Hacker News Reader

> Cannonball drivers, including Toman and Tabbutt, claim to be hyper-focused and safe while driving two to three times the posted speed limit

It's hard not to become overconfident and over-reliant on technology and subsequently assume your driving skills are close to perfection, without even realizing that even the perfect driver cannot avoid all the other drivers' mistakes.

This is an achievement but it's performed under different conditions than any other driver attempting it will encounter. Getting the record because the police just felt more laid back that night for example is like beating up an old Muhammad Ali and saying you must be the best boxer.

Yup. Plenty of drunks "claim to be hyper-focused and safe" too. You can't trust people's judgment about themselves, especially not when they're doing something obviously dangerous for their own gratification.

The "well they drive fast in Germany every day" argument doesn't hold water either.

1) Even on the parts of the autobahn with unrestricted speeds, 130km is still the recommended upper limit, and you're more liable in a collision if you go faster than that.

2) Many people in Germany don't agree with unrestricted speeds, and politicians have compared it to gun law debates in the US.

3) Germany has higher than average deaths per 1000 km driven (for an EU country).

>3) Germany has higher than average deaths per 1000 km driven (for an EU country).

Source?

On Wikipedia similar data doesn't seem like confirming this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-r...

The referenced paper:

https://www.itf-oecd.org/sites/default/files/docs/irtad-road...

(page 21) places Germany as "better" than Netherlands, France, Austria and Belgium (the latter is on par with the US)

It seems like a pretty big undertaking to draw in the "knuckledraggers". Knuckledraggers just go blasting down the breakdown lane during rush hour.

It's dangerous -- primarily to them -- but I can't help but admire and respect what they've done.

As to the top speed -- there are areas in the West where you can see tens of miles with absolutely nothing on either side of the road.

> It's dangerous -- primarily to them

They're endangering everyone on the road with them. No one would care if the drivers were the only ones in danger.

Why are you repeating what I said, yet as if you're stating a contrary point?

This is why I've been finding the splits/differences with Electric Cannonball Runs fascinating. EVs have the added planning skill needed of requiring charging stops (and the related benefit that some "record breaks" over the years are just the addition of a charging stop in the right place). But also, Electric runners seem to have settled a lot more on sticking to posted speed limits, as a gentleman's rule to the game, in part because more EVs make the speed limits clear in GPS displays and in part because some assisted-driving has also infiltrated the EV records. (A lot of drivers using Tesla's cruise control tech.) But also mostly just because there is so much skill and planning in the recharge stops game that speeding isn't necessary for the fun of the sport / ability to break records, because there's plenty of other things to do.

I'm not sure that it will last much longer that Electric Cannonball Runs will focus more on speed limit following, but I hope that it does. It's a better sport that way that it is more "gentlemanly".

"Even cars built for autobahn travel will not survive a major crash at that speed. "

I don’t care if they destroy their own cars but in reality they will destroy other people's cars. You also can't expect other people who do their daily driving to account for idiots going at such high speed. Just a stupid and reckless thing to do. With all the Twitter shaming going on for minor offenses these guys deserve a major shaming.

> This is a bad idea anyway you slice it.

I do not disagree at all. I am just confused on why this is 'romanticized' and 'published'. If I went and robbed my neighbor of $10k in a record breaking "quick" fashion, would I get journalists at my door looking to publish articles around it?

Everyone speeds. Everyone. Everyone breaks traffic laws. Most see traffic enforcement where there are no victims as heavy-handed. Comparing that with a robbery is specious.

"But they could have..."

But they didn't. Nor have the many who came before. The risk profile of these guys is less than someone who is checking a text while driving.

(Okay, a tiny, tiny minority of drivers never break the law. They are the extreme exception)

No, because anyone with a bumpkey and a couple days to kill on staking the place out can do that. If you went and broke into the Natural History Museum to steal the Hope Diamond than you too would have journalists breaking down your door in order to get your story, because the latter actually takes an impressive amount of skill.

>Even cars built for autobahn travel will not survive a major crash at that speed.

One can't realistically ask people to only ever do what's safe.

As a species we're built to operate at certain risk level. If you track the risks of business, leisure, travel, etc., through ages and cultures, they do show remarkable stability. As soon as better technology, organization, skills, and so on come along, people start going faster, harder, further, more intensely and such.

You can make superficially reasonable arguments, but you can't change the fact that risk-taking is necessary for gains. This observation is built into our, humans, very nature, and everybody has a natural grasp of it.

> Even cars built for autobahn travel will not survive a major crash at that speed.

I couldn't care less if they're killed--they're clearly asking for it. It's the innocent bystanders that will inevitably die that concerns me.