http://uk.news.yahoo.com/itn/20070924/tuk-...-dba1618_2.html

In January, Timothy Brady, 33, who worked at a car hire firm, was caught in a random speed check on the A420 near Abingdon, Oxfordshire, driving a

 

"Travelling at 172mph, almost as fast as a jumbo jet taking off, it would take a car almost half a mile to stop at that speed."

I'd like to know where they get these figures from nowadays.
Not that I'm condoning what he did, but have the "stopping distances" that they have in the likes of the highway code been updated in the last 30 years? Since they improved the braking systems, and added stuff like ABS ?

 

Notice the amount of *bigging* up the speed in that article. Jumbo jets taking off, 1/4 mile to stop, terrifying, race tracks, speed records, about to kill himself, selfishness, lust for speed etc.

As for facts in the article, well there's the speed and the road, that's it. No mention of road conditions at the time etc.
There were other road users in the vicinity? No mention one way or the other.

As it stands, apart from being caught, I don't know one way or the other how to view this chap. Was it a roads with a fair few other drivers? Was it wet? What was visibility like? Or was the road completely empty, he saw a straight safe stretch and thought "lets see what this can do"?

Actually, my rant, such that it is, has little to do with this case but more to do with opinionated, factless reporting that the beeb is all too abundant with these days. I'm surprised the article didn't mention climate change somewhere

 

All he was trying to do is get home before he had an accident!

 

Has it also caught anyones attention too that the Speed kills adverts, the one where the car brakes at 30 and the child has a certain percentage chance of living and if they drove 5 mph faster, the child dies... the cars in those campaigns are always always old bangers, no ABS, probably on drum brakes and er driven by someone with the reaction time of a tortoise...now, if they did those campaigns with a porsche on ceramic brakes, the child probably would just recieve a bump, cos the uprated brakes would have done their job and stopped the car before it would even touched the child.

But then they'd do the advert where the child purposely runs into the car... which in reality we all know that kids these days after school can just run out from nowhere. Honestly speaking is it easily for parents to actually keep control of their kids, or it is easier for a driver to predict the movements of children whilst driving on Britains (fixed/mobile)camera infested roads?

Blabbed on a bit too much there and probably off topic...

 

^ Yes

 

The fact remains that the guy was a prize knob.

We all know that, in the current climate, anyone caught doing that kind of speed is going to get a major public spanking pour encourager les autres. Anyone who thinks that any of the "But what about....?" points will carry ANY weight at all is either naive or just plain misguided.

The road safety lobby is gradually demonising speeding so that it will become as publicly unacceptable as drink driving now is. It doesn't matter what the reality is because as long as the perceived wisdom is as per the breathless lazy-reporting BBC article above, anything said in defence of his guy is going to smack of being either justificatory or - to the non-petrolhead - just plain wrong.

 

^ Indeed

 

Hmm... Looks like many of the driving public have much to learn.

ABS means it can actually take longer to stop than a car without ABS. ABS is to help you steer rather than skid straight on.

Reaction times are the same, no matter what the braking capabilities of a car are.

Most people drive ordinary cars, not Porsches.

Back on topic, whilst 172mph is stupid on a public road, I'm unsure the jail sentence fits the crime. We see 'real criminals' who steal, injure and so on get off with lesser punishments which seems unfair.

 

Probably because this type of incident is an easier target? Not that I would wish to condone such speeds on the public highway! 172mph..... strikes me that if nothing else he was being a bit silly. You know you are going to take a serious spanking if you're caught. And he has.