Comment by gambiting | Hacker News Reader

Comment by gambiting | Hacker News Reader

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As someone who has had a Mercedes AMG that could do 0-60s in less than 4s for a few years, it just gets boring so fast, and it makes you question why you bought the thing in the first place. It's unusable in almost every situation on the road, except for the rare "opportunity" when you stop at traffic lights next to a Golf R and yes turns out you have a bigger.....turbo.....than them. Well done, that 5 second ego boost was really worth all the money and looking like a dick to anyone above the age of 25.

Nowadays as a "petrol head" when I look at stats I want to see weight - as little of it as possible. Horsepower needs to begin with 2, maybe with 3 in some cars, any more than that and it's silly. I want reviewers to say the car puts a smile on their face driving it to work every day, not doing 160mph on the race track. And of course, high speed is "fun" - one of my favourite memories is driving at 158mph past Berlin at 4am - incredible. But the modern obsession with horsepower and 0-60 is...just stupid. Fast 0-60 time does not make for a fun or an engaging car. It just makes it fast.

" It's unusable in almost every situation on the road"

Yet it's a useful, comparable, measure for acceleration and is frequently exercised on track. If you had an AMG and haven't taken it for at least one track day then I question why you bought it. Image?

Maybe 30-70 would be more useful for determining overtaking capability, but that would require everyone in the motoring industry to agree to change at the same time.

>>If you had an AMG and haven't taken it for at least one track day then I question why you bought it.

Oh I have, and it was awesome. But 99% of the time I drove it to work and back, sitting in traffic, thinking to myself I'd much much much rather be in something more comfortable, more quiet, something that isn't using quite so much fuel just sitting there and something that didn't require new tyres every 8000 miles.

Like yes, speed is awesome - fast acceleration is cool. But the obsession with it is destroying the industry - like, it's so clear that a lighter Lamborghini with 400bhp would be a lot more fun to drive than a 2 tonne one with 1000 horsepower, no? Even if the latter does pretty good on the race track. But because everyone only cares about 0-60 times and horsepower we are where we are.

I'm sure the roads I drive must be different from yours, but when I started driving a Tesla in traffic, it felt like you can just teleport into spaces. The threshold for being able to overtake and pull into traffic without obstructing is so much lower.

Of course, it's also less safe. But the threat of a quick death in a lithium fire is the only reason some of us get up in the morning.

Your just getting old, I mean I agree with u but I'm also old,

Most young boys have the Lamborghini poster on the wall even if it actually sucks to drive, especially the iconic Countach, I find pure joy in driving my old beetle now, or the past weekend a friends 1957 MGA, horrible safety, tiny engines, zero comforts, not even a radio, just a pure carthat can't even be sold anymore, but there will never be a better driving experience than an proper ancient British roadster.

As they say, it's more fun to drive a slow car fast, than a fast car slow.

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