i'd gladly take one, but it'd be just as cool to have a piece of shit thats just as fast

 

Damn I didn't think you liked cars unless they had a VW emblem in the front grille.

Kudos.

 

You do have a point. Probably an exotic if I had the money.

 

I would get an exotic. When you get up there in the car world it's not about the speed and handling you give the car, it's about the experience and presence a car gives you. That's why I love my M Coupe so much. It's slow as shit but the presence it has on the road is unreal, just ask anyone who has rode with me somewhere, everyone sweats your nuts.

Bingo.

http://www.koenig-specials.com/ferrari/ferrari-f50.html

 

I was going to buy a Maserati instead of a Ferrari 328 GTS (my all time fav car for styling). Maserati is owned by Ferarri and uses the F430 engine, although diff heads and cam. Attention to detail and the exhaust note with Tubi exhaust is unreal. Then I realized that the car payments were similar to a mortgage.

There are more important things in my life than cars. Grown-ups have priorities.

 

I tell you what, when you get the opportunity to buy an exotic, go ahead and build a car that on paper will outperform it. Then drive both of them back to back and tell me which is the better car.

If you're a magazine racer there is no point in buying a Ferrari, Lambo, or even Lotus. You have to be a real enthusiast that can see past the numbers a car puts down on paper. The dynamics of a how a car functions as a whole is what makes an exotic. It's about how it makes you feel.

You can build a 500hp VW that will pull 1g+ on the skid pad and it won't "talk" to you the way a proper sportscar will.

You have to drive an exotic to understand. I didn't understand until I got the opportunity to drive a turbo RUF and ride in a 512i.

 

You won't be seeing a VW badge in my grille, and I don't think I'm really a VW elitist. I drive a fun European economy car, basically. It's quick and comfortable, but there's nothing exotic about it really. I'm a realist.



That's what I'm saying. It's more than just status.



You're right... There are more important things in life than cars, but when you reach a point in your life where you can afford expensive toys and you're financially stable enough to buy the things you've always wanted, why not do it? You've always wanted them. Chances are if you can drop $200,000 or so on a car, you've already opened several windows and doors for your children (if you decided to have any) and made sure they were provided for.. providing a college education, a first car for them, etc could easily be done if that's what you so wish to do. I guess you have to be careful where to draw the line between providing them with everyone you didn't have as a child, and spoiling them. You want them to be able to fend for themselves when they leave the nest, but you also want them to be able to enjoy what your hard work and dedication (or luck) achieved.

....anyway, you don't take your money with you when you die. Lets say you have $10,000,000 net worth (liquid).. You've got your million dollar house, you've got all the gadgets you could ever want, you've got the finest furniture, art, etc.. You've got rental properties, investments, etc to make sure that you could go the rest of your life without working if you decided to retire... Whatever the case is, you're financially comfortable, and able to live a lavish lifestyle. Is there really anything immature about buying an exotic car when you've reached that point? Again, I'm not talking about living in a $150,000 house and having a car of equal value or more. I'm not talking about making sacrifices to purchase the car of your dreams. I don't know if you were just using a blanket statement, or if you were basically saying my dreams were childish, but I don't see anything wrong with living it up when you've got the money and the means to do so.

 

I've driven two exotics to date, and if I make the trip back to Kentucky I've got a Murcielago an uncles friend is more than willing to let me drive. I completely agree.

I've been what you would probably consider a "magazine racer" for several years, and then I finally realized what really makes an exotic car so exotic. I always thought it would be cool to make an economy car wipe the floor with a Diablo, but then I realized I'd still be driving a hunk of crap at the end of the day.

I'd love to have the opportunity to have that 500hp GTI you spoke of, AND a few exotic cars to boot. If I had to pick, of course I'd go exotic.

 

You can never improve the lack of engineering that didn't go into something like a civic or mustang by throwing a lot of money into it to make it fast. Cars are totally stripped and almost completely reengineered when they're going to be used in BTCC or something like that, they just aren't a suitable place to start for a serious performance effort. Add up the money that it takes to do that within the confines of the rules, and you could have bought an exotic, or two or three. An exotic starts from the right DNA, and is designed around a single purpose from the ground up, often with no regard to cost or practicality. If that's what you're after, there is no replacement for an exotic.. There are exotics that are just really expensive for the sake of being really expensive (Stryker, etc), and then there are the true engineering masterpieces, the Ferraris, Lambos, Koenigseggs, and Paganis of the world. Money doesn't make a brilliant car, a team of brilliant designers does. It just takes money to fully realize the potential of a clean sheet departure from standard design.
If I had the choice I would get a Zonda, because I believe it's one of the purest exotics out there, built in small quanities to an obsessive standard of design and function. Oh yeah, did I mention I'm obsessed with composites and idolize Horacio Pagani?
Someday I may get a chance to become part of a team that designs stuff like this, and will be far more satisfied with that than I ever could be if I restored or modified something else.

So I'm all about exotics. Anything can be made fast, but it's impossible to correct something that starts out fundamentally flawed.

 

If I was rich enough to be able to throw around money like that Id own exotics and cars I built..