With the warm weather finally arrived, organized cruise nights with local clubs have started again and it's one night I try to treat myself too each week, as work (and she-who-must-be-catered-to
) permits. The evening usually begins with clubs meeting up at various designated sites to shoot the $hit for awhile and just hang out with like-minded car nuts and admire all the different rides. It's a relatively small area I live in, so the few clubs around are made up of all makes and eras of cars. Being an ex-Firebird owner, I usually hang out with friends I made there over the years of owning that car. After a couple hours of sitting and yakking and a few short jaunts around town, some people call it a night and head home...while others hang on into the wee hours and wait for a little more action of a different kind
.
Being such an awesome night weather wise - great top down driving ( there's something about driving top down on a beautiful clear warm night that just can't be matched during the day) I decided to stick it out too. Those of us still around headed out along our usual route, through deserted streets across town to have a little fun. Nice wide 4 lane roads with a few traffic lights along the way to pump up the action and set the mood. A long line of gleaming iron with the deep burbling tone of (mostly) V8 muscle, barely restrained, for background music making it's way through the warm spring night - well there's times you just say to yourself "life is good"!
The SLK55 has gotten a lot of compliments among this group since I picked it up and it was itching to stretch it's legs a little. There was a Paxton S/C'd 5.0 Mustang along with us that I was slicing and dicing with a little on the way across town - nothing serious just some posturing really. But then, just before our destination we caught a red light side by side on a nice stretch, fours lanes wide, leading slightly uphill and we both looked over at each other and grinned. ESP off (always drive it that way anyway *L*), tap down to 1st gear in "S" mode (so it'll stay in 1st and not bump up to 2nd if I get too much wheel spin and have to get off/on the gas again).
Light goes yellow in the cross lane, absolutely no other traffic aound, I can hear the 5.0 start to bring up the revs and heart pounding, the light goes GREEN. Half throttle to get moving and then I WALK on it - a little wheel spin, but nothing serious and then the SLK with a roar from the quad pipes (LOVE the sound with the top down!) as the 5.4 V8 at full song squats and is GONE! Now I fully expect this S/C'd Mustang (he runs quicker ET's than me at the track...on sticky tires << my ace in the hole here as he was now on regular street tires) to leave me sucking dust, but didn't happen! I get a good jump on him off the line as he spun big time and had to peddle it. I could hear the screaming whine from the supercharged 5.0 as he finallty hooked and clawed his way back to my rear fender. I thought awww now it's over...but it still didn't happen! With each shift he would fall back a little further and then hold, but with the SLK snapping off clean redline shifts in each gear I had the advantage there too it seemed.
Took it deep into 4th gear and with a turn approaching and a car's lead over the Mustang, he backed off and moved over behind me. From that point we just cruised in peace to the next hangout not far up the road. "Holy ****, what's IN that thing" were his first words when we got out LOL!
Awwwwwww summer is back!!!!
