Melodramatic Reflections on Street Racing

Working with teens at DriversEd.com gives me a lot of chances to look back on when I was 15. One of the biggest events that occurred around the time I got my license was the pilgrimage that surrounded The Fast and the Furious.

It broke the news of the street racing scene to the rest of the world. You heard mufflers everywhere. Lowered cars scraped painfully over speedbumps. Type R decals splattered everything from common Civic or Prelude models to 350Z’s. Plainclothes cops sat in modded white Mustangs, trying to entice itching racers on the streets.

Then there was the backlash. All our underground racing spots were unearthed and bagged by PO’s before we even knew our time was over. Today, even passively witnessing a street race makes you liable.

Despite the virtual disappearance of underground races, the culture and spirit of modding lives on. It manifests itself in newer, more socially-acceptable mediums, like Pimp My Ride. While stocking your car with cool extras like PS2’s and subwoofers, West Coast Customs discreetly avoids any under-the-hood modifications.

There’s also the customizable Scion movement. The Scion is the ultimate blank-slate vehicle. Almost everything about it can be adjusted, upgraded or added-to at a cost far lower than you’d pay if you were trying to mod your tore-up Civic at home. Having the dealership pimp your ride is a lot more efficient than buying your parts bit by bit off EBay.

Still, speed to me has always beat pretty features. I miss the days of lowered hatchbacks laced with intake. In terms of souping up our cars, though, parents and authority figures alike prefer that we focus more on aesthetics than performance.

Why can’t they feel the same way about school?

-Faithfully inscribed by Angela, the Soul of Marketing

"I'm Not a Statistic!"