(Words: Kevin Brown) Every year tens of thousands of people gather in Columbus, Ohio, to partake in one of the largest car shows in the county, and every year that show has an event dedicated purely to the art of turning solid rubber into smoke. Being one of the most iconic characteristics of a muscle car, the burnout is as old as hot rodding itself, and is always a crowd pleaser.

Personally I find the act of cranking the line-lock closed, mashing the go pedal, and beating on a set of tires like they owe me money to be purely therapeutic. There’s something about the sudden loose feeling of a cars behavior, coupled with the noise of fuel turning into rotational force as the engine rips the grip away from the rear tires and turns the once solid, cold, rubber into a now greasy state, that gives you feelings similar to those produced by cocaine…I would imagine. (Hi, mom!)

But, as simple as it may seem, burnouts can be hard sometimes! Its ok, we’re not here to judge, we’ve all had a car with low horsepower or high rear gear ratios that just doesn’t want to slip the tires under load. But at least you’re not one of these guys! The following videos show two clips filmed by Mike from Classicmustangs429 on YouTube, who was lucky enough to capture the moment a couple over confident drivers attempt to turn tires to glue, but instead turn their clutch into smoke.

To be fair the surface has so much rubber laid down on it that it resembles a prepped drag strip. Regardless I would think that the lack of vibration or rotational noise from the rear end should’ve been plenty for these drivers to realize “oh hey my tires aren’t spinning…” but nope! Our boy in the GTO just keeps giving it hell! Same story with the viper, although, in the end, he did start to turn the rear wheels. Either way I found it entertaining since I’m not the one paying for a new clutch, so I figured you would too! If nothing else, always learn from others mistakes.

(Note: My one question…how did the drivers NOT notice the smell? -Ed.)