have you ever saved your butt with your drifting skills?

[pork_poney]

my only experiences drifting on concrete were all attempts not to die. i drive a 95 grand cherokee. come around a corner a little to quick? jeep wants to roll? lay into throttle, tail steps out, no more roll. i don't often corner to quick. i'm pretty good at judging things like that, just, more often than not it's an excuse to get sideways.


but but... i HAD to, mom...

[kouki4cocopuffs]

I was driving down this canyon road on the way home and it was SLIPPERY....I made a turn at 30 mph, not intending at all to drift, but the car did it anyway....so I almost hit a guardrail, but I turned the wheel quickly so that I just spun out facing opposite traffic. Eeek, scary. Not really a life or death thing, but you know...

[Darkstar]

I used to drift some cars in snow surface, and I'm pretty sure that it helped me make my skills better. I still have a looot of things to learn tough

One day I was driving my dad's Lexus IS in winter. Dad told me to turn the traction controll off to feel the car better. As some time passed, I realized that this is why I didn't smash up the car. Anyway, I was driving on a snowy surface. It was about 1 degree in Celsius (about 30 degrees Fahreheit) and the snow was partially melted. I wasn't going fast - the car was going about 30 miles or so. I went a bit too tight into a right hander's corner (I wasn't drifting back then). Then I spotted this car coming in the opposite direction. I instantly went back to the correct route and I lightly tapped the brake pedal. When the oncoming car passed me, my car started to slide lightly (my speed was about 25mph at that moment), and I countersteered without opening the throttle. I had a not very nice surprise there - not only didn't the car recover from a slide, it was also going in the direction of a metal fence, which would make some bad damage even if I hit it not that hard. My choices were: a) brake only A BIT, countersteer more and try to recover, b) smash the gas pedal and try to spin out (there weren't any other oncoming cars), and finally c) countersteer with a lightly press on the gas pedal. My choice was c), which I happily found out later to be the only correct solution. Reason? The surface there was totally iced, with no snow neither water. It looked as if it was snow, but it was one of the few ice surfaces that were on the road. If I tried to spin out, the car wouldn't make a tighter turn and spin; instead, it would run into the arifield's fence (that's my favourite spot for perfecting my driving skills ). If I braked as in the option a), I would also run into the fence, because the ABS-equipped brakes would probably make me confused (I HATE this electronic *Censored**Censored**Censored**Censored* that these new cars are packed to the roof with) and I'd end up with an airbag in the face.

I wouldn't say that these were "drifting" skills (oooh, it sound so good! ), but just a lot of "handbraking and powersliding stuff" skills.

[flamingheads]

I havent had anything really, just a bit of counter steer and acceleration when the back starts to slide out in the rain. Speaking of that does anyone elses back slide out on roundabouts in the rain? Its happened to me like 3 times and i wasnt doing anything wrong that i know of, it was just that it was a long corner. My tires are pretty bald tho.
But my friend has been in like 4 accidents. The most recent and bad was in his girlfriends car and something happened to one of the wheels and the car slid out or something an they went off the road next to a bridge. They were both ok but the was written off. Anyway my point is he drives a BEETLE and has no experience driving fast so anything to him is a problem.

[GM_Racer]

I have too fell victum to the Rain I did not have the Drifting skill yet but with a little bit of know from watching Inital D i was able to control it it was a gd thing that there was no cars on the other side of the road.

I was Driveing to a stop and i saw a 240sz sitting beside me and i decited to show it what i got under the hood so i do a little spin off and doing so as i turn stuped me i keeped my foot on the accl and keeped goingal the rear end oversteered on the and i turned the weel to the other side as doing not to hit the curb and the truck some how turned around and ended up on the other side of the street luckly there was no cars on the other side to hit after i controld it i drove off quick as Hell and got out of there after wards i was thinking over and over how i got out of this stuped matter it was that i keeped my foot on the accl that i keeped the truck from hitting the curb but failed to rember that there was cars comeing on the other side but did not hit any.

[yarzan]

Originally posted by GM_Racer
I have too fell victum to the Rain I did not have the Drifting skill yet but with a little bit of know from watching Inital D i was able to control it it was a gd thing that there was no cars on the other side of the road.

I was Driveing to a stop and i saw a 240sz sitting beside me and i decited to show it what i got under the hood so i do a little spin off and doing so as i turn stuped me i keeped my foot on the accl and keeped goingal the rear end oversteered on the and i turned the weel to the other side as doing not to hit the curb and the truck some how turned around and ended up on the other side of the street luckly there was no cars on the other side to hit after i controld it i drove off quick as Hell and got out of there after wards i was thinking over and over how i got out of this stuped matter it was that i keeped my foot on the accl that i keeped the truck from hitting the curb but failed to rember that there was cars comeing on the other side but did not hit any.

dude ive read like all 8 of your posts... do u know what a period is? i dont think uve used one once! sheesh man... learn to type, and learn proper grammar... please for the sake of the people that try to read what u post.

[oldlostcory]

I don't know if this counts. But i was driving my old neon(hated that car) and was coming up to this light, about to make a right turn. I hit this huge ice patch right after i started to turn. Next thing i know is i'm sliding straight for a semi that was in the left turning lane. So i did the only thing i could think of and grab the ebrake, the back end came around and somehow i managed to just swing by it by like 2 feet. Thank goodness i practiced a little in snow covered parking lots.

Oh this is my first post by the way, rock!

[RyanHampton]

Drifting just saved my a$$ yesterday at 180mph! I was going into turn three and wanted to see if my car could change line while in a corner. To say the least it could not and the back end stepped out at 185mph. I did a 180 mph braking drift and kept the car low. after a few seconds the car straightened out and I kept going... So yeah drifting pays off in strange ways..


Thanks,

[malcolm]

Ryan, when you say braking drift, you just had to tap the brake, right?? You were already on the limit, so it must not have taken much to upset the car enough to drift it. I take it you must have hit the throttle rather hard to keep it away from the wall... Can you tell us a little more about what you did?

(by the way, I PM'd you...)

[Mary EL]

Great Stories !!

Wow,

You guys have some great stories. I think everyone must have, because the whole idea of this thread is "avoiding accidents" or even having the accident but avoiding disaster. It amazes me that the mind slows everything down in times of stress, and a person can think of several options and even make a choice in the middle of what's going on.

And Spanky, yes I was an engineer for GM, so I drove at times on the test tracks at Milford (MI) and the Desert Proving Ground (DPG) in Mesa, AZ. The DPG has now moved to somewhere else, though. I wouldn't recommend test driving for a living, it seems pretty BORING. Eight hours every day - doing loops of a particular test. A test might be - 5 miles oval track, 2 miles gravel, 3 miles city traffic (back-up, stop, go, brake lightly ...), salt spray bath, car wash, mud bath, twist ditches, 6% grade at wide-open throttle, repeat 50 times. And the driving is very precise, exact speeds, routes, etc. Test drivers used to have high school diplomas, but now they require 2-year degrees, I think. What you want to do is be a development engineer, for the vehicles. For that, you need a 4-year degree and some luck and persistence. It takes some time to get those jobs because a lot of engineers want the job. As a vehicle engineer, I only got to drive there once a month or so. However, you get to test drive pretty much everything they make at some point, including Corvettes, Cadillacs, etc. It's got some nice perks, but it's still a job... To make it more exciting, I became way over-educated, so I am in development now. I get to "test" things, which really means destroy a lot of things. That includes burning things, crushing them, exposure to heat, vibration, fuels, different fluids, ozone, UV, pressure, -40 cold, gravel, and lots of driving time (not by me). Most recently, I spent several months working on fuel cells (hydrogen-powered vehicles) and electric vehicles. There is a lot of new stuff going on in the automotive industry.

Oh well, sorry for rambling, back to subject - let's hear some more hair-raising stories -

Drive safely, you all -

[racing2khaos]

Dude this one time i was leaving from costco.... i was speeding on my way home(Children dont ever do this at your house!!!) and i was going about well 55mph thats it so at the corner theres a car that going to turn, and this guy was going to and so stupid he stop in front of the lane so i just drift my as around him... well thats it....

[GM_Racer]

Originally posted by yarzan
dude ive read like all 8 of your posts... do u know what a period is? i dont think uve used one once! sheesh man... learn to type, and learn proper grammar... please for the sake of the people that try to read what u post.

If u Love Reading my Quotes.Then u will notice that Iam now useing Periods.So now u can get off me................................................ ....For all the periods that i messed.Oh do u know how to Capitalize words.

[Hubert Young]

lagcisco: no, not a dumb question at all! Drifting is all about sensing the amount of grip available in any given situation and the use of momentum. It's a "feel" that is developed from sliding the car around.

Knowing how to drifting have many times save my butt in different situations both on the streets and on the race tracks. Public roads are so unpredictable at times and being able to control the car and know what to do when you are understeering or oversteering could avoid accidents. Trying to pass on the race track driving off line could also put you in a slippery spot and knowing how to control the car and sense the grip available could save you from going off the track or crash into the wall.

[Sideways Spanky]

Originally posted by GM_Racer
If u Love Reading my Quotes.Then u will notice that Iam now useing Periods.So now u can get off me................................................ ....For all the periods that i messed.Oh do u know how to Capitalize words.

I uh.. Still can't figure out whether this guy is joking or not.

Anyway, another story. Not exactly drifting, or life saving. Last night I took out my son Uriah, 15, for some driving lessons in the RX-7. We covered a few laps of the gravel parking lot of the daycare on the outskirts of town at 1:00 AM. Me being a father with my son's safety as a priority, I instructed him in the fine art of doing doughnuts. Not a minute after he started, we see the blue and red flashing lights of a 5.0. He walks over to the window, and says "You know that ruins the surface of the parking lot." Yes, Uri awnsers. With no cars around, and no damage done to anything, he gives me a $75 ticket for reckless driving. Thank God for a nice guy. I don't want any 13itching about mean cops, because I deserved it. Was it worth it? Hells yes.

[Sideways Spanky]

My bad. It was this morning.