The Raptor

I agree. That's why I bought my 2014 460hp, 3,400lb Vette vert.

rob-2

Nav, cell phones, eating while driving and a general laziness towards the responsibility of driving has crept into our society. If you tell me people are distracted today as they were in the 70s, I'm calling BS.

The close calls I had, or am referencing where not due to a lack of flow or understanding of driving by me. In one case we were in stop and go traffic. Lady in a lifted pick up thought the spot beside her was free. My wife and I were crawling with traffic as was the car in front of us. A bunch of horns lit up as she came over, including mine, which you couldn't heard from my little Honda. Thanksfully there was some shoulder I could use. Got half way into my lane before she pulled back.

I can drive a 150-200hp car on the streets and have no problem with that. I'm not saying my kids will get high powered cars, just expressing that the inability to leap out of the way can cause problems. There was an on ramp by my parents place that I had to take floored to get merging with traffic at speed. You'd enter at 25 and need to leave at 75-80 to merge with rush hour traffic doing 80+. What did the people in low powered cars do? Nearly cause accidents by merging at 50. Why didn't people move out of the way for merging traffic? Cause they're rude and self centered. When you can go from 20-100 in a single gear you start to love high HP. By no means a requirement.

TheDonEffect

I drive all over the bay regularly, on and off rush hour, and these days I drive a hybrid and just sold my c5z, and honestly the only thing I find unsafe about the hybrid is it's on throttle response, I need to floor it, which I hate doing, to get it to move beyond a crawl whereas any other normal car would be fine. You gotta drive defensive here and using high horsepower to pass people here is just screaming for a ticket. I prefer driving normal cars on the roads here because I have been ticketed here for doing 66 on 880 (65 limit).
Don't get me started on the aggressive, don't give a damn about anyone else drivers in and around Oakland who make it a point to scream past you when you're in a merge lane. On the 580 where I do most of my driving, the curvy nature of it makes it a rear end collision magnet because when you're trying to speed up to pass aggressively, check your blind spot, boom a car is infront of you that you didn't account for because people are constantly speeding up and down because of the curves.
I've never been wanting for power, except in san francisco but honestly it was more of a function of driving stick than lack of power because driving my vette there was god awful, another reason why I got rid of it.
Yes higher model cars sell on more power but I think it's more for the experience of ease not to mention smoothness of an engine that's not feeling like your engjne is being wrung out within an inch of its life. Driving a v6 accord with its lower cruising rpm and instant power delivery over the 4 cylinder is the selling point, not so much about that it's incapable of doing certain things.
And agreed about the s2000 with its low low end torque, but like you said a miata almost feels faster around town because of torque relative to it's weight along with shorter gearing is better than the s2000, so you're not needing more power, just how it's delivered and in that the s2000 is very unusual. My frs which I replaced the vette with is actually a joy driving around these miserable roads, that is until I actually hit an open empty straight and want to stretch its legs out for kicks, then it's just underwhelming, but for 90% of driving I find it way better than the s2000 which was a bit of a chore to drive, and the vette would get me in ticket speeds quickly.
I made this realization one day when I driving a 2008 civic lx with a stick, I wondered why the heck is this car more enjoyable to drive around here than my s2000. Gearing, torque, relative to weight, extremely easy to modulate clutch (the s2000 is also easy), etc.
Honestly I think if you drive something like an si or gti you'll find driving around here, while never fun, is much more fun than driving an s2000 or really most sports cars. Me I put a premium on rwd, and have aspirations of going to the track more to blow off steam, and I wanted back seats etc. It's small footprint, pretty comfortable overall car, peppy enough engine that will soon have FI, etc just makes it a better fit for what I use it for. Oh and a crap ton cheaper than buying anything with 400+hp. If this car were to be only a track car, then it's sit in my garage for all but a few weekends a year, and that's a waste of money for me at my income level. If I had that kind of disposable income then yeah I'd want something cooler.
Lastly, the s2000 is more on the driving a slow car fast side of the argument than the driving fast car slow. The s2000 gives the sensations of speed, but actually being consistently fast in that car is hard. Try launching it with any kind of consistency
Even power hungry Jeremy Clarkson owns and drives a gti around, there's a reason for that. Smaller footprint, nimble chassis, useable power, comfortable and practical. Right tool right job.

Vitt

Man! I wish cops were on the lookout for things like that rather than look for those driving above the speed limit but fully aware of their surroundings.

912S2k

I like high horse power cars and handling cars.

GT350RS

This is true, like how experience with this kind of racing naturally makes you take corners in every day driving faster...My wife always gives me a hard time for this, lol...

I suppose you could chalk it up to laziness then...I'm not trying to say you can't drive the car normally with everything off, sure you can, but consider them like you would cruise control.. It just makes the car a little easier to deal with. In Track mode with everything off, the car feels more aggressive, more reactive. This is more so when you tune it. I normally drive in sport mode because of the exhaust and less boosting to the power steering. You can smoke the tires in the 350 almost right off idle on dry pavement with the nannies off, so for those times I might want to get ahead of the guy next to me for one reason or another, its good to keep on...

I've been reading a lot about the clutch spring, and that's definitely my next mod. The OEM clutch is just weird...too light for this car...It takes some getting used to after driving the RS and the S2K...

TommyDeVito

Clutch on the RS is the exact same as the GT350. I'm not referring to the clutch itself, of course they are different, only referring to that damn spring. They (IIRC Steeda) make a replacement spring for both the Shelby and the RS so you might as well order both when you do it. It's my next mod for the RS.

radiantm3

yea the clutch bugs me a lot. Way too light. It’s not hard to drive, but just doesn’t feel right.

gerry100

lots of stuff I agree with here.

Pure acceleration is a very expensive drug and you always need more. Any fool can mash the pedal and hang on

My 83 VW GTI was fast for a while, and my '94 Vette was fast for a while until I became acclimated. If I had a 700hp Dodge, I'd enjoy some burnouts and hole shots and become bored with 700 one trick ponies.

My old 911 is underpowered for its handling potential but my S2000 is a good balance of available power with excellent handling. When I master the handling the power will be there.

GT350RS

Good point...they feel different to me, probably based on the RS' different seating position but the RS clutch is a light one as well...