It’s almost a rite of passage. It’s a good day…you’ve got the windows down, the music has been great, and what better way to cap off a wonderful day than by stepping your big toe just over the line of legality a little bit. Doesn’t matter what…maybe you hit the on-ramp and treated it like the 1/4 mile. Maybe you found a dusty corner at a wide intersection with no traffic coming and you felt like leaving proof that you made a right turn. Maybe it was a late night and you didn’t expect anyone to be in the abandoned department store parking lot when you spun the wheel, dumped the clutch, and went for a spin. But just as sure as I am that you all are picturing the good times, we all know there’s one thing that can sink the S.S. Showboat faster than a torpedo: a random cop appears. At that point, your vocabulary is reduced to a couple of choice words, a sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach, and a sudden fear for your bank account.
I’ve been lucky…but that doesn’t mean I haven’t earned my stories. There’s a couple I’ll never tell, but here’s a good one that I will: I was cruising through a neighborhood in Colorado Springs with a friend in my newly-purchased 1987 Monte Carlo when we drove past a city park that had the sprinklers going. In the center of the road was a flash flood divot that was getting wet from the overspray. If there wasn’t a better designed burnout box, I’ve yet to see it. After psyching up my passenger for the full fury of 180 asthmatic horsepower, I crept in, locked the 200R4 down into first, and got to work hazing the rears off. To be fair to the 305, it did put up one hell of a smokeshow, but just as the first wisps of vaporized tire started to enter through the open T-tops, my buddy grabbed my shoulder, shouting just about every swear word known as three police cruisers drove right in front of us in plain sight. If they saw me, they weren’t bothered to do anything, but honestly, they probably saw the nose of the car and a bunch of white smoke and figured that I had just blown the motor or something. They were nonchalant…I, on the other hand, was so clenched that I would’ve beaten Cameron’s coal-to-diamond time by about six and a half days.
We’ve all been there, so let’s hear it…when did the boys in blue scare the hell out of you?
Cresting a hill at double the speed limit at around 1 a.m. on the freeway, the only other car on the road turned out to be a…well, you-know. It got worse when he swerved over thinking he’d block me…less of a problem was the time doing a smokey 180 into a 7-11 parking lot, then looking into the rr-view mirror as I unbuckled right at the moment when -she- turned on the flashing red lights (would you believe she was more amused than pissed)…or drifting a long circular freeway offramp near the L.A. Zoo (drifting is not a recent invention) and losing it into and through the bushes just as a training class for the L.A.P.D. motorcycle corps was riding up…There were others, mostly in a series of V8 Vegas, some good for a laugh and some I cringe to remember, all from some time back anyhow.
Heading North on the GSP here in NJ about to go through the New Gretna EZ Pass there was a white car to my left in the first lane. My 8.1l Sierra pounds ahead because 7 toll lanes feed into 2 travel lanes. Accelerating to 65 I move to the right lane. Moments later the white car pulls along side…it’s a NJ state trooper. He looks at me shaking his head…I looked back and shrugged. Those Crown Vics are pitifully slow and he knew it. 🙂
BMT…Get Brian to relate his story…priceless!
When I was 17, I was heading home from my freinds house, and right before you get to my street, there is a long straight downhill road that then levels out flat and directly leads to an inclinded railroad crossing. Well, I decided I wanted to jump the tracks that night, and stomped it down the hill, and because the hill is so steep and with the trees on each side, you cant see the leveled out part until you get there, I didnt see that there were two cop cars, one on each side of road, with the cops out of their cars and standing in the road talking to each other. I come barrelling now the street, the cops see me, and have to DIVE out of my way to avoid getting slammed by me at around 80+ mph. It was too late to slow down, I hit the tracks, went airbrone, sent sparks flying through the air and got to my street. As soon as I got to my street, the blue lights were coming. They pulled me over 2 houses down from my house. I thought I was definately going to jail. They made meget out, gave me a sobriety test, searched my car, the full monty. I told them my house was right there. They said theyd follow me to the house and tell my parents what I’d had been doing, which I thought was worse than going to jail at the time. So they did, I pulled in my parking spot, got out, and watched as they slowly drive by and KEPT GOING! It was such a releif that I just busted out with nervous anxiety driven laughter, so loudly I guess, I woke up my mom inside the house. When I walked through the front door, she asked me what I was “cackling about”. I said nothing and went to bed. WHEW. This was written in a hurry cuz I gotta go to work, theres a LOT more to this, but thats the gist of it.
back in the days of the dinosaur,when i was a young man,a buddy and i were driving around in his ancient plymouth—i think it was a “50—flat head 6 ,3 on the tree,well and truly used up—i didn’t have my license yet,but he let me drive—bear in mind,this was way and hell out in the boonies,no traffic to speak of,and around 8 at night—-we come to a railroad crossing and the arms come down like a train is coming by—all of a sudden,masses of lights behind us,spotlights blinding us,and the amplified voice of god instructing us to show our hands,don’t make any sudden movements,and we’re surrounded,etc.—turns out some felons had escaped and stolen a car like the one we were in—except for scaring the pooh out of us,nothing happened—but the driving lesson was over for that night……
Here’s the Cop you DON’T want to be stopped by
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-06-06/vision-released-police-officer-pulls-gun-on-motorist-outback-qld/7482950
Wow, he IS special.
I belonged to a car club in Canada which had obtained permission to use an abandoned airfield as a drag strip. On a Saturday afternoon a bunch of us were doing some work to prepare the strip for the first race. As I was leaving on the dirt road to the main road, I was drifting around a broad curve when in the middle who was coming at me but an RCMP car! Sumbitch, I knew he had me, I didn’t even wait for him to turn around after me, I just pulled over and waited for the inevitable. Told the officers why we were there, didn’t expect any incoming traffic, so I let loose. They did do anything, much to my relief! Scared the crap out of me though!
Was heading to Barboursville, WV from Cleveland way back in ’94 driving my ’89 Mustang LX coue. Crossed over the Ohio after setting my personal best CLE-Ohio River run (2hrs 15mins for 165 miles) and was still hammering it down when I saw brake lights on the northbound lane on I-77. Slowed it down to 65 and before long I had a WV trooper on my back bumper. He followed me for at least five miles before peeling off a ramp, I’m guessing since it was dark he just couldn’t be 100% sure it was me blasting down “his” highway. Probably saved me 1 couple hundred $$$ easily.
A while back ago in my 01 Ram Sport 4×4 I had a major redneck/young guy moment. I throughly enjoyed spinning tires in the rain, drifting dirt roads, etc. Well, one day with an ex I did a huge a$$ donut in a gravel lot off of the road.. Let off squealing tires into the road and with a gigantic dust cloud following. Only problem? A cop (I don’t know if he was local or not) rolled directly into my dust cloud as I took off. You can imagine the curse words- especially considering I’ve already had one reckless. I slowed the hell down and he rode my a$$ for a few miles before getting off somewhere.
145 in a 30 on a base patrol road racing a plane that was taking off. He was parked behind a building. He didn’t bother pulling out but I heard about it later. He said he knew his Corsica couldn’t catch me and decided to spare me.
I had an 81 Chevy Malibu, 4 door, dark blue that I was driving down a road in a spirited fashion that connected a pretty unused area of Prineville Reservoir with civilization. No one ever drove down this road so i was using all of it – I came around a blind corner and just about head-on’d into a cop. I went around the corner and could have nailed the throttle to see if I couldn’t get away (at this point the cop was around the corner and invisible.
I pulled off at the next wide spot and sat on my hood. Sure enough, a couple minutes (really, minutes) later the cop pulls behind me. He asked me what was going on, I said he’d probably want to talk to me about using the entire road back there. He did the inevitable license, reg check, then came back and said I should probably stay on my side of the road and went on his merry way. Cool guy.
My brother was out in our Cal Look Beetle, giving it a bit of stick on the way home. Pulled up outside the house and a police car pulled up behind him. He’d seen my brother and knew he was speeding but couldn’t catch him for long enough to work out exactly how fast he was going!
Back in 96 I was north of Phoenix in the hills pushing my ratty 71 GMC as hard as it and I could go. Came around a left corner on a small rise far on the outside just as a cop was doing the same thing headed the other way. If I had been doing the speed limit instead of doubling it I would have been in my lane instead of almost in the ditch and had a head on, how we didn’t even swap paint I’ll never know. I distinctly remember seeing his mirror pass under mine.