"Asphalt" (Asphalt)
01/21/2014 at 18:30 • Filed to: great driving roads, best driving roads, asphalt, fiat 500 abarth, top gear, jeremy clarkson, clk63 amg black series, power, drifting, handling, corners
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"Asphalt" (Asphalt)
01/21/2014 at 18:30 • Filed to: great driving roads, best driving roads, asphalt, fiat 500 abarth, top gear, jeremy clarkson, clk63 amg black series, power, drifting, handling, corners | 0
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Good day everyone in Jalopnikverse. Much like you, I am a car enthusiast, and that means not only do I enjoy driving cars, but I also enjoy reading and watching about them. From Youtube's various car channels to the most famous Top Gear, I've seen them all. Very exciting shows they are, what with their Dodge Vipers and Olivers, they attract and inspire motoring enthusiasts all over the world, unless, of course, you're a motorcyclist trying to watch Top Gear.
One particular episode of Top Gear that truly inspired me was of course a review Jeremy Clarkson did on a car. Perhaps it was particularly special for him as well, as he soon after purchased the CLK63 AMG Black series. In it, Jeremy questioned the modern automotive enthusiast; he questioned the dying activity of driving with no destination in mind. Driving for the journey itself, a journey that truly does not have an end. The pursuit of driving just for fun is something that, he says, seemed to be done only by motorcyclists, not human beings.
As Jeremy wraps up his review of the CLK Black, he said that "you can sit back and indulge in what this show's all about. The absolute joy of driving a great car on a great road." Cue inspirational music.
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Wow, I thought. This is absolutely great, inspiring, and makes me want to get out and drive. And then I realized he didn't answer his original question. His initial questioning of why people no longer go out for great drives. He guessed that it was because cars weren't exciting enough, and the rest of the review implies that the CLK Black is what makes his great drive possible.
But, he's wrong. There's no doubt that the CLK Black series is a fantastic, exciting, and fun-to-drive car; but saying that a CLK Black is required for driving fun suggests that we all need to have the financial ability to purchase a car costing well over our budgets. FR-S, BRZ, and the Fiesta ST are all fun little cars that are within people's budgets. Clearly then, it's not the car that makes the drive fun.
In fact, it is a great road that makes driving fun. These days our roads are clogged with ever increasing traffic, potholes, or are flat out not fun to drive. As the majority of us live in, or near large cities, the only roads we drive on are grids of traffic. Living in New York, this is something that I've always experienced, and to get a fun drive, I must leave the city far behind.
But this makes having a fun drive difficult. After paying for gas, paying the expensive tolls to get in and out of the city, and driving through mind-numbing traffic, I now must find great roads to drive on. Roads that aren't pothole infested, that don't have too much traffic, and that have lots of curves to enjoy a car's handling.
Top Gear and various other programs have only occasionally bothered talking about, according to Jeremy Clarkson, is essentially what half their show is about, the great roads bit. Ferraris and Lamborghinis are exciting to film, exciting to travel to and see. Finding great roads would be fairly mundane and tedious work. Other than the greatest road in the world segment, Top Gear hasn't really covered this aspect of their show.
And so, that's what I'm here to do. Forget the flashy cars and the drifting and lots of power slides, and just focus on the roads. Asphalt will document great driving roads, beginning in the Northeast, and spreading throughout the country. If you're a driving enthusiast, join us and subscribe to our !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! to get the latest updates. We'll be posting reviews of our roads on this blog. Most importantly, go out and drive!
Here is our latest road:
It's more of an enjoyable cruise, but check out some of the other videos for tighter roads. Link in description to map.