A friend and I love to go to driving events, including one where Mitsubishi had a stunt driver from one of its commercials test our ability to withstand carsickness (I failed) while simultaneously sliding a Gallant around a track at high speed and chat about being a stunt driver. But the greatest event of all was the GM Autoshow in Motion, which I went to twice before GM "temporarily" (their words) suspended it in 2006.
The event was simple: GM brought all of their cars and trucks, all of the vehicles made by companies GM owned or partially owned (Saab and Hummer) and competitors' cars to the parking lots of Fed-Ex Field, where the Washington Redskins play. GM would set up a bu ch of courses with traffic cones, and you could drive as many vehicles as you wanted. No salespeople, but a box lunch and a T-shirt when you were done. All free.
Most of the courses were fairly low speed, but two stood out. In one section of the parking lot they'd trucked in tons of dirt and made an off-road course for the Hummers. Unlike all of the other vehicles (save the Corvettes), someone from GM rode in the passenger seat, mainly to help you out. The GM person would tell you when to stop, switch into low range, etc. One hill was so steep that as you began climbing it your view through the windshield was nothing but sky. It was a view I've never seen through the windshield of my Subaru.
But the best part was the Corvette course. Here the folks had laid out traffic cones so the course had a long straightaway and some fairly high speed turns. The guy rising with you — at least my guy — encouraged me to wind it out.
There were two lines to drive the Corvettes, one for the automatic transmission models and one for the folks who wanted to drive a manual. The automatic line had a dozen people in it, while the manual line had none. I've driven a stick for years, so I got in that non-line and was whisked into a Z06 that was loaded (heads-up display, trick suspension, the works).
I started driving and the GM guy in the passenger seat spoke: "When you get to that third cone, nail it." "Really?" "Really." Holy guacamole. If that car had had a back seat I would have ben in it, the beast accelerated to quickly. Without the headrest I would have snapped my neck.
When we completed the course there was still no one in the line for manual transmission cars. "Want to go around again?" "Hell, yeah." He encouraged me to go faster this time, and I didn't want to disappoint him.
At the time I owned a 1993 Mazda Miata, which was just like the Corvette except for four fewer cylinders and about 300 fewer horses.
After the second drive, I reluctantly got out (even though no one else was in line), so I didn't take advantage of the GM guy's good nature. He'd already given me an extra turn.
"So, is this different from what you're driving now?" he asked me. "Yeah," I replied. "Right now I have a Mazda Miata."
"You know, the Corvette is much more practical." "Really? How so?" "Bigger trunk."
He was right: the Corvette's trunk was twice the size of the Miata's. As fine an argument as that was, however, my wife was unconvinced.
And she claimed my free T-shirt.
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