The Cannonball Run Era Needs to End

[DrQ]

The Cannonball Run Era Needs to End​

The original Cannonball was run to protest road laws, and they’re virtually unenforced now. The Cannonballers won. Why are we still doing this?​

https://www.motor1.com/features/736754/end-the-cannonball-run-era/

A new record in the Cannonball Run—an unsanctioned time-trial rally from New York to Los Angeles—always attracts headlines. But this week’s record-setting run is even more absurd than most. Completed in a BMW 535 diesel, driver Chris Stowell covered the 2,800-mile Cannonball in just 27 hours and 16 minutes at an average moving speed of 105 miles per hour. More ludicrously, he achieved this with no spotters, no co-driver, and only light modifications to his car. It represents the outright post-COVID-lockdown record, as well as the solo record and the diesel-car record.​

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A record-holding run with so little pomp and prep has me asking: why bother? The whole point of the Cannonball was to outwit and outsmart police enforcement as a team, as a means of showcasing the absurdity of cat-and-mouse speeding enforcement. If a single guy can hop in his daily-driven BMW and break the record without so much as a single ticket, what is the purpose of even running the Cannonball anymore?​

I have to agree.

 

[T_R_Oglodyte]

I have to agree.

Yep - at that points it's not really any different than a closed circuit street race.

 

[jp10558]

OMG. What I'm usually worried about is severe differences in speed moreso than speed in general. I agree with the original protest against 55mph being a reasonable national speed limit. That said, I've been pinged by an automated system in PA for 77 in a 65, but it was a warning. I don't really want the UK style speed cameras.

That said - I also don't drive a sports car - when I drove sedans it was easier to go faster, now in a Pilot slow is the name of the game, it just doesn't handle well. And ever since adaptive cruise control and podcasts, I have slowed way down and been a lot calmer. I haven't found many problems with that - the travel time seems way more affected by stops for food, gas and restrooms than 65 vs 80+ MPH. Maybe I'm just getting old.