Getaway

Transmission Starts...

It's an undisclosed date, time and place.

The trees are still and the air heavy. A Renault Sport Clio Cup 172, driven by The Mechanic, bites hard on the English air. We overtake desperately...

"Let me take you round the lanes" he'd said.

I'd had a short go in the 172. I'd found it to be a revelation. I could actually feel the front axle moving around in my hands. The steering was brilliant, the engine, eager and sonorous. I'd feared an over rated, uncomfortable cardboard box. True, the Renault is no solid German but it's better then you think. True, the last Clio I'd driven had felt odd, somehow perching you on top of the car instead of inside it.

But the 172...

The 172 was comfortable, the ride wasn't too hard, the gearbox, although slightly vague didn't suffer from French pudding syndrome. In other words it didn't feel like I was stirring porridge. Even though it didn't have ABS or any sort of electronic aids I was sure we would be ok.

Thus;

Rule No. 002 - Safety Is Absolutely Coupled To Feel

After promised lanes an over eager exit from town had met a 330d in police livery coming the other way. After I'd sent my friend down a dead end drive way we'd exited and cooled off. We'd turned back and got on it again. We'd met the 330d again. The 172 providing the extension to his strength, The Mechanic had hurled us down the road towards lanes unclassified.

"We'll be fine" I'd assure.

"We'll be reported" I'd schizophrenically added.

Later, the Renault ticking at the side of the road, I'd asked the more mundane questions. The answers, 35-40 mpg, no major trouble, totally reliable, had told me all I needed to know. I want one. I want one badly. Perhaps not badly enough to get chased around though...

Transmission Ends....

Bank Job

Transmission Starts...

Of course you know that the thumpa-thumpa of those Imprezas that cruise around town and city centre one-way systems on this island Britain is artificial. It's all in the exhaust lengths you see. What's important though, what's important is that it is easily discernible.

When that thumpa-thumpa turned into a loud snarl then a popping on the overrun I knew what was being chased. Police sirens flooded the distant night but our man (or woman) in his (or her) Impreza was doing a good job of keeping the fuzz at bay. I could hear him (her) snarl down the Lansdown road, pop and crackle down the gears before screeching around the roundabout at the top of Montpelier.

Of course they'd get him in the end. Once the police became airborne he'd (she'd) be done for. That turbo flat-four would glow so fiercely that any old idiot with heat sensitive goggles would see him. Plod in a whirly-bird would have no trouble at all.

So we live in a world of CCTV and helicopters. So we live in a world of GPS. Putting all of that to one side though, imagining all of these things did not exist, that it was still driver -vs- driver,

What

Would

I

Choose?

something big of course. Something big enough to ram a police spec X-5 or Range Rover. Something fast, something high and 4WD. Something able to cross a field but shoot down a motorway.

I'm gonna rule out the police choice afore mentioned SUV's. The baddies never drive the same vehicle as the goodies. That is not how it is written. Porsche is out. I got drunk the other day and kicked one as hard as I could. No criminal damage. To solid. A case made you might think, but I hate the things. Case closed, I think.

That leaves the BMW X6 M. Almost as offensive as the Porsche, but not quite. The new bimmer has the guts and the glory. Imagine coming across a road block of 330d's and Volvo T-5's. Imagine putting your foot down and listening to the growl of a 547bhp twin turbo V8 marshaling near as damn it 2.4 tons of German battering ram. Imagine the patrol car's engine bay spread over the carriage-way as you roar off into the night. It's everything you need. Everything you need for a bank heist.

The man who lives at the tip of my home road, however, is not a bank robber. He does live in a world of GPS, CCTV and helicopters. He doesn't need a 2.4 ton four seater that does an average of 16 mpg. He simply trundles around in it, kids in the back.

Fool.

Transmission Ends...