Me vs Stupidity in a Jetta
Just witnessed one of the stupidest things I have ever seen.
I am driving home from the office in my 540. I come to a red light on Macleod trail N and about 50 St (Calgary)
I am in the middle lane, a POS in the left and a new White Jetta (1.8T I think) in the right lane. It has dark tinted windows and aftermarket wheels (BBS ?) that are 17" or 18", with 40 or 45 series tires. Car looks new and clean. Light changed to green. POS car in the left guns it pretty good. I go to half throttle so as not get behind his junk. Jetta goes hrd too. but we are not really racing, just keeping pace.
Keep in mind, this road is pretty heavy with traffic, and it is rush hour. I then notice the Jetta step on it. I push deeper into the throttle to keep pace. Don't like getting cut off if that is what he has in mind. I switch to the left lane (POS is now far behind). Jetta switches to the middle.
As we approach a truck in the middle lane, my lane is wide open, the far right is also wide open. Jetta cuts quickly right to go around the slower truck. There is now another red light coming up, with traffic lined up, stopped.
Now, you must follow carefully and try to picture this:
Cars in the left (my lane) are stopped. There is only 5 or 6 in line. Cars in the middle lane are stopped, but the line is way longer, maybe 20 cars. The last car is line is not a car, but a dump truck. Cars in the right lane are stopped, maybe 10 cars.
As Jetta boy cuts around to the right of the slow moving truck in the middle lane, he also decides to gun it and try to go back left across two lanes and get in front of me. From his lane, I am sure all he could see was the ass end of the stopped dump truck in the middle. He guns it and goes across two lanes, and cuts in front of me, narrowly missing the front right of my car and the back left of the dump truck.
We were moving a a pretty good pace already, but he sped up even more. Big mistake. I was already on the brakes because the cars in my lane were stopped. He was still accelerating around the truck. When he got into my lane (left) he sees the stopped traffic and slams the brakes. He never had a hope of stopping in time. I estimate his speed at 100 Km/hr + when he hit the brakes.
He may have slowed to mavbe 40 km/hr when he got to the last car in line, a half ton truck. To idiot Jetta boys credit, he did not slam into the back of the truck. At the last possible moment, he cranks the car to the left and goes onto the concrete divider (at least an 8" curb). This is not good for wheels and low profile tires, not to mention the suspension of a Jetta
He drives along this until the turning lane begins, and stops for the red light. As I roll by, I can see his front right tire is flat, and the wheel does not look good. If the right is flat, I can only imagine what the left looked like, as it took the full force of the curb impact.
This will be an expensive lesson, but thankfully no one was hurt by this clown.
Definite suspension damage, wheel damage, probably tires too.
Those wheels looked expensive......
