Not a Bedtime Story, Celica's Performance and Handling!!! Options

[claudio]

This happened a few years ago when I just got my Celica. It was a little after 2 am on a clear winter night and I was driving on this freeway. No lights and pitch black, the freeway was totally empty-no headlights in my rear view mirror and no tail lights in front. I could only see as far as my headlights lit the road. I was going a little over 80mph for the past 40 minutes. I was chatting with my girl (at the time) feeling a little drowsy (long day and we just got back from a club). Suddenly, the expression of my girl's face changed. She looked straight in front of my left headlight. I turn my head and with the light from my headlights a few feet ahead of me I can barely make out a car (all lights off). Half a second later I can now see its a brown cadillac. It is sideways (perpendicular to the road). The front end was in the bushes at the center median and the tail side sticking out completely blocking my lane. It was crazy, everything slowed down. In a moment I was about to hit head on the drivers side door and rear tire of this old brown cadillac PARKED on the freakin freeway . . .at over 80mph!! Before I can think of pressing on the brakes or swerving the car, I see my left hand go from 10 o'clock to 4 o'clock on the steering wheel. Before I know it I am looking at my driver's side mirror which is an inch or so from the cadillac's tailight. In one motion I swerve right around the cadillac and back into my original lane with an inch or two between my celica and that cadillac. Two seconds afterwards, I immediatly turn to see if my girl's alright. Her eyes are shut tight and her arms are over her face to protect her head. I tell her, "its alright." and she looks up and says, " I was sure you were going to hit it. I didn't even feel us go around it!"

The front of my new (at the time) car could have been totalled (and we probably wouldn't have looked too good either). No screeching. No back injuries from the quick swerve. And complete control of the car.
Thanks to: Seat Belts, Bucket seats, good suspension and catlike reflexes (joke) - more like lady luck.

All I have to say is, that night, I know what Celica means when they say Performance and Handling.

[Guest_Matthew_*]

damn

[boosted_K2]

speed and power isnt everything, having a celica probably saved you and your GF (at the time ) lives.

[Ghost]

Celica means heaven, regardless, thats a good story man. It's close calls like that are really a wake - up call.

[No0bOne]

That is dangerous! But it must have been a panicking and crazy thing to encounter and than do!!

[Tenchi]

Wow, close call. I'm glad you reacted on time.

[Benevolence]

Don't think a mustange could have done that.

[iceman23]

Ha,ha...something similar happened to me but I had a 96' Camaro at the time. Ha, I guess my camaro got a wild hair up it's arse cuz as heavy as it is I got around the P.O.S. that swirved in my lane.

[all4sho94st]

atleast it wasn't raining or anything , you prolly would have spun out more. no its not the car its your skill. hah j/k i dunno

[claudio]

yeah, I'm happy it wasn't raining. . .I definitely would have spun out if it was.

[whitefuzz]

almost the same story, only mine didn't end up that good:

one night, about 1.5years ago i was taking my gf(at the time) home it was raining so the road was wet, i was doing +- 70km/h on a regular road(normal allowed speed) all of a sudden this beemer comes out of the drive way of a house & drives onto the road right in front of me and stops on my lane... there was only one lane... & traffic coming from the other direction...
i hit the breaks but the road was wet so i slipped straight into the beemer... big crash... i hit the steering wheel with my head(wasn't wearing my safety belt) and my gf was screeming stop stop cuz the beemer made a 180° spin and was out of our way & we were still slowly rolling along...
so i stopped the car & checked on my gf luckily she had just put on her safety belt!
in the other car was an old turkish lady driving, & old man on crutches sitting next to her, & younger lady & her 2years old kid in the back
the old people were alright, the lady in the back had her face cut up from the glass of the window & the little kid spend 2 days on intensive care... but it survived!

when the cops showed up the turkish people(who didn't even spoke dutch, the native language over here) claimed that the old man was driving but he wasn't, the poor man had crutches!!!!
I SAW THE WOMAN TRYING TO GET OUT OF THE DRIVER SEAT!!!
she was 65 & she didn't have a drivers licence...

they still say the man drove but they agreed that it was all their fault...
still my 5th gen celica was totally trashed
i was really pissed off the day after!!!!

but if it didn't happen i would probably still be driving that stock 5th gen instead of my current 6th genwith kit... so i guess there's a good part to every story...