Went out today for a nice easy relaxing drive with my 16-year old son to enjoy the fall colors and shop for motorcycles (for him) and pickups (for me). Mainly enjoyable, but I kept getting ricers trying to impress me or get me into a race by coming up within a few inches of my rear and revving on me.

One was a CRX that had at least 200,000 miles on it. When we left the 25 mph zone I had open road in front of me so I used it to leave him behind. The other was a mitsu 3000 ZX twin turbo that nearly killed himself and others passing on blind corners to get behind me. I had a good half dozen slow cars in front of me on a 25-mph turn section of road and was not willing to play games with him. He rode my tail, I mean 6 inches off my bumper, for 10 miles before I reached my neighborhood and turned off.

I got really pissed at this guy because his driving was endangering me and my son and the music from his overamped system was really annoying. I wanted to stop and beat the crap out of him but my son, being more mature than me sometimes, talked me out of it. Calling the police was not an option either because in the state I live in cars do not have front license plates.

What is the best thing to do in such a situation? I ignored the driver and drove the speed limit to try and discourage him. I have found from experience that trying to lose a car like that does not work and is dangerous. I love to drive fast but I only do it when the conditions are safe and when the way I drive is my choice not that of some idiot following me.

We have a heavily modded 04 WRX that turns at least 350 BHP and is a lot more of a racing machine than my stock S-2000 but we do not attract anywhere near the attention that we do in my new S-2000.

Any recommendations or similar stories?

Tim

 

That sucks. Yeah, for me the S attracted more races in 1 month of having it than I had in my entire ownership spell with the 03 Cobra.

I think people know the S is a fast car, but they think they stand a chance beating it on the straight. Some cases, they are right.

Btw..."mitsu 3000 ZX twin turbo"... what the hell? Was it a nissan 300ZX or a Mitsubishi 3000 VR4?

Oh, and the best thing to do in that situation.. here's my take on it. If you don't want to race, and some guy is being a dick and doesnt back off after a little while, step on the brakes a little. Keep doing it till he backs off. It always seems to work for me.

 

to be honest...i have not had anyone trying to race me anywhere in three states i'm around. this is atl, TN, KY. now with my Yellow Type R, i cant get away from people trying to race me. I almost miss racing people once in a while.

 

Yeah, 3000 GT VR4, you are right. Generally I am in more of a racing mood and will play along as long as it is reasonably safe. I was just in a laid back drive easy mood today and resented the intrusion. Thanks for the response. I have used the brake light manouver in the past but this guy was so aggressive that I was mainly interested in making him bored so he would find other targets.

I have a good friend that drives a Miata that once sprayed pepper spray over his shoulder to discourae a tailgater and it apparently worked wonders!

Tim

 

Next time just pull-over and let the dumb ass prove how stupid he is

 

hmm no one ever races me. pretty boring

in these situations you want to put on your left or right turn signal and he'll back off thinking you are going to slow down for a turn but keep going straight. he'll be really confused

holla!

 

 

Next time arm your son with a box of firecrackers. Light em, aim, toss em at the windshield and boom!

Or a safer approach would be the little poppers that give a loud pop on contact. Don't make it obvious you're throwing, just have your son fling them upwards if your top is down and hopefully it'll hit their windshield. They may think it's rocks coming from your car and back off

Wow good ideas I may try these myself

 

I'd say never pull over if someone is riding your ass. You don't know what kind of issues a person may have, and you might regret putting yourself in front of that person off the road.

But yeah, brake lights will work. If its a road with more than one lane, of course pull over to the slow lane and let the loser get on with thinking he's the man.

 

lol. To comment on the funny side of this thread, you could always get yourself a nice turbo and whatever else it is you need to shoot flames out the back of your car. Roast his front bumper.