Sideswipe

Twin Kills!

I shit you not.

I'm entering I-459 at a good clip and decide to downshift from 3rd to 2nd in SS mode. As I'm rocketing to the end of the entrance ramp I notice this old guy and his wife in a 97' Lexus ES300 cruising along in the fast lane--the space I'm trying to get into. The old guy looks at me--looks at me--as he sees that I'm trying to merge into the fast lane from the entrance ramp. He speeds up trying to cut me off. I blasted right by him with 2 car lengths to spare. Asshole.

I'm up to 100mph and I barn storm past a guy cruising along in a navy blue TL. He does nothing. Okay, about 2 miles down the road I exit on to the 280 and I'm cruising along--the cops zap quite frequently in this area, so I'm trying--TRYING--to take it easy. All of a sudden, this dude in a tan TL comes barreling up from behind. I let him get within 3 car lengths and I gun it.

Whatever he was thinking I thoroughly changed his mind about passing by me. Still, he's on my bumper and trying his BEST to pass me--couldn't do it.
We're both sitting at the red light--he inches right up to the line. I shift down to 1st gear, light turns green, and I take off like a bat out of hell. Dude in the tan TL is right up with me about 2 car lengths behind. I even it out at 80mph--all of a sudden, the same guy in the navy blue TL that I passed several miles back on the interstate comes flying right up to my right side.

We split hairs--I take the far left lane and he takes the far right lane as we blast by two slower cars in the center lane. The dude in the tan TL is still right behind me. All three of us are in a wide turn, the guy in the tan TL falls back but the dude in the navy blue TL in the far right lane pulls up one car length ahead--fuck that. I downshift to 2nd and eat his ass for lunch. I zipped across three lanes ending up right in front of the guy in the navy blue TL by about two car lengths and I'm steadily pulling away.

At the end I get four car lengths on the guy in the navy blue TL before we all have to shut down for a group of cars stopped at the red light. Light turns green but this time I ease off. I'd already beaten both TL's into the ground, so I let the dude in the navy blue TL fly around me and get in front. As if that wasn't enough, as we're exiting he decides he wants to show me how good he is at flying through a hairpin turn. I'm right on his bumper just to see how much he's willing to push it. Right at the exit of the hairpin turn he begins to lose his rear end. I eased off, so as not to Dale Earnhart the guy into the guard rail.

Oakroadsteve

I applaud your kill on the tan TL. That is on the straightaway, but can not condone the LeMans stuff in the curves and the like with traffic all around you. Not to say I have not done the same at one time or another and when the adreneline kicks in you are almost willing to take any risk.

In your narrative you mention that you passed the blue TL at 100. I have a CLs 5spd and have been beaten by Jetta's after hitting the century mark and my car is no slouch pulling 14.1 to 14.3 in the qtr. Does yours hit a brick wall after 100mph also??

Nice kills but be careful out there...



I'm entering I-459 at a good clip and decide to downshift from 3rd to 2nd in SS mode. As I'm rocketing to the end of the entrance ramp I notice this old guy and his wife in a 97' Lexus ES300 cruising along in the fast lane--the space I'm trying to get into. The old guy looks at me--looks at me--as he sees that I'm trying to merge into the fast lane from the entrance ramp. He speeds up trying to cut me off. I blasted right by him with 2 car lengths to spare. Asshole.

I'm up to 100mph and I barn storm past a guy cruising along in a navy blue TL. He does nothing. Okay, about 2 miles down the road I exit on to the 280 and I'm cruising along--the cops zap quite frequently in this area, so I'm trying--TRYING--to take it easy. All of a sudden, this dude in a tan TL comes barreling up from behind. I let him get within 3 car lengths and I gun it.

Whatever he was thinking I thoroughly changed his mind about passing by me. Still, he's on my bumper and trying his BEST to pass me--couldn't do it.
We're both sitting at the red light--he inches right up to the line. I shift down to 1st gear, light turns green, and I take off like a bat out of hell. Dude in the tan TL is right up with me about 2 car lengths behind. I even it out at 80mph--all of a sudden, the same guy in the navy blue TL that I passed several miles back on the interstate comes flying right up to my right side.

We split hairs--I take the far left lane and he takes the far right lane as we blast by two slower cars in the center lane. The dude in the tan TL is still right behind me. All three of us are in a wide turn, the guy in the tan TL falls back but the dude in the navy blue TL in the far right lane pulls up one car length ahead--fuck that. I downshift to 2nd and eat his ass for lunch. I zipped across three lanes ending up right in front of the guy in the navy blue TL by about two car lengths and I'm steadily pulling away.

At the end I get four car lengths on the guy in the navy blue TL before we all have to shut down for a group of cars stopped at the red light. Light turns green but this time I ease off. I'd already beaten both TL's into the ground, so I let the dude in the navy blue TL fly around me and get in front. As if that wasn't enough, as we're exiting he decides he wants to show me how good he is at flying through a hairpin turn. I'm right on his bumper just to see how much he's willing to push it. Right at the exit of the hairpin turn he begins to lose his rear end. I eased off, so as not to Dale Earnhart the guy into the guard rail.[/QUOTE]

Sideswipe

[/QUOTE]

From personal experience, ABS, as opposed to non-ABS, makes all the difference in the world. If you saw how Hwy 280 was designed you could see how easy it is to hit it at high speed. Over the last 20 years they've continued to expand the lanes to the point where the curves are almost like the turns at Talladega raceway. The whole race didn't go over 90mph. It was all about being careful navigating around traffic and accelerating at the right time.

As far as hitting a brick wall at 100mph--I don't have that problem because 99% of the time I utilize the full potential of 2nd gear before upshifting to 3rd. Many times I'd rather let a guy get a car length on me, so I can stay within 2nd gear's range before upshifting and blow past him. Still, I haven't noticed a plateauing of the powerband until around 120mph.

The AT I got from Gatorland Acura in Gainsville, FL. made every bit of difference. Before the Gator tranny I had to be going at around 80mph to gateshift down to 2nd. Now I can gateshift down to 2nd at 90mph! But you can trust--after losing 2 trannies you can bet I only tried that twice.

Oakroadsteve

Never have used the SS either when racing or runnig the quarter. Can I improve my times by utilizing that feature. My warranty on the second tranny has less than a thousand miles on so I don't want to stress the unit.

Sideswipe

In my opinion, SS mode is only good for downshifting at high speeds. If I were doing the quarter I would strictly gateshift. When I was on my first auto tranny I would ignore SS mode and let the AT to do the work for me at high speeds. I found out the hard way that the AT cannot handle the stress of traditional automatic downshifting and upshifting under maximum output. This is why I always shift to SS mode when I know I'm going to drive above 80mph. In fact, I drive in SS mode 99% of the time just to add longevity to the tranny.

princelybug

iTrader: (16)

Nice kills.

phee

iTrader: (5)

using SS doesnt change the shift characteristics. all it does is hit a switch that tells the trans to change gears..thats IT

Sideswipe

Pressing down on the accelerator at high speed time and time again put a strain on the auto tranny to the point where there was a noticeable hesitation in the auto shifting mechanism. It had gotten to the point where the engine would noticeably over rev. However, each time I used SS mode to downshift, the tranny seemed to handle the stress better. This isn't just random guessing. This is a result of years of countless experimentation with 3 trannies.