HOUSTON - After years of losing races to the 2nd generation Acura 3.2TL and 3.2TL Type S, area racers are now going after older models they feel are more in their league.

"It's still a TL you know," says one local racer who asked to be unnamed. "But its a lot slower than the other TL's so we actually stand a chance."

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Yeah so the past week or so, I've been challenged left and right by people. Dunno why.


1. So I'm in the middle lane of a three lane road. I'm at a light. Just up ahead, the left lane ends so you have to merge. On the right, a phone company truck was parked with flashers and cones. It's a nice day so my windows are down. In the left lane is a mid 90's Sentra packed with five youngish guys. They're all looking at me with these menacing stares. I look over to my right and two rather large women in a '90s V6 mustang give me nasty glances too. The driver of the stang grips her wheel
with both hands.

Both cars start inching up with false starts as the light stays red.

Not really caring, but also not wanting to get stuck behind two potential slowwies, I select the "sport" mode on the tranny. At the light, I'm off after a quick tire spin due to some gravel. Results are not even worth mentioning.


2. I'm cruising along with my girlfriend on empty roads after catching a girly movie (Memoirs of a Geisha). I'm restless, looking for something to do. A Sentra SE-R (or Spec V, I can't tell) with an exhaust comes blaring by. It matches speed with us (annoying because the windows are down), trying to egg me on.

We meet up at the light. The driver and his companion are making the customary "let's go" motions. We launch and the TL pulls out ahead.

At the next light, the guys say "hey let's do it again since I missed a shift." This time, they rev the Sentra and drop the clutch. He launches nicely and is instantly ahead, with my nose about even with his rear tires. The lead slowly increases, although I win back a few inches everytime he shifts. By the time I decide to shut it down around 65 mph, I'm a good two or three feet behind. Damn. They toss a nice friendly wave though.


3. Freeway. 1-2 AM. I'm holding 65-70 on cruise control. A 3rd gen TL and a V6 T-Tops Camaro blow past me on both sides. Camaro is sucking it hard. 3rd gen disappears into the night. Camaro decides to let me catch up. He does a few quick "launches" but I'm still on cruise control. He keeps looking at me. Finally, I go. Takes him a split second to react but soon he's gunning it too. It's pretty much even, with nobody able to pull away. We hit 90-95. I shut it down and he shoots out ahead. In a show of driving prowess, he changes into my lane and turns on his blinkers.


Ok so the SE-R was a disappointment. I thought it would have been closer or even. But then again he, had a manual and was dropping the clutch. Any TL-P's run against SE-R's before? I've always been curious how a 1st gen would do against a 99 TL-P. My friend has one but we've never tried it.

 

i'll race you in my 99 tl-p anytime! nice stories, I love your commentary, subtle humor.

 

Hehe. Quite a long drive for me just to get in a street race. And then there'd be WINTER driving action, which I'm not trained to handle.

BTW I'm pretty much stock except for wheels, a removed resonator, and drop in KN filter.

 

i respect 1st gen's a lot. it is a great car, very classy and still not an outdated look. actually you see far fewer 1gen tl's then 2G's so there is a little mystique to the 1G's that I like and I might buy one for my wife soon. I am not close to stock though. I/H/P/spacers/grounding kit/denso iridium IX plugs and soon hyper ground voltage kit and probably a hi-flow cat in 2006 too. I beat my friends type S about a week ago and it wasn't neck and neck, but still pretty close.

 

bro, sport mode???

 

Yeah. Sport mode is "D3" on the tranny.

If you're mashing the gas, it doesn't make much of a difference. But if you're just riding the pedal hard, it'll shift more aggressively than D4.

Mashing is bad for launching in my experience.

 

For a quick acceleration, I stab it at half throttle and then smoothly go all the way in the next few seconds. For whatever reason (traction control on or off) the car doesnt like full throttle launches.

Oh and I'll race all of ya

 

yea i noticed that too.. same with the 2002 accord that im STILL driving

like if i jam on the throttle it wont gun it as fast then if i like go half throttle and hten slowly goto WOT its weird

 

Its the same with EVERY Automatic Honda/Acura I've driven. I wonder if its a design characteristic or a software issue?

 

or if I smash on gas my tire never gets grip.. so half pressure sounds good

 

I think its a safety thing. A mashed pedal is going to be associated with panic, pain (like a charley horse), or just unintentional. A controlled press into WOT is probably calculated and being done by a driver in control.

 

Good points..

Since its FWD most of the weight will shift to the rear and you wont have that much traction in the first second.. so you might has well go gentle (at first)

 

If I can describe my gas-ing tip, I think I'm close to the floor from the exact half way point. I find gas pedal doesn't have linear motion, it's more like exponential

 

wack: im in houston too. alief/sugarland area and ive never been reved at.

 

My girlfriend lives off of I-45 around Lockwood (near UH) so I go there often. That's where most of this stuff happens. A while back, an Infiniti J30 revved at me on the feeder of BW8 approaching the Airport. That guy was crazy and annoying in his attempts to get my attention.

I live off of 290. Late at night, 290 outbound becomes a 9 mile test track. Everybody hits 100 it seems. 80 is going slow.

I'm surprised you don't get challenged on Bellaire. Plenty of "tuners" out there that will race anything with four wheels. I painted my calipers red. Maybe that's why?