How fast have you ever driven a car on populated public lands/roads?

When I was younger and kinda stupid I had my sportbike up to three digits just for the hell of it. I stopped that real quick, it scared the shit out of me.

(The fastest I ever went on a bike was 90. Just the once.)

I have buried my needle more than once. It was so long ago.
The fastest I ever went on gravel was sixty. Gosh, that was something. My muffler blew that weekend, so hard, I thought someone shot my car. It was very loud, and kicked bits of gravel dust so hard from my floorboard, I thought it was shotgun pellets. I was wearing shorts at the time, and it really stung. It happened well past midnight, and I had to drive home like that. For twenty miles I saw porch lights come on. One small piece of sharp gravel hit my leg hard enough to pierce the skin. When I got home, I had a blood trail all the way down my calf to my ankle. I had to drive real slow because the noise vibration was so bad. Man, don’t speed on gravel!

Back in 1973 I drove on brand new I 280 from Mountain View to Burlingame CA in a 72 Pontiac Gran Ville with a four barrel 455 V8, that had just had four new tires mounted, balanced, and installed, plus an alignment,

I pegged it at 120.

And I drove a friend’s Porsche 914 with a special 2.4 liter engine from Los Gatos CA to Goleta CA (285 miles) in 3 hours 20 minutes down Highway 101. The stretch from King City to Paso Robles we were doing about 110. That part took us a half hour.

100mph I’d say. Our speed limit is limited to 110kph on freeways, and I’ve done 160kph in the past when I didn’t think it was likely I’d get pulled in and it was a clear straight road. The road was very quiet with virtually no other traffic. i wouldn’t do it now. Too many cameras and radars.

About 160 mph, on the German autobahn, in a Volkswagen of a colleague of mine.

About 120 on my TDM900 motor bike. That was way too scary, though.

Nowadays, I try to limit myself, out of environmental concerns. I still remember how fast our fuel reserve went down when driving so extremely fast. We could see the needle move!

120 in my Mini Cooper S (R.I.P.) on the interstate.

My son has admitted to me that he went as fast as 180 on his sport bike on the highway.

I’ve done 110 MPH on motorcycle and 135 MPH in car. Driven 225 miles in 2 hours and 25 minutes.

Last week I had to take the Camry up to about 110 because when I went to pass a jerk on the (straight, flat) 2 lane here, he just kept speeding up.

Be a lot easier if I had more than 4 cylinders.

I don’t think I’d enjoy it on a bike, @ARE_you_kidding_me

I hate gravel, @Here2_4. You’re lucky to be alive. I always feel like I’m driving on water. Hydroplaning.

I think 120 is about my top, @zenvelo.

I’m math challenged, @Earthbound_Misfit. Don’t mix your MPH and KPH. :)

I’m impressed, @whitenoise! Fastest I’ve heard for an individual.

I didn’t know Cooper’s had that lind of kick, @hearkat! Really. No idea.

135 is sweet, @Tropical_Willie. I remember the thrill of my brother driving around 110 on a twisty, turny 2 lane before I was old enough to drive.

I don’t think I’ve ever broken 90mph. While there are people who think I drive like a maniac simply because I prefer “flow of traffic” speeds instead of the posted speed limit, the truth is that I’m not really that much of a speed demon.

Oh, and 160kph is 99.4194 mph. So when @Earthbound_Misfit said 100mph, the math was already done for you :)

While I tend to push the upper limit, I’m also know as a speed demon because I prefer to drive with the “flow of traffic”, @jerv. There is a highway from St. Louis to Kansas City Missouri with a posted limit of 70 where I have ‘gone with the flow’ at at least 90.

I tend to think that it’s my god given right to drive the-speed-limit-plus-five.

I have been in a stream of traffic that was speeding where a single unmarked police car kept at it until he pulled over the leader. I’m cool with that.

120 in my Civic, 100 on a bike.

Nice, @syz. I had no idea we had so many daredevils here. :)

Heehee… I just rebuilt a 25year old Nissan 300zx. Having real fun these days testing how hard it can fall. BTW… really hard to text at light speed eating tacos with the law pursuing.

@ibstubro I had (an incredibly annoying) coworker who was very proud of his new “pony” (Mustang) with a vanity tag that said “Ifly”. I asked him after a couple of weeks what he’d opened it up to and he stammered that he’d gotten it up to 90 – I was hitting that pretty much every day in my 10 year old Honda.

My parents bought a “racing edition” Miata and it was 6 months before they realized that it was a 6 speed. What a waste.

110 in either my Civic or a rental car, just to see how things would go.

@ibstubro: I’ve been tempted to ask a q on here about why, when people are going slow in the left lane, do they speed up when you try to pass them on the right? It is really frustrating. Once you succeed in passing them, they slow right back down again. WTF?

@ibstubro – They are sporty cars, and the S model is the Turbo. My 2008 had 172 horsepower @ 5,500 rpm, and 172 lb-ft of torque @ 5,500 rpm. The speedometer went up to 150 MPH. I can personally vouch for their 5-star safety rating in rollovers.

Typical flow on NJ highways is 75–90 depending on the time of day. I have my motorcycle license, but never bought a bike because the traffic congestion around here is crazy and too many people just don’t pay attention.

“Flow of traffic” around here tends to be around 65–70 in most stretches of I-5; it’s mostly through cities that are posted 60. And there’s enough staties that I don’t want to stand out any more than I already do by virtue of having a huge skull-and-bones on my hood. Since my car already draws a bit of attention, I don’t risk drawing any more than I already get.

Wuss 90, @syz. I don’t suppose you ever “borrowed” the Miata?

I did that once in a rental car, @jca, and got busted doing 98 in a 65. Mandatory court appearance. Although the prosecutor was sympathetic after hearing my story, he could not let me slide. Your Q is exactly why I had to pass the joker in the pick-up. Hey, I’ve got principles. :)

I just ass*u*med they were doggy because of the size, @hearkat. I’ve only rolled a Cutlass, and I walked. Bikes and convertibles never appealed to me a lot. I like my creature comforts. :)

By the way, my top speed on my bicycle is 64 mph, downhill on Monitor Pass, no car traffic allowed, on a road that had been swept to remove any gravel or other debris, tires at 120 psi.

My Miata runs out of revs at about 100 give or take. Funny, but the fastest car I’ve driven was my dad’s old ‘72 Grand Safari Wagon. 455 4bbl it would peg the speedometer, so we don’t really know how fast we got it to. It took about an hour to get the collective smiles off our faces though. Dad included.

Wow! That IS impressive, @zenvelo! Scare the beejeezus out of me!

Sweet, @majorrich. My dad was a former auto mechanic and had a need for speed, too.

@zenvelo: In one of our local parks in NYC, a woman just died after being struck by a bicycle going faster than the speed limit. I think she held on for a few days. The news said she had head injuries. I think they’re enforcing speed limit for bicyclists now in the NYC parks.

@jca I am aware of cases like that, and I don’t speed on my bike where there are pedestrians. A pedestrian was killed by a cyclist in San Francisco last year, the cyclist was trying to set a personal record to finish a route, ran a stop light and hit a man in the crosswalk, who died. The cyclist is going to prison for manslaughter.

My downhill speed was on a closed course in the High Sierra.

@zenvelo: Gotcha. I wasn’t meaning that you inappropriately speed on your bike.

@ibstubro that’s why I converted the 160kph to mph (100mph). I gave the freeway speed (110kph) as a reference figure. Our top legal speed is apparently lower than in the US. There is a road in the Northern Territory where you can drive at an unlimited speed, but other than that the highest legal speed on a freeway is 130kph (81mph), but most freeways are still limited to 110kph (68mph). So my 160kph was actually excessive speeding here but nothing compared to the US or places with higher speed limits.

Gotcha, @Earthbound_Misfit.

The highest speed limit that I know of, personally, is 70 MPH, here in my 200 mile wide area.

I’ve seen posted limits up to 75mph, but for the majority of the US, it’s no higher than 65 on interstates and 55 on other highways. We actually have lower speed limits than you think, @Earthbound_Misfit; we just have less regard for the law.

I agree with @jerv, @Earthbound_Misfit on limits, except for a possible discrepancy on ‘regard for the law’, and ‘law enforcement’.

That said, it seems like there were higher limits in Montana, or other Western states that have low population and a disregard for federal subsidies.

Wait. Quick! 2012

Then you are all exceedingly naughty @jerv and much naughtier than I gave most of you credit for :-)

I had a 750 Yamaha FZ doing 235kph that’s very close to 140mph

I had a super train doing 160mph out in Alberta that is 100mph in a 2 trailer 83foot semi.

I have had my pickup doing just over 160kph.
That’s about it.

Remind me that we never want to play chicken if I ever meet any of you guys on the road.
I’ve not played chicken a lot, but I’ve never blinked.

@ibstubro You might win against me, actually. My 2200 pound car lacks most of the safety features of modern cars (crumple zones, airbags…). It’s crash safety rating is only marginally better than a motorcycle, which leads me to drive a bit more cautiously than someone in a 2800–6800 pound roll cage with side impact beams and airbags. I may be assertive, but I’m not suicidal.

135mph.

I usually get pissed at people going 65mph on the freeway.

@cheebdragon: I’m with you on that one, sister. Half the time they do it in the left lane, which is even more infuriating. Of that half, probably 20% refuse to move over when you’re behind them, and even more frustrating, a small percent will even speed up when you try to pass them on the right.

Yesterday I was behind an old man and woman on a 3 wheeled motorcycle driving between 20 and 25 in a 30MPH zone. At the 4-way stop, when it came to be their turn, they just sat there – long enough that 3–4 cars could have turned. When I finally managed to go around them, the old man raised a tattooed arm in a rude gesture.

Since they were gesturing a lot, I can only guess that driving the motorcycle at the speed limit would have cause enough noise that it would have inhibited their conversation. And this on one of the busiest roads in town.

People that speed up when you’re passing them with your cruise control on, people that drive well below the speed limit when you’re unable to pass, and people that refuse to change lanes so you can enter the freeway are my worst pet driving peeves.

Don’t forget about the people who insist on driving the same speed as the vehicle next to them…they make it difficult to change lanes and create a road block for everyone behind them.

@ibstubro Then ~65% of Seattle drivers would piss you off.
@cheebdragon About 20% would piss you off.

Yes, about 85% of Seattle drivers do one of those things. Now you know why I get a little cranky when driving.

I hate it when some moron wants to stay right beside me on a fourlane highway extremely dangerous for the both of us if one of us have to react to anything.

I dislike anyone driving more than 10mph under the speed limit when they are more than capable doing the speed limit.
People will start to do really dumb illegal things to try and get by the idiot.
I also can’t stand maggots that have to get by the big truck at all costs just to sit in front of me going 10 kph slower than I was traveling, really want to crush them like the worthless scum they are.

I read on the internet that my Acura Legend LS coupe 5 speed would max out at 141 MPH.

Sure enough…

It stopped climbing at 141 or you stopped @SecondHandStoke?

Aerodynamic limit.

Fourth gear.

About 6K RPM.

Very cool, @SecondHandStoke. :)

@SQUEEKY2 My boyfriend has been known to pass people using the emergency lane. It scares me every time.

It probably should, @cheebdragon.

Cops love finding people driving in the emergency lane.