When you've got a car coming towards you way to fast to stop, on a single lane road - you don't really have much choice - I slammed on the brakes and turned the wheel to try to use the verge and the car just kept on going into the hedge. Not really much I coulda done tbh...

The same guy did exactly the same thing (30 round a blind bend in the middle of the road) on a little-pot-holed single track road about 100 yards from where we met last time - Luckily I was going slow enough to slam on the brakes and pull over to the verge because he just kept on going...

EDIT - Even so I wouldn't of under or over-steered - but my car does understeer like a bitch (or in the dry when it grips - it just body rolls...).

That's what would be called (driving too fast for the conditions, easily done tbh though! )

I probably was driving too fast - but the guy coming at me didn't actually stop until where I was moment when I first saw him so even if i'd of stopped dead that instant he'd of run head-on into me.

this one time, lying on a weird racing-skateboard-something, rolling downhill, i swear i was doing more then 30KPH! the damn thing started shaking left-right very fast and almost threw me off before i could stop. and the fingers almost scratched on the tarmac. very scary!

on a public road that was. yesyes!

Quote from eimer_ :

this one time, lying on a weird racing-skateboard-something, rolling downhill, i swear i was doing more then 30KPH! the damn thing started shaking left-right very fast and almost threw me off before i could stop. and the fingers almost scratched on the tarmac. very scary!

on a public road that was. yesyes!

yea I had a similar experience! I used a public road to ride down a huge dike on the north sea on my vacation.. using a pedal go cart. the steering had some backlash and got out of control under a similar speed, so I flipped after doing slalom lines towards the pavement... I got several bruises and scars all over the body, speed kills!

but seriously.. this thread is just for "comparing sizes", really mature imo

@Jakg i would stop explaining and defending myself if i were you.. i mean, yeah.. people can laugh but so what, in the very same situation perhaps they would have done the same or worse.. good you came out just with minimal damage and just with your ego hurt.. next time you see the postman you could play chicken .

in some situations it`s better to be the one hit by some racer wannabe, than swerve and hit someone else by trying to avoid him.. and become responsible for that accident, while the 'racer' walks away.

Quote from Jakg :

I (like most people on here) would much much risk spinning on a roundabout rather than plowing straight into another car - especially seeing as I could well be able to catch the car...

Yeah with your invaluable racing sim experience. :rolleyes:

How long have you been driving now, six months? And already you think you're a better driver than most people on the road. Typical kid with his first car.

Sorry Jakg but you sound like a liability to me. Get some perspective sharpish.

As someone who has proved they can instinctively countersteer etc through both LFS and driving karts then I'd say i'm likely to end up better off in an accident than someone like my Mum who'd just freeze.

I'm not the best on the road

Quote from Jakg :

As someone who has proved they can instinctively countersteer etc through both LFS and driving karts then I'd say i'm likely to end up better off in an accident than someone like my Mum who'd just freeze.

I'm not the best on the road

I wouldn't really say any of that at all.

I had the same small thought that LFS would some how be there in the back of my mind if something ever happened. After spinning in the snow I can guarantee that it means absolutely nothing.

Like thisnameistaken said, don't think you'll be able to handle anything till the time comes and you find out, which I hope you never have to do.

Quote from Jakg :

As someone who has proved they can instinctively countersteer etc through both LFS and driving karts then I'd say i'm likely to end up better off in an accident than someone like my Mum who'd just freeze.

I'm not the best on the road

Going into a big slide in LFS is nowehere near as scary as going into a big slide in a full size car in reality, until you actually do it you don't know how easy it is to simply think "oh shat" and freeze.

Karting isn't the same either, when you oversteer in a Kart you're probrably doing less than 40mph, now try that at 60/70mph.

Force feedback ins't quite like reality either, it seems softer and less effective in reality, although that was probrably due to the rubbish car.

But the thing that really makes you shat your pants is locked front wheels, or sliding front wheels, towards a barrier, in the rain, now that makes you freeze!

299+

I've done some Karting as well (nothing special mind, only did about 40mph on an indoor track) and can say it's nothing like countersteering in a car.. karts have like 200 degrees steering lock and a very short wheelbase of all of a meter.. this makes them both easy to correct and very snappy..

Anyway, we'll all learn in time.

Quote from 5haz :

Karting isn't the same either, when you oversteer in a Kart you're probrably doing less than 40mph, now try that at 60/70mph.

If i'm sideways at 70 i'm pretty much ****ed whatever.

The odds of my car getting sideways in "ordinary" conditions are pretty low, but meh.

Quote from S14 DRIFT :

I've done some Karting as well (nothing special mind, only did about 40mph on an indoor track) and can say it's nothing like countersteering in a car.. karts have like 200 degrees steering lock and a very short wheelbase of all of a meter.. this makes them both easy to correct and very snappy..

Anyway, we'll all learn in time.

Indeed, which is why kart racers can violently chuck a Kart at a corner with a flick of the wheel, and then hold it in a slide, they get a shock when they move up to cars and try to do the same!

And I think its a good thing for every driver to have a few "ohhhh shitttt" moments every so often, so long as they don't get seriously hurt, the saying "once bitten, twice shy" is probrably true, we learn from out mistakes.

Quote from Jakg :

The odds of my car getting sideways in "ordinary" conditions are pretty low, but meh.

Errr, yeah. Same for me and everyone else driving, if the conditions are normal then the chance of crashing is....low.

Just don't expect you magical LFS or karting saves to kick in, as the fear and panic will probably overwhelm them. Just don't say stuff like that, even if you think it don't say it cause it just makes you look stupid.

Sorry Jakq.

I sometimes have thought about this, what affects if you freeze or not.
Because some people just freeze and some just don't.

I have had my scary moments behind the wheel, mainly during the first 6 months of having a driving license, but I never freezed, no matter what I kept steering and so on behind the wheel even if the slide wasn't anymore recoverable. I maybe wasn't able to exactly foretell what the car was going to do and my steering maneuvers were too slow, but I still didn't just lock the brakes and freeze.

But then some people do freeze, some earlier than other. In some cases it's possible teach the habit away, but sometimes even rally drivers with few years of experience freeze at some point.

I'm not saying that I'm that good that I don't freeze, but it's not natural for me too freeze like that. And I have to admit that probably during the first 6 months or so I thought that I was pretty good with car handling, but now when I think back it wasn't that impressive after all.

Quote from Jakg :

As someone who has proved they can instinctively countersteer etc through both LFS and driving karts then I'd say i'm likely to end up better off in an accident than someone like my Mum who'd just freeze.

Bear in mind that if you start to oversteer on a typical road, you won't have any space to correct it. If you're turning right you'll be in a ditch or on the pavement before you've caught it, if you're turning left you'll be in the path of oncoming traffic.

"If the road was wider I would've caught it" won't give you much consolation when they're cutting you and your friends out of the car and giving you other peoples' (maybe even mine) blood to keep you alive.

The best skill any driver can have is to be able to anticipate what's going to happen next, and thus avoid doing speeds inappropriate for the conditions. I can't imagine ever understeering into a car on a roundabout - how the hell would you end up in that situation if you weren't driving like a cock in the first place?

Like I said before, get real before you get hurt.

Quote from thisnameistaken :

The best skill any driver can have is to be able to anticipate what's going to happen next, and thus avoid doing speeds inappropriate for the conditions. I can't imagine ever understeering into a car on a roundabout - how the hell would you end up in that situation if you weren't driving like a cock in the first place?

Words of advice (to people of all ages and abilities) right there..

I was doing a perfectly sensible speed on a roundabout ( a fairly large one at about 20) - It's just the roundabout wet and it was the first time i'd been turning hard at a low speed - but there I learned my car is rubbish in the wet.

I wouldn't class going slower than the cars in front "driving like a cock", but thanks anway.

I myself did 150kph with a Vectra! , and me in the passenger seat my uncle did 235kph with his Astra.

E: Or was it 230? whatever it was, his car only shows up to 210.

Quote from S14 DRIFT :

Ehh.. no seriously now, you're a biker yourself and you know figures are aload of BS. I've had about 115mph out of it, in 3rd. I have 6 gears and it was still seriously pulling. My one is given a top speed of 138mph, which is probably a bit conserative.

Id ask to get the speedo calibrated as ive seen 600's give z1000's a whooping top end (and you have pm)

I'll 'borrow' my Dads GPS (or rather get him to chase me) if/when we do a Euro GP and see what the beast can really do..

Quote from Jakg :

If i'm sideways at 70 i'm pretty much ****ed whatever.

I've been sideways, or at least not straight at that speed. That was back when I hadn't been driving for very long and didn't understand that acting like a ricer and trying to switch lanes really fast isn't a good idea.

Quote :

this one time, lying on a weird racing-skateboard-something, rolling downhill, i swear i was doing more then 30KPH! the damn thing started shaking left-right very fast and almost threw me off before i could stop. and the fingers almost scratched on the tarmac. very scary!

roflz.

That reminds me of a time I up engined one of those Skoda Estelle's, the ones that got them their bad reputation. I thought with a bigger engine in it might not be so bad. Well come 90mph the thing rattled and shook like an alchoholic having DT's. There is a limit to how much one should vibrate in a public place, and that car was pure kink!

I only had the engine in a few weeks when it caught fire going down the motorway, that was a moment I can tell you, all I could see out the back (engine was in the boot) was flames, despite doing 70 odd mph the flames rose up above the eyeline of the rear window!

Quote from Becky Rose :

all I could see out the back (engine was in the boot) was flames, despite doing 70 odd mph the flames rose up above the eyeline of the rear window!

Just 18 more mph and you'd have been golden, if a little displaced.