Carman VII-May the horse be with you

The beginning of the future
It’s been a while since then, but when the first BMWs i3 came to town I was invited for a test drive. Naturally, long before that I knew almost everything about that small (not even compact) electric car.
There were three things which stood out and made me anxious to welcome it.
First, it was a Rear Wheel Drive. Ignoring this would be a huge mistake, so, this was the right way to start the future with…
Second, it was electric! Silent, fast, clean. We all understand silent and fast, but with clean I don’t mean environmentally clean. I mean that its power unit (you don’t call this an engine anymore) is constantly clean. No leaking, no smells, no vibrations…
And third, the basic material which makes a car, is no more tin! It is a specially constructed for the iSeries carbon fiber… This is a great advantage, which I don’t dare to begin explaining, we will never get out of here and my dinner that waits is spaghetti!

One of the most beautiful things which I read later-on about this car, was written by a car-journalist… He wrote that this new i3 is very much like the first mobile phones of the ‘80s in every respect. It had drawbacks, some think it was funny, people didn’t understand it at the time and everybody sensed that this is the new “hype”.
But nobody suspected the revolution behind it, until it exploded.

It will take some time but, the iSeries (along with other equivalent cars like Tesla) look to be a similar revolution which will trigger the same path of events, just like mobile phones did…
My own impressions from the test-drive in one line… This is the re-invention of the car, without destroying anything that makes a car a great invention.

No driver included
I simply cannot believe what I am about to write in those next lines… I finally do admit, that I am not anymore against the idea of autonomous cars which drive all by themselves! But for all of you out there who still like to drive yourselves, before you sentence me to death just like I deserve, please hear me out.

My love for driving is undying, and I have that same passion like I had from the beginning of my days. To give you an example, me and my girl, we find a new spot on the map, we put some stuff in the trunk and we are happy to drive off in order to discover any new place, or re-visit one that is unbeatable to resist.
So, once we get to our destination, we check in to a Hotel which will be between our liking and what we can afford, and what do we do next? We drive every possible road that is on the map and every dirt road our car can handle. This is our idea of fun… Everything else comes far behind in our agenda.
We don’t even have a stereo at our house yet, because we “forget” to buy one, since all our music is played while driving… We like driving around so much, it comes to a point that we look at each other, and we simultaneously say our standard phrase: “THIS is getting ridiculous”
And that is just the beginning of it… Watching races, test drives, car-magazines… there is always something with cars going on. And yes, I even explain to my Aikido students the ways of applying Aikido principles into driving…
So, how the hell did I change my mind about autonomous driven cars?
I will come to that soon enough...

During World War II, German pilots of the Luftwaffe would take one mission after the other, until they died or survived. They could not “stand down” after a number of missions, like it was customary in other countries. In extend to that, some highly decorated Ace pilots, would go as far as ignoring Hitler’s direct orders to finally stand down after their unmatched achievements in combat… They continued to fly because they could not abandon their fellow wingmen. At the end of that bitter war, from 10.000 pilots only 2.000 survived, among them my uncle Hans…

As a driver I have been driving “forever” By now I must have far above a million miles on my back, since driving is not only my hobby, I used to drive professionally, for the Armed Forces, you name it… I would not complain if I died in my car (and how could I, even if I wanted to?!) it could be considered as “natural causes”.
But I don’t have a death wish of any kind…
Because more and more I feel like a German pilot pushing his limits and his luck. Every time I start my engine and drive off from my garage I whisper a silent phrase to Hachiman: “Let us return…”
Dying while fighting a war is waste enough, but dying of pure stupidity is beyond description… I happen to drive in one of the most hostile environments that exist, each year the fatalities are through the roof, and the constant maneuvers in order to avoid accidents, has replaced in great part the pleasure of driving.
To give you an example, this last year alone I have been hit three times. Two of them were while I was legally parked… One time my girlfriend was in it while waiting for me to return, the second I witnessed just as I was walking towards my car and the third time I was a hit from behind while being stopped at a full red light.  
Most people don’t drive cars anymore, they simply move about with their cars… It is no exaggeration to say that the majority of them talk on their mobile phone, text messages, surf on the internet, eat, they do anything but drive. In all three cases I was hit, it was by absentminded drivers. Not my words they admitted so to the police themselves…

Most people don’t care about a good car anymore and they don’t care to drive. What matters, is as many connecting devices as possible, full automatic transmissions, censors which control everything so you don’t have to park, lose your lane, forget to stop in time, call the ambulance once you crash and the list is unending…
My cat is more interested and pays more attention to driving techniques and mechanics, when I explain it to her. This is a comfort to me otherwise I would end up talking to myself…

When I exit from a corner with a slight and totally safe over-steer and I maintain it that so for the length of five meters, people’s faces turn pale white, take pills, have strokes and suffer heart attacks… But in my entire full length of my miles I never drove into anything or anyone, while I have lost count how many times I have been hit by absentminded coffee-machine drivers…

Yes, I have changed my mind… I am not against autonomous cars anymore. Let them have them, because they don’t wish to drive anymore. Let them have them, so I can safely at last enjoy my driving with my “dangerous” Rear Wheel Drive, my manual gear box and my sport frame and set-up!

Safety as an obstacle
A condom is a safety factor in a relationship… unless your plan is to have about eleven, or so, offsprings! Condoms contribute to safety in many ways, there is no denying that by anyone, it is a fact.
 
Choosing to sign a premarital contract in order to secure your wealth and money is also a safety measure, in case more than everything gets lost in a relationship… However (it is my personal opinion and not a fact) this kind of safety measure, will surely kill something off from your relationship, the moment you go into that direction…

It is the same with cars… There is a point to reach, regarding its safety, but once you cross a certain point, it has already killed something off… And unlike premarital contracts, where you can argue about what it really does, it is a fact that too much safety in a car is dangerous! In order to apply it, it clearly ends up taking something off from the driver. And it is the driver we need to protect, c’est ne pa?!

In Formula 1 races the designing of safe racing tracks has become a science. Now, I always vote for the logic of science, those who read me cannot deny me that, but the freedom of how to live and consequently how to die is mine! Nothing else is more “ours” than this!
The first thing that happened in order to make Formula 1 circuits safer, is to… chop them into shorter ones, by throwing away those parts that were the most “dangerous”. Just to name a few examples: Nürburgring was cut short, not passing anymore through the forest which gave to this circuit its famous nickname Grüne Hölle (Green Hell). In Belgium, Spa-Francorchamps, though it still remains a “drivers with the magic touch” circuit, it also was cut short, not passing anymore through a great number of villages. And in Monza the high-speed leaning curves, which will cut your breath just by looking at them, have become a sad remnant of the distant past…

Step number two was to re-build the tracks at the dangerous parts and I think that both those steps were… just terrible.
But finally, all new built tracks are extensively researched and from the beginning designed to be as safe as possible, and I can’t deny that this move was for the better.  

And now I am happy because I got you where I wanted to!
There is one circuit which, despite some minor changes, it remained the same since the beginning of F1, which is ages ago!
If we were somehow able to build an exact duplicate of it, and place it anywhere in the world, it would never-ever be approved. There would simply be no way to pass any of the modern, well-thought security measures! Period…
BUT, despite all that it keeps running and they wouldn’t dare to cancel it either, because it is so profitable and famous.
Have you guessed it yet? It’s Monaco!

So, we are back to square one… How much safety you said?!...

January 21, 2017