Totally in agreement. Again I want to say I don't hate the Vette. I love those cars. Personally I would still take an M3 over a Vette, but thats just me, I prefer the styling and handling of the M3, it acts the way I expect the car to (in game here) and I don't have to adjust my driving to it.
Though the Viper thing, I really would want to believe what you are saying, but until I see a Viper taking a Ferrari, in a pro race with both drivers being intimately familiar with their cars, I'm still going to go with the Ferrari. The Viper can turn very well, if you slow down a lot, a whole lot more than I can push a Vanquish through the turn. I can't get the Viper to handle very well at all, its a knife edge between going into the wall or spinning out, wheras I can easily push a Vanquish around a turn with no problems. They are ungodly fast, as I mentioned my brother had (HAD, until he destroyed the front end ramping a steep hill) an SRT truck with the Viper engine, and it was unbelievable.
It sounds like american sports cars don't really click with your driving style at all. One thing you have to understand about them is that they come from a musclecar heritage. And as such, the credo of american sportscars has always been to be overpowered.
This can give some folks the impression that american sports cars have inferior handling. In fact, they handle very well... often better than their foreign counterparts. But because they have excessive power available, they require very careful and patient throttle control. They are definately harder to drive. But if you can master them, the rewards are there.
Oh, and if you wanted to watch Vipers beating Ferraris, you should have been watching the Le Mans series a few years back. In more recent years, it's the corvettes beating the ferraris.
You are totally correct about there are a lot of great cars out there. And man I do love the '69 Stingray, it is a great car. All of them have strengths and weaknesses. In some cases for me its just a matter of the styling of the car. All of this started from the comment of a fast Vette meaning that exotics have no place anymore.
I totally agree with you there. A fast vette doesn't change anything. If you want the fastest car you can buy for a significant portion of a million dollars, the answer has never been an exotic european supercar like a Ferrari.
The primary point of the exotics is just... to be exotic. I may have beat that Carrera GT on the track, but my vette will never turn heads like it does. That's what the guy spent $450,000 for.
But there are any number of 'common cars' I've raced with that could beat it on the track which cost a small fraction as much as it does.
I don't doubt that someone that is intimately familiar with a car can easily take someone in an exotic, like you were able to take a Porsche in your Vette. That doesn't really s urprise me. Some cars fit a persons driving style like a glove. And for that very reason is why the exotics will never have to 'go home'.
I very much agree. Except I would point out that exotics are rarely purchased because they match a person's driving style. With very rare exceptions, they're all hangar queens. Last I heard, there weren't any Ferrari F50's with more than 500 miles on the odometer. Most of them have less than 100. Folks don't buy these cars to drive them. It's a strange market.
I guess I get a little annoyed when people assume that some exotic car would automatically trample any 'common sports car'. Like they can't comprehend the possibility that it might not be true. The notion that Chevy or Dodge can't make a car as fast as a Ferrari is just silly. There are fine engineers living all over this planet.
In fact, the performance of a stock Corvette is _not_ dictated by the limits of technology. It's dictated by the market. Almost every year, there is the standard model corvette and then a special faster version of the corvette available. They don't sell a lot of the faster versions because they're too much car for most drivers to handle. They are simply _too_ fast.
When you start modifying a vette, it's very clear that the car is restrained. You're not so much modifying it as you are unleashing it.
Frankly, the recent explosion of powerful cars on the market has not happened because the performance just recently became available. It's been available since the 60's. Nope, it's a direct result of advanced computer controls making powerful cars easier for the common driver to handle. Traction and steering aids. Without a computer nanny, the average driver would kill himself with a 300+ hp car.
Heck, the average Gran Turismo player can't handle powerful cars without the driving aids either. And they're driving cars that are invulnerable to damage.
- Skant