First of all, coming from Europe, I must say that “street racing” is a totally different game around here. In fact, officially, there’s not “street racing” at all!

What we have here (at least in southern Europe, I live in Spain) is little bursts of “sportive character” between drivers, exchanges of gazes at the red lights, trying to overtake in the always crowded left lane on the highway, etc. We call it “piques” (difficult translation, literally could mean “*****”, “bite”, “sting”, but something like “goading the other driver" would be spot on!).

Of course there’s the occasional “quemado” or “burnt” (your “ricers”, except that here they drive German-Spanish Seat Ibiza Turbo Diesel!!!, more on that later…). They go all day looking for “victims” and they drive with “attitude” (and perhaps get his *** kicked in the process), but I haven’t heard of anything close to clandestine “street racing” a là “Fast and the Furious”.

As you may know, European roads are usually more cramped and curvy and oil is more expensive (not to mention toll roads everywhere!!!) so this means that “street racing” lovers express themselves in ways very different from yours. Here to show you're fast you have to show it in curvy roads (got WRC?). Or later in the pub telling tales of "going from A to B in less than 40 minutes", etc. It seems that this is universal,

But lately there has been an invasion of geometry-variable-turbo-charged-common-rail-diesel-engines (from VAG, mainly Audi A3, VW Golf and Seat Ibiza and Leon between 100 and 150 HP), that are filling our roads with “tractors” (as some gasoline drivers call diesel cars around here). They are very proud of their mileage and make a lot of noise about it (literally). They are very powerful and fast (and noisy) tractors indeed.

To sum up, we got here our dose of “street racing” as well, but a little bit different. Here drag racing (just slamming the gas pedal) is considered second class racing, you have to show “if you have hands” in turns (as PseudoRealityX puts it, straights are for fast cars, turns are for fast drivers).

Also economy and market forces dictates that pseudo sportive diesels (lots of Hp and torque and fun for highway driving) are the current “rice” cars of choice (the diesel fever in Spain is a phenomenon in its own, it's 55-45 in sales for the diesel!!!). Tuning is also growing trend, and as we share a lot of car models with German and Italian tuners, there’s a lot of choices if you are into that.


Sorry if I screwed up with the language, but English is not my mother tongue!

Some links (in English for your pleasure):
http://www.seattuning.com/ Name says it all
http://www.seatcupra.net/ Cupra means lots of HP and racing character!!!!!

 

Mr. Mxyzptlk, for starters....on the language thing...YOU did WONDERFUL....I have seen posts by US citizens that were not worded as well...so don't give that a second thought. :{D

YES we have WRC....in fact I was watching it last night on the SPEED channel...and guess what? the competition was in SPAIN! I forget where.....it was a repeat of an earlier broadcast....but yes...we here in the US and Canada also love the curvy road....if it were nothing but straightline racing....our little 130 HP cars wouldn't be much to play with....but they are quite competitive in the curves. :{D

 

I believe the last WRC race was in Catalunya, saw it on Speed over the weekend. WRC is now my new favorite autoracing series, next to Speed World Challenge Touring Car series (gee I wonder why )

 

Senor Mxzyptlk, not sure about California, but here in Vancouver road racing is not that common anymore because of the law punishing severly those that do race. People used to meet up around midnight at a certain place and then cruise together to a deserted place where some people would drag.

As far as Vancouver goes (one of capitals for ricey cars), it's nothing like 'Fast and Furious' and I doubt that any city is.

 

Bravo!!! Bravo!!! You did awesome dude!! In fact, had you not said anything, I would have assumed you were of English descent!

I agree with you 100000% about street racing. Americans are so used to cheap petrol (gas), wide-open roads and big crappy engines with lots of powers. This is evident in everyday rush hour here in Atlanta, GA where, people rush home from work at 80mph (sometimes plus that), tailgating or drafting (as in NASCAR). All on big highways, until someone screws up and ruins the rise home for everyone by causing a 10 car pile-up.

This is why Americans will probably always like NASCAR because they basically go fast in a straight line that is turned into a circle. And they'll always like drag racing for the same reason.

For me, although I do like WRC, I still prefer Formula One and speaking of which, for those of you who do not watch F1, the next race is on this Sunday morning at 7:30am Eastern (14th of April).

I could go on a rant but it would be pointless. I guess Im allot more European minded than I am American, even though I am American.

Oh, and I would LOVE to get my hands on a Seat Leon Cupra R! Also, how much does Shell Helix oil cost there? Im trying to find a way to import it to the States. Or is Agip better? I am looking for the synthetic of course. Right now I am using Exxon(Esso) syn. 5w-50. Email me privately dude and we'll chat! Its spoon137@bellsouth.net

 

Shell Helix costs here 16.73 USD (or 22,35 CAD) (4 liters)

BTW, Atlanta is one of the few places I've been in the USA. I was for the 1998 E3 in the Atlanta Dome!