Dear Chris Harris - Does it need to drift?
Discussion
Hi Chris, you're top bloke; we've met couple of times with RMA at the 'Ring and in the Tiergarten bar after where we've gassed on about motors, so I have a question; why does it matter if it will drift?
You, Sutciffe, Needles, Clarkson et al, make a living from a practice that is impossible for the average PH'er to replicate. It seems every test has a prerequisite of will it drift, why?
On joining PH your reasoning was the overall motoring experience; new, second hand, modified, whatever, so a chap looking at a manual 456M will not have drifting at the top of his list of must haves just the ownership experience
When I open each month's Evo I go straight to Fast Fleet for an update on the ownership experience and from memory I can't recall a single mention on the drifting ability of any car
If you run a car at a track day and start drifting you'll be thrown off. If you compete and try it during a race you'll be slow, try it on slowing down lap and you'll look an idiot. Try it on the road and you'll be done for dangerous driving
So who drifts? Other than muttering rotters, no one. Its totally irrelevant, check this out; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJ2CzeyCss0 a Car Mag drifting tutorial on a deserted track using a current M3 fitted with E46 M3 front wheels and tyres on the rear so it will drift, why?
You fitted space savers to a C63 so it would drift, again why?
I use a E90 M3 everyday which is without question the best car I've ever owned, number of times drifted; zero.
So tyre smoking drifting vids are just vanity and nothing to do with the ownership experience. Is it time to stop?
Cheers
Kevin
You, Sutciffe, Needles, Clarkson et al, make a living from a practice that is impossible for the average PH'er to replicate. It seems every test has a prerequisite of will it drift, why?
On joining PH your reasoning was the overall motoring experience; new, second hand, modified, whatever, so a chap looking at a manual 456M will not have drifting at the top of his list of must haves just the ownership experience
When I open each month's Evo I go straight to Fast Fleet for an update on the ownership experience and from memory I can't recall a single mention on the drifting ability of any car
If you run a car at a track day and start drifting you'll be thrown off. If you compete and try it during a race you'll be slow, try it on slowing down lap and you'll look an idiot. Try it on the road and you'll be done for dangerous driving
So who drifts? Other than muttering rotters, no one. Its totally irrelevant, check this out; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJ2CzeyCss0 a Car Mag drifting tutorial on a deserted track using a current M3 fitted with E46 M3 front wheels and tyres on the rear so it will drift, why?
You fitted space savers to a C63 so it would drift, again why?
I use a E90 M3 everyday which is without question the best car I've ever owned, number of times drifted; zero.
So tyre smoking drifting vids are just vanity and nothing to do with the ownership experience. Is it time to stop?
Cheers
Kevin
I'm not slating genuine drifting just the presumption that a good can only be so it it drifts
I use the M3 on track and it moves around but not tyre smoking nonsense
I also race a 130i so car controls not alien to me, I just can't understand that testing a road car must include an irrelevant drift
Who on here drifts their car on the road intentionally?
I use the M3 on track and it moves around but not tyre smoking nonsense
I also race a 130i so car controls not alien to me, I just can't understand that testing a road car must include an irrelevant drift
Who on here drifts their car on the road intentionally?
Chris Harris said:
Kevin
I need to draw some distinctions from the points raised.
I think you are slightly unfairly connecting the roles of oversteer as a dynamic merit in a road test or group test, and as a means of making a car magazine article or video look more exciting. Personally I have never awarded a comparison test victory to a car solely on the basis that it will oversteer – I agree it’s way too simplistic a view of everyday motoring. However, I would happily use the fact that a car is rear driven, and therefore will drift, to contribute to a case for it beating another car. That’s an important difference.
As for full third-gear slides with smoke billowing of the rear tyres – yep, that’s pure, undiluted showboating. And it is proven to sell magazines and make people watch videos. That is my job. When I read a car mag, I want to see excitement. Just like I grin when I see a knee scraping along the ground in a bike mag or some lunatic leaping a mountain bike in a fashion I could never, ever imagine doing myself. I suppose the difference is I like seeing stuff that I cannot or would not do.
I also urge you to make the connection between that kind of abject yobbery and the smaller, subtler forms of car-movement that anyone can enjoy, and given our conversations clearly you do, because the former really is just the ultimate extrapolation of the latter. And for me enjoyment of any kind of slip angle, whether it’s slow, fast, fwd, rwd or 4wd is one of the key tenets of being a car enthusiast. You don’t have to be all-ends-up in an E92 M3 to enjoy the feeling. It happens in a go-kart at 15mph, in a Ford Anglia on a wet road at 25mph; that sensation of spinal cord registering some slip and then needing to steer into a slide is something I love.
Part of the everyday ownership experience? Nope, but that doesn’t make it any less valid as a promotional tool. If motoring media only reflected what people actually did with their cars on a daily basis my good friend Colin Goodwin would never have driven a Ferrari F512 M to the Sahara desert. And that would be a shame. I agree that any piece of objective journalism which declared a car brilliant solely on the grounds of it being a drift-tool would look ridiculous – but I’ve never read such an article. This business is about information but also entertainment.
Motoring journalists are the only people who indulge in a little oversteer? Not sure I agree there. Historic racing, rallying, pretty much every form of club motorsport, not to mention track days - where people do allow their cars to move about underneath them, but don’t lay-down massive black lines because, you’re right, they will get thrown off. All of them involve sliding of some sort. For me, all of them are improved through sliding.
It’s not impossible for PHers to replicate this stuff either. I did some drift schools years ago at Autocar, and hundreds of people enjoyed learning how to make a car slide. There are several other courses like that one still around today, but I suspect that most people just indulge their curiosities in a sensible, safe manner however they see fit.
Wouldn’t car media be a rather stale, inert environment if people didn’t wage war on tyres? I agree it doesn’t mean anything in the context of the real-world (except, as I’ve already said, being an extreme representation of the handling traits that cause many people to chose a car like an E92 M3) but then if a car mag is already giving you the story of living with the car nine-to-five, isn’t there space for some fun?
I see it as just that – great fun. I love sliding cars, but in the context of my everyday driving life it means nothing. Why stick a C63 on space-savers? To investigate the concept of reduced grip because it will become a theme with the GT 86/BRZ in 2012, but mainly to see what it would be like and get some great sideways shots for a camera which can shoot at 200 fps.
In answer to the question in the title of your post: No, it doesn’t have to drift. But if it does, I think the chances are it will make a more appealing driving machine.
In answer to your last question: No.
Apols for any typos etc, in a rush.
Best
Chris
Hi ChrisI need to draw some distinctions from the points raised.
I think you are slightly unfairly connecting the roles of oversteer as a dynamic merit in a road test or group test, and as a means of making a car magazine article or video look more exciting. Personally I have never awarded a comparison test victory to a car solely on the basis that it will oversteer – I agree it’s way too simplistic a view of everyday motoring. However, I would happily use the fact that a car is rear driven, and therefore will drift, to contribute to a case for it beating another car. That’s an important difference.
As for full third-gear slides with smoke billowing of the rear tyres – yep, that’s pure, undiluted showboating. And it is proven to sell magazines and make people watch videos. That is my job. When I read a car mag, I want to see excitement. Just like I grin when I see a knee scraping along the ground in a bike mag or some lunatic leaping a mountain bike in a fashion I could never, ever imagine doing myself. I suppose the difference is I like seeing stuff that I cannot or would not do.
I also urge you to make the connection between that kind of abject yobbery and the smaller, subtler forms of car-movement that anyone can enjoy, and given our conversations clearly you do, because the former really is just the ultimate extrapolation of the latter. And for me enjoyment of any kind of slip angle, whether it’s slow, fast, fwd, rwd or 4wd is one of the key tenets of being a car enthusiast. You don’t have to be all-ends-up in an E92 M3 to enjoy the feeling. It happens in a go-kart at 15mph, in a Ford Anglia on a wet road at 25mph; that sensation of spinal cord registering some slip and then needing to steer into a slide is something I love.
Part of the everyday ownership experience? Nope, but that doesn’t make it any less valid as a promotional tool. If motoring media only reflected what people actually did with their cars on a daily basis my good friend Colin Goodwin would never have driven a Ferrari F512 M to the Sahara desert. And that would be a shame. I agree that any piece of objective journalism which declared a car brilliant solely on the grounds of it being a drift-tool would look ridiculous – but I’ve never read such an article. This business is about information but also entertainment.
Motoring journalists are the only people who indulge in a little oversteer? Not sure I agree there. Historic racing, rallying, pretty much every form of club motorsport, not to mention track days - where people do allow their cars to move about underneath them, but don’t lay-down massive black lines because, you’re right, they will get thrown off. All of them involve sliding of some sort. For me, all of them are improved through sliding.
It’s not impossible for PHers to replicate this stuff either. I did some drift schools years ago at Autocar, and hundreds of people enjoyed learning how to make a car slide. There are several other courses like that one still around today, but I suspect that most people just indulge their curiosities in a sensible, safe manner however they see fit.
Wouldn’t car media be a rather stale, inert environment if people didn’t wage war on tyres? I agree it doesn’t mean anything in the context of the real-world (except, as I’ve already said, being an extreme representation of the handling traits that cause many people to chose a car like an E92 M3) but then if a car mag is already giving you the story of living with the car nine-to-five, isn’t there space for some fun?
I see it as just that – great fun. I love sliding cars, but in the context of my everyday driving life it means nothing. Why stick a C63 on space-savers? To investigate the concept of reduced grip because it will become a theme with the GT 86/BRZ in 2012, but mainly to see what it would be like and get some great sideways shots for a camera which can shoot at 200 fps.
In answer to the question in the title of your post: No, it doesn’t have to drift. But if it does, I think the chances are it will make a more appealing driving machine.
In answer to your last question: No.
Apols for any typos etc, in a rush.
Best
Chris
Edited by Chris Harris on Sunday 22 January 21:09
Thanks for your reply, frankly I think we are in agreement drifting is a visual entertainment that we all enjoy viewing but mostly irrelevant to the ownership experience
Goodwin to the Sarah, Llewelyn to the Somme, classic stories both but not a drift in sight
Keep it on the island!
Kevin
My original comment is about tyre smoking drifts accepted by Chris as just showboating. A moment of oversteer that you instantly corrected will connect you to your car like no other driving experience. Read John Barkers M3 Fast Fleet diary in Evo, he never really liked the car until one rainy night it stepped out and he collected it. A connection was made.
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