In Cars with Brad

I have to say that whenever my youngest brother Brad was around, things were never boring, even when I was just riding in the car with him. Brad and I both share an interest in cars – sports cars to be specific, and “recreational driving”. Brad used to have one of the coolest cars that ever passed through our family, a 1988 Toyota Supra Turbo. Back in 1988 this car was on the cutting edge of technology. It even had an electronically adjustable suspension that could go from “Cruising” to “Normal” to “Sports” modes with the touch of a button. It had an inline-6 cylinder engine, the configuration for many race cars in past decades.

Mom and Brad went shopping one night in the Supra. When they came back, I learned that Brad had taken Mom to an empty parking lot and spun the car around and around in circles, pivoting on the front tires, all the while burning rubber with the rears. I’m still fuzzy on what Mom’s reaction was, but knowing Mom, I bet she had a blast but she was probably concerned that Brad would get into trouble or an accident if he pursued risky driving habits.

The 3^rd generation Supras had great grip when going around corners. The problem was that when you reached the limit of that grip, things happened rather suddenly. There was no warning or progressive sliding like the newer 4^th generation models exhibited. The car would hold the road to a certain point, and if pushed beyond that point, it would quickly swap ends.

Which brings me to my story… Our parents left town around noon on a Friday to visit Mom’s parents. Brad had an afternoon class and I had work, so we started the 3 ½ hour drive in the evening instead. One of Brad’s friends, Chris also came along for the weekend. So the three of us piled into Brad’s Supra and we were off.

It was sunny when we started and gradually darkened. We went from rice fields and flat terrain into the Ozark Mountains of northern Arkansas. When we were only 30 minutes from the grandparents' house, going up and down and back and forth on the curvy road, it was dark and had recently rained. Chris was polishing his laser pointer aiming skills by shining his pointer at passing street signs. The red dot reflected on an S-curve sign.

Maybe they should have placed the sign further ahead of the curves. Or maybe Brad should have been watching the road instead of the laser pointer. In any case we were suddenly entering a sharp left curve at 60 miles an hour. Brad cranked the wheel to follow the curve and let off the gas. The combination of wet pavement and weight transfer caused the rear of the car to swing out toward the steep 50 foot drop on the right side of the road. Brad flipped the wheel right to recover, but over-compensated and the rear snapped out to the left.

At this point we were traveling sideways down the road at about 45 miles per hour with one set of tires on either side of the double yellow line. Brad was doing his best to straighten the car out, but after the tail swung right and left 2 more times each, we finally spun around backward and left the road back end first and traveling about 30 miles per hour.

The fortunate thing was that the outside of the 2^nd curve in the S was a 45 degree slope going up. We slide up this grass and dirt bank still slowly spinning. Then one of the rear tires caught a large rock going sideways. We spun around forward again and rolled back down onto the road and finally stopped. What has taken me 15 minutes to write actually took about 7 seconds to happen.

I noticed that the outside of the first curve in the S and the inside of the second curve were a steep drop into a valley below. We had exited the road on the proper side, but even so, there were large, sturdy looking oak trees near the top of the bank we slid up and across. A little more momentum and we could have been their lunch (or late evening snack, considering the time).

The rock managed to rip the rear tire almost free of the wheel. Brad got the car off on the side of the road and we changed to the spare and were on our way again. I’m no scientist and I had a rough time with physics in college, but even I can see that things could have gone a lot worse. There are so many variables that come into a situation like that. None of us were hurt, the car was not damaged, and only a tire was lost. Sometimes I do believe angels act as guardrails. They bounce us in the right direction, but only enough to save our lives and still let us know we should be more careful.

A few months later I was riding with Brad in the same Supra on the way to church. We were going down a divided highway where the intersections had no ramps or overpasses. We had to make a left turn across oncoming traffic. Now, the entrance to road we were taking was guarded by 3 concrete islands. The sequence was something like this: northbound lane to freeway – island – crossing, out – island – crossing in (that’s where we were headed) – island – northbound exit lane.

We glided into the left turn lane still at cruising speed. I could tell Brad was going to take this corner fast. Braking slightly, he entered the turn which would take us over the median, 2 oncoming lanes, and between 2 of the islands. I felt the centrifugal force pushing me towards my door. Then the rear end snapped out to the right and we entered a long spin that took us sideways across the two lanes and in between the islands we were originally aiming for – except we slid in between the islands backwards.

Anyone watching would have thought it was planned and executed by a professional stunt driver. As we sat there facing out in the “in” lane, I looked over and saw a car sitting a few feet away on the other side of the center island, waiting to cross and go south. The man driving was probably about 60, and the look on his face was that of a man who’d just seen aliens land.

Brad quickly backed up and turned – BAM!!!! – right over the curb tail of the center island. I know both of us were so embarrassed, though we didn’t mention it. It was starting to look liked we’d just hopped in a car for the first time in our lives, and had no clue how to use it! We continued slowly and humbly on to church.