Crashing Exotics

POSTED BY , 17 June 2007

-J.F. Musial

As a subscriber and daily reader of the Wall Street Journal, I found it somewhat shocking to see this article related to a field I know a thing or two about: exotic cars. Wouldn't ya know it; it seems as if they are crashing.  Before I go off on a rant here and throw my two cents into an ever growing fire, lets first examine what makes a car an exotic.  Is it the color scheme or the weight of chrome on the wheels? The simple answer: No.

A car is an exotic by its mere exclusivity, eloquent or vulgar styling, and by its engineering achievements. Take the Porsche 911 for example. An engineering masterpiece, yes—but it's bland, it's simple, it's efficient, and it won't turn anyone's head either on Ocean Drive or in Newark New Jersey. That's true for not only the basic C2 P-Car, but a Turbo as well. An exotic to me is what I would find at the super-market in the children's toy section.  Those toy cars that you get when you are seven going on twenty-five years old from the aunt and uncle. An exotic should make you stop in your tracks, turn your head with your mouth wide open, oblivious of your girlfriend as she walks into Broadway traffic.  No M3, AMG, standard Porsche, or even sub $200,000 Italian stallion will make me do that.

So where does that leave us? With the Ford GTs, the FXXs, the Pagani Zondas, the Carrera GTs, and of course, with the true historic classics like the E-Type Jag. These are the real exotics, and guess what—they had better be driven hard. Anyone who has ever met me knows that when it comes to cars, I have lost a few nuts and bolts in my head.  I love to drive, even if it's in an aging Nissan 240, a car that somehow got me from NY-SF in 39 hours last month. Cars are meant to be driven. They should have rock-chips and bugs splattered across their front hoods.  Seeing an exotic in this fashion gives me pride; it shows that the car is living up to its name and the owner knows how to treat her (Or him if it's named the Bismarck).  So obviously, these cars will tend to break more, even crash more.

This is where I have problems with the recent Wall Street Journal article.  It gives exotic car owners a bad rap.  Obviously, cars are going to crash sometimes; all cars. It's just interesting how we most often hear about the accident's involving high-ends or exotics.  It seems every summer we hear stories of 18 year old kids driving down the LIE in their AMG Mercs' which 'mysteriously' lose control and kill everyone on-board.  This is a prime example of how money doesn't buy driving talent.  I always like to think that if someone has the means to buy an exotic, they have some sense as to how to care for it and how to manage the power/responsibility.  There will always be those guys and gals out there who don't work their way up to the top, but rather break it big with a stupid idea or hot single.  They get loads of cash, go out and buy the car that will raise their D-list status, then drive it like it's stolen.  They usually end up dead in a tree or serving time in an L.A. County prison.

If you've gotten this far into the article, I know you like to drive. Not only that, I know that you understand me when I say that driving is a pleasure, yes, but it is also a privilege.  Most of us understand that.  We drive hard; we have fun doing stupid donuts in empty parking lots, but never to an extent to put someone's life in danger. The true exotic owners understand this.  They head to track events, they maybe push it a few miles per hour over the speed limit on open country roads or late at night on the interstate, you'll never see them weaving in and out of traffic on the NJ turnpike at 140mph at 5 p.m. Those readers who are guilty of this: give me the keys to your car, I'll take care of it while you head to Skip Barber before you kill yourself or someone else. What I'm getting at here is that cars have and always will crash.  We each have the responsibility to do everything in our ability to not let that happen each time we get behind the wheel.  Speed can be dangerous, but bad judgment is what kills.  Many of those who are fortunate enough to have an exotic have made the right judgment calls to get them where they are. These are people who have the intelligence to know right from wrong.  But by owning an exotic car, it doesn't make you Michael Schumacher.  Your F1 transmission won’t help you when you are doing 140mph and a mother taking her children home from school pulls out in front of you. There has and always will be bad drivers on the road.  Unfortunately, some of them own amazing cars.  Just because you may play the part, look the part, doesn’t mean you have the skills to drive the machine your wallet says you can drive. The internet in recent years has opened the doors for a lot of us to see what bad driving is really like.

My final words to all of you: Don't be 'that' guy.  Drive safely and be responsible.