Yo guys,
This topic has been discussed many times before - but this time it's a little bit different.
I'm not talking about the fastest, sexiest, most luxurious, or fancy brand of car you've owned. I'm talking about which one, when you hit the pedal at the green light, did the most spectacular damage to the pavement you've ever experienced.
I'm a writer and about to get a tad windy - but bear with me, please.
Over my lifetime of fifty years, I've owned a lot of cars. Likely the highest brand I've owned was a Porsche 911. The most luxurious, I'd say, would go to my old Mercedes sedan. The best handling, undoubtedly, was my bright red Corvette ZR-1. I also loved my Mazda RX-7 - that little bugger was a joy to whip around with on out-of-the-way country roads - preferably with a really great cassette in the stereo.
But, the most sheerly, rawly powerful...
Back in 1968, my Grandpa bought a brand new, fresh from the showroom, Oldsmobile Delta 88/Custom. It was in the ugliest color imaginable - kind of like bile-green buzzard vomit. I hated riding in it - not just because of it's looks but partly the fact my Grandpa would drive like a Grandma. Ugly freakin' thing, it seemed to me.
At the time.
When I finally turned 16 and got my license, in 1979, my parents wouldn't let me borrow one of their own cars. They always said "Go down and ask Pops" ... our nickname for my Grandpa. We are a very tightly knit family, and tend not to stray far from each other, so it was only three running blocks away.
Whenever I got there, I would first ask him for his Mustang - a gorgeous blue thing. Then, when he said "Nope", I asked for his cool new Chevy pickup. "Nope".
i always ended up getting the Olds. Hated it, but a 16 year old kid can't be too picky, so I drove it. In the day, it was certainly not a chick magnet, or one I even wanted to be seen driving in. But, it worked - and it handled like a Yugo with no brakes, completely bald tires, and steering that seemed to work only about half the time. The Olds itself was actually still near mint - Pops kept it that way - but that's how it felt.
Well. One day, on a trip to Dayton about twenty miles from here, on the highway some moron in a Camaro came up behind me and started tailgating. Just plain wouldn't stop, and since there were two lanes, I wondered why. I absolutely hate, loathe, and despise tailgaters. I kept on chugging along, though, at around 50 mph.
I then learned why he was doing that.
I got so weary and fed up with this fool's harassment I decided to see if, by any chance, this old crate could maybe pull away from him, at least for a couple of yards or so. Therefore - being a young fool myself at the time - I floored it.
Holy Gawwd!
That Olds took off so fast it actually squealed the tires. I felt as if I was on the launch of a Moon mission, slammed back into my seat and pegging out the speedometer at 120 before being able to actually release the accelerator. That poor Camaro - I could barely even make him out in the mirror when I finally managed to slow.
I learned, quite awhile afterwards, that particular Delta model had the 455 "SuperRocket" engine, with a "Super High Compression" component. It had to be fed Premium gas or the engine would sputter like crazy - but who cared? In those days gas was not much pricier than running water from your garden hose. They rated horsepower differently then, but at the time, I think, it was around 365-370. Nowadays, it would be considered far, far higher.
It really did actually turn out to be a chick magnet after all too - at a stoplight in town, if there were some girls you liked talking or gathered nearby -
When the green comes, hit the gas. That Olds would, literally, stay in one spot for as long as you wanted, spinning its tires, squealing, and smoking like crazy - I doubt that, if you didn't cut it out, you wouldn't have made it into even the middle of the intersection without driving on rims alone. It felt like a Bugatti Veyron with skinnier and way thinner tires.
Girls who would witness those foolish displays would very often come up to me at school to talk or flirt!
Mission accomplished!
That, I believe, is the most genuinely powerful car I've ever owned - Pops left it to me.
J.
