sex?

Anyone looked over there while we're discussing it here and detect a sense of irony?

Europa has made by far the most coherent argument so far on this subject so I'm happy to hang onto his ideological coat-tails. The coupe vs section is one of the most entertaining parts of the forum and although some of the post are stupid and irresopnsible, that's true of every section of every forum. So there.

Meanwhile, I know someone already posted a link to this but it deserves repriniting in all it's glory. Best post of all time imo:



AnrewR's Coupe vs The Oppressive Forces of Reality post



My first victim this morning was some tarted up Corsa, filled to the brim with teenagers, wearing their backwards baseball caps backwards so that the peaks were pointing forward. Glancing at my newly fitted Howhardaretheytryingometer I saw it had swung right up to 100%, or Noel Edmunds level of trying.

Naturally I dispensed with them in short order and with such ease that they'd been gone for more than 5 minutes before I noticed that I was still on my drive and hadn't even turn the ignition on.

Swinging on to the road, with the engine burbling nicely, I was immediately challenged by an oncoming furniture lorry, its horn beeping in a testosterone challenge to the superiority of my Italian supercar.

I have to admit it was tight until I realised that I was hitting the red-line because I was in neutral and not because I was really, really going for it. That also explained why the lorry was vanishing and why my dog was OK with it's front paws on my drivers window. Turns out it can't run at 150mph on its hind legs after all.

Upwards and onwards. My journey to work is around 25 miles and normally takes me around 8 minutes, but I am helped by having removed all surplace items from my interior, glove box and boot, using hydrogen to fill my tyres, always having a dump before I leave the house and leaving a suit at work so that I can drive there naked.

Thanks to these high performance measures I was able to leave a trail of Scooby-Doos, EVO IXs, Aston Martins and Saxos shuddering in my wake, many of them wearing expressions indicating that they obviously thought my car was a Ferrari of some kind, or maybe some sort of ultra-Lamborghini.

The only real challenge I faced was on a fast section of twisties where I suddenly realised that somebody was trying to overtake me. Glancing across I saw a one of them brand new Swedish supercars that holds the lap-record on Top Gear ... and it was being driven by Nigel Mansell ... and it had a big sign on the side reading, "Powered by NOx".

So it really gave me a hard time until I got up to third, at 150, and then I managed to pull 70 or 80 car lengths ahead, but using binoculars I could see that Nigel waw giving me the thumbs up. Nice bloke, shame he can't drive for toffee.

I was about to back off a bit, but then I realised that the light behind me was trying it on. Now I've no objection to people driving quickly, but this light was, literally, going as fast as it's physically possibly to go ... and in a 40 limit!

There's no way I could observe that sort of behaviour without showing the wave/particle radiation just what an idiot it was being, by driving even faster.

I'm happy to admit that it wasn't easy to lose it, especially when I had to write a 600-page physics article proving special relativity wrong and, thus, allowing me to accelerate beyond 186,000 miles per second, but thanks to the Coop's brilliant 4th gear I was able to manage it and that light looked pretty stupid.

At least it would have looked pretty stupid if I could have seen it. Which I couldn't. Because I was going faster, like.

When I finally got to work I was delighted to see they'd arranged a ticker-tape parade for me and the coop and journalists from all of the motoring magazines were writing articles explaining why the coop was the greatest car ever in the entire history of cars and how there'd never be a car better, ever.

So, pretty good morning, really, but looking out of the window there are some tachyons in McDonald's car-park, over the road, acting pretty cocky.

Looks like I'll have to learn their theoretical asses a lesson.

No, really, you're all too kind.

Except for those of you who haven't posted to say how much you love me ... you're not kind enough.

Just read this thread now, what a load of utter kosh in my opinion. We might as well stop the tuning thread as well as slower cars mean slower speeds so less accidents right

AndrewR, that was the work of genius! Honestly it's funny all the way through. My fave is The Nigel mansell driving the swedish supercar part. Powered by NOX

Perhaps there should be a Coupe vs. AndrewR thread?

Of course.

Anyhoooo, it's staying

I think Andrew has had sufficient love now