Awesome responses... this is exactly what I was hoping for. It is amazing how much feel I can relate to all of these. A good drive is so rarely about the car, speed and road, but about the circumstances. First track day, first drive ever, first Porsche... etc.

ATL... your description of your permasmile in your boxster brings me neatly to my second best drive ever.

2. 1999 - Mitsubishi EVO 5 RS - white/black - just outside Cannes

Once again it was the circumstances leading up to this drive that make this one of the most memorable moments for me. This time I am 23 and only have 15 years of car magazine reading behind me.

A year earlier my favourite magazine EVO has started to write about the Mitsubishi EVO 5, describing its supercar like performance and its ability to out-manoeuvre just about anything. Tommy Makkinen is winning his fair share of rallies. To me the EVO is everything a car should be. It is light, fast, a homologation special and extremely rare. I have only seen them in Magazines and on the Television.

On my way back from the beach in Cannes one day I make my usual stop at the local exotics dealerships to gawk at the occasional f50 and other hypercars. Immediately I know that this time is different. from the car park I can see, right at the back of the showroom, 10cm of a white spoiler. I know EXACTLY what is attached to it. At the back of the showroom is a new white EVO 5. It looks ugly as sin and clearly the black sheep. It's fat sticky tyres, inflated bonnet and large exhaust point to the wolf lurking underneath. I run to the dealer to explain to him how much I love this car. He clearly doesn't give a crap, about me or about my story. He can also sense that I do not have the means to buy this car. BUT... I just can't stop talking and to get rid of me and stop me from drooling all over his floors he tells me that we can go for a test drive, one day, if I leave immediately and call back.

I go home and call, and call and call. He finally agrees to a date when I tell him that I will be coming with my father (my father has also agreed to come with me simply to get me to shut up).

So a few weeks later we return to the dealership. The car is parked outside waiting for us. The dealer is also looking thoroughly p1ssed off at the thought of wasting part of his morning on us. He has seen my father, wearing his cheapest white sneakers, a promotional polo of some description and his very finest pair of glasses from the mid 70s. No car sales today!

We get in to the car and he explains that this car is in fact an RS, bought new by a local racing team but not used because of financial difficulties, it has 5 gears, little or no noise insulation, no stereo, no electric windows or air-conditioning. It is baking hot outside... and inside.

He starts the engine, a rumble but also that the sound of a tiny tinny 4-pot. Had I mentioned the dealer's bad mood? He plunges the his foot to the floor and the car literally kicks forward, and again and again as the revs top-out every second. I have NEVER experienced acceleration like this before. I don't think that I have EVER felt any acceleration before. I look back back at my father in the back seat, who stares coldly at me.

The dealer is on the other hand starting to cheer up a bit. We are now in on some residential roads and we must be doing 150km/h. A hair-pin turn approaches. He flicks down into second and glides the car around the first corner, and then the next. I am in heaven. The dealer, now sitting with a huge grin on his face looks across and asks if I am ok. I am, sort off, petrified and completely excited. He slows down and drives back to the dealership. 5 minutes have elapsed. he tells us that he is amateur rally driver.. thank god for that.

We arrive back at the dealership. I help my father out of the back seat. He doesn't look happy, even less than 5 minutes ago. His shirt is soaked through, the dark patches are bigger than the light patches. His glasses are slipping off his sweaty nose.

Thats it.. I will never own a car.

My father calmly tells the dealer...


"We will take it..."


I am speechless, completely...

On the way back my father explains himself. He tells me that since the day that I uttered my first word.. CAAHH.. he knew this day was coming. He figured that this car was exactly a tenth of the price of every other car that I had ever salivated over... and finally also explains his regret at not having bought a 911 in his youth. It turns out petrolheadedness is recessive gene.

That was one of the best drives ever and the first time that I thought that of my father as awesome.

As a small postscript, I am now very good friends with the dealer. We have done a rally in Corsica together and speak on a weekly basis. It turns out he also prefers these cars to the countless Ferraris he has.
The evo was totalled 6 months later by my sister's boyfriend, we sold it and a few years later I bought an evo 7 with my own money.
The smile is only started to wear off now, but writing about it brings it all back.

Below is the exact hairpin bend.

 

h-bo I know where this road is, I've driven somewhere close to it....great story.

 

Awesome H-Bo, I want the third now!

 

Some amazing reads in here. It's a bit difficult to talk with my friends about cars seeing as they have little to no interest in them. I, on the other hand, have been absolutely addicted to the motor world since I was 15. I hope to have more experiences like these but not sure if any could ever match them.

1) I was 18 fresh out of high school and received a gift from my uncle for graduating in the form of $5k. He had hoped that I would use it for school but then again he knew boys will be boys. After picking up a Crate half stack and Epiphone G-310 I really didn't know what I wanted. I then realized that I should upgrade my car (which at the time was a 1987 Toyota Camry) and had a flashback to when a friend took me to a local drifting event at PIR which was also my first glimpse of a Nissan 240sx. I fell in love instantly. I went to the local 240 experts and they found me a babied 1992 Nissan 240sx hatchback with 70k on the odom. (BTW this was in 2005) I ended up buying it and immediately had them swap in the SR20DET with a full JIC Ti exhaust.

When I first got it back and heard it start up I had the same permagrin that ATL had. I could only describe it as eargasmic, to some it might have been just noise but to me it was soooo much more. Then the drive came. I opened her up on I84 and although it wasn't the quickest, it was the most raw of the cars I've had. It felt like I was one with it and couldn't care less about what the people around me thought. I ended up driving for 3 straight hours which, up until then, was the longest I drove any car.. Unfortunately I don't have any pics of her but I don't need any because it's infused in my brain and something I will never forget.

2) My second had to be my WRX. It was my first "built with my hands" car which made it all the more enjoyable. Flashforward a couple months into December 2006 when we were hit with a decent amount of snow. A couple buddies and I decide to hit up the fresh Portland powder and needless to say it resulted in plenty of sideways action. To paint a picture for you it was 4 Subaru's and a TDI Suzuki Samurai in the industrial area by PDX with huge open parking lots usually reserved for stock trucks. I never knew a car could handle snow the way my Scooby did. It went when I wanted it to, stopped on a dime and had just enough grip to keep me going where I wanted but also enough power to break loose at will. A cop ended up coming by and we thought we were in trouble but it turned out he was a member on NASIOC and also had an STI and just wanted to tell us to be safe. I ended up letting him take my WRX around for a few minutes which he thoroughly enjoyed. We ended up staying there for about 2 hours and my only regret was that I didn't stay longer as that would be the first and last time I drove the Subaru in the snow.

3) My last was actually my first test drive of my 2003 PPW 350Z. The owner knew I was a car guy and knew my Nissans so he just kept quiet and let the car do the talking. He suggested I take some backroads around Newberg and really open her up. I was instantly hooked. I'm sure all of you have heard a 350Z before so I don't need to describe it but to hear it growl through the twisties with ease and brake effortlessly with the help of the factory Brembo stoppers. The owner was right, the car sold itself..

here's a pic of the day I brought her home:

 

1) When I was 16 and just got my liscence, I came home and got the keys to my dad's stock miata (at the time we had 3 I think) and went for a drive down Scott Rd. Its my local fun road here in Sacramento. I had the top down in December and remember how fast it felt and how much fun it was to finally be on my own. Over the next few years I got a del sol and a miata and had a blast.

2) About 1.5 years ago I sent my dad a link on ebay to a superformance cobra. My dad and I have been lusting after these for years. We went to the historic races every year at Sears Point and always tripped over our jaws at the cobra corral. Only recently had my dad retired and we picked up our car hobby. At the time he had a 2006 corvette and a supercharged miata, both where quick. Back to the story, so the link found his inbox and I never thought about it again. Then about a week later I got a phone call from my dad. He was laughing like a little school girl so I knew something was up. He said he couldn't keep a secret anymore and he was in Irvine picking up the cobra I had sent him. He bought it behind my back! Anywho, he came home and I flew out the next day and went for a ride. I was shaking head to toe before I fired it up. UGH, the sound was amazing. It still sounds great but taht first time cranking it over was unforgettable. I went for a drive and remembering the feeling and the sounds and smells and just the raw power. It was the fastest car I'd been in and still is. Boyhood dream come true for sure.

3) My first time out in my chevelle. Its a 1972 chevelle that is far from stock, I've posted it here before. Anyways, I was at Barrett-Jackson with my parents and then fiance. My dad and I had been enjoying the open bar and we had the catalog dog eared and memorized. We were watching a 289 cobra and it was almost up. But as you know if you had been to Barrett-Jackson before, there are thousands of cars under tents. Well I had been eyeing this bagged out chevelle all week. Of course the cobra and chevelle were back to back on the auction block, and my dad ran up the bid on the cobra but backed out. I was upset but it went higher than market so no biggie (this is a year before the previous cobra story). Then up goes the chevelle. I lost interested and was bugging my dad for being a wimp and then he raised his hand on the chevelle and before I knew it we won it. So we get it home about a month later (long story) and I take it out for the first car show of the year and I felt like a king. Everyone looked at the car and it won the show. It rides like shit, zero stereo and no A/C in 105 degree dry heat but man I felt like a million bucks. I still drive it as much as I can and am looking forward for the puddles to go away so I can start it up again.

 

Some great stories here, keep them coming! I love the rags to riches stories esp!

 

Patiently awaiting h-bo's 3rd story

 

Without a doubt my number 1 drive was when I was able to ride shotgun in Kuzi's 16M. This summer I was up in Seattle and had the opportunity to meet with Kuzi and go for a ride. This was the first time I had ever been in a Ferrari and therefore my first Ferrari ride. Let's just say it was absolutely thrilling. To top things off, Kuzi was driving his F40 in front of me and Andrew was driving the 16M that I was riding in. The sound of the 16M exhaust was unreal and the F40 exhaust was just incredible. You could hear the exhaust cracking and popping during the low speeds at the beginning of the ride. Then, when we would go under tunnels on the highway Andrew would downshift the 16M and the exhaust note was like a symphony. At the very end of the ride, we were in downtown Seattle and my dad was outside looking for me. He never found me in the Ferrari but he said that he heard it for awhile and I believe him because after Andrew dropped me off I could hear him at least 3 blocks away. That is without a doubt the best ride of my life!

 

1. 996 TT X50

2. Audi RS6 with chip/Evo VIII vs 06 WRX

3. Stage 2 WRX vs GTR