I�m a I-love-them-even-more-than-girls spanish car enthusiastic. If you encourage me to supply proofs for this no problem:
Three cars owned within five driving license years. 205 GTI 1.9 with Blistein gr.N suspension included. I will be driving a 200SX S14 from next week. I think it�s enough…
I�ve been amazed for years about why are the spanish so lagged around the driving and car culture. I try to analize the causes for this, but I�m still lost.
It�s easier to analize the facts:
90% of spanish people define a car as the best way to go from A to B.
The overall driving skills in my country are close to catastrophic levels, nobody is interested in learning more.
The traffic authorities blame always the excessive speed as the main cause for our insane amount of road accidents.
The traffic authorities don�t (want to) see that the solution for point 3 is actually pointy 2!
As a car is just a way to go from A to B (nice places though) nobody is going to spend more than the minimum possible money on their “pieces of metal” (Tuning here is better not mention)
Due to point 5, we don�t have any Norris Desings nor Xtreme nor Power Engineering in my country. Poor technical level.
People here think that trackday means going to the track to see the races. Nobody is going to drive his/her car inside the circuit because that means a lot of risk and a lot of money (after all he/she bought his Leon Cupra R because is so beautiful…)
All the information shown in the previous points explain why is crazy to think that any kind of car sub-culture (let�s say japanese drifting) could grow in my shiny country.
I love japanese and british car culture, with their respective idiosyncrasy. And what is worse…even americans have greater car culture than Spain!!! (at least they drag).
What do you think, being british, about my country auto issue? Any help to research the causes?
Now they will fit a Renault F1 rear wing at the back of their tuned Daewoo Lanos…(a lot of young people buy this car because is so cheap that they can spend the rest of the money in redneck tuning, it seems they don�t know the meaning of the “understeer” word)
I mean, Spain is known to be one of the most enthusiastic countries when it comes to motorcycling.
And they did the Radical test over there as well.
Strange…
But hey, I suppose you’re one of the fortunate ones then, you should be happy
Uldis
PS - supongo que ya te vas a comprar un Exige entonces, usar todas esas carreteras onduladas para ti solo y llevarlo tambien a la pista, verdad?
Yeah, you�re right when you say that here we like motorsports. We have a good bike culture, a lot of people go to the tracks to see motorcycle races. And, indeed, you see very nice bikers and bikes around Spain.
The driving skills of the amateurs are actually at high levels.
But with cars is different. There are a lot of less people that go to see car races.
Now something big is happening. Fernando Alonso is for us like the “Golden Child”: One is born every 5000 years.
He�s producing a tremendous media-explosion about F1. I�m not liying if I say that the number of spanish F1 races viewers has multiplied by 2 since he�s racing.
Strangely, this fact is not translating into a better street car culture. It is translating in putting Renault F1 big stickers on those Daewoo Lanos !!!
P.S: Of course I would like to buy a Exige to run sideways every U-Turn of my twisty B-roads, but I don�t have enough quids yet. I�ve just bought a second hand Silvia S14, so not bad to start drifting…
Well, you really can’t drift with an Exige, unless it’s Dave’s supercharged one.
Thy’re made to go fast through the turns without sliding, but ever so often you can see some of of getting sideways (and coming out of it).
Nissan 200SX (Silvia in Japan)
S14 (Generation code, latest is S15, not selling in Europe)
Actually the correct name of spanish languaje is castellano. The idiom is the same for Mexico and South America; but, the same as you with the North Americans, we have some different words and expresions (and of course accents).
I know that Exiges are made to maximum grip, specially with the help of advanced aerodynamics, but I suposse that if you floor the gas on a tight U-turn in first or second gear it will drift nicely.
By the way, does it have limited slip differential?
If afirmative, what kind of?
Your right you can get the back to step out in these conditions but I have never actually seen anyone set an exige up in what i’d call a ‘nice drift’… but then i’ve never seen anyone do it in an F1 car or a le mans racer either… it’s not really their thang maaaannn…
oh and they don’t have LSD’s although some folks do get them converted…RussT ??
I am nearly sane again now, following the house renovation from hell. I meant to say that the LSD is only any good exiting the slow corners - I am not brave enough to try and power oversteer thru the quickies! One of its best tricks is to be able to spin the car in its own length - something the standard car cannot do
I assure you the standard car CAN be spun in its own length, though the last time I did that was at nearly 100 mph at Castle Coombe - it took a long frisby ride over the infield before it finally stopped going round - the cause was too much power coinciding with a bump and a wet white line