Driving up to Mt Tamalpais this weekend, I gradually approached a BMW X5 sports utility. What I found extraordinary was that, even though he was in front and the pace quite leisurely, he felt a need to increase his own speed simply because I was behind him. Later, on another winding stretch of road, a S2000 was equally compelled to roar by me.

In both cases, the Z seems to have stirred this need for the other drivers to assert themselves, even though I was not competing with them. It's a remarkable testament to the car that it can provoke this kind of threatened response.

As an older driver, this kind of feeling is actually quite exhilarating. One feels, without wanting to kill or be killed, that the presence of the car, itself, is sufficiently aggressive that it doesn't even have to demonstrate its potential.

It is enough that it is a Z.

 

that's funny.. while i was driving down 101 south to go home after work tonight, some bmw x5s cut me off (almost hit my front bumper) and sped off, only to get pulled over by the cop car that was right behind me.. (2 reasons for me not wanting to race him.. 1: the cop car had followed me for like 5 milles, 2: my car's still not broken in.

still funny though. well, i was cracking up anyway.

 

Twice tis has happened to me since I picked up the car on saturday.

Both times on Richmond Parkway. Once by a H2 who I quickly spit up past the train tracks in the wide curve, and then by a young kid in a older M3.

He must have seen me coming after smoking the H2.

I am still braking my car in people. Please leave me alone.