It's just after midnight on an extremely cold night (-23 Celsius) and the
wife and me are heading downtown to pick-up some Chinese food from Rol San.
The roads are glossed over with the black and dangerous stuff, with a thin
layer of snow floating above the icy menace. The streets are almost empty,
all the sane people are safely at home waiting for better weather. I'm not
scared, I'm totally confident with my car's handling prowess and I'm quite
cable of taking the car to it's limit and beyond. I've got an amazingly well
balance, light weight, front drive, that's packing one of the best snow
tires on the market (Nokia Hakkapolita 1) and a sporty suspension system
that sits low to the ground. It's my 98 Honda Civic Hatchback which has seen
7 winters while accumulating 215,000km.

I'm going south on Bayview and about to enter a stretch of road that will
involve taking 5 connecting ramps, crossing two bridges, going down and up
one ravine and over another. Basically, a tantalizing 5km stretch of road
that will take me to my deep fried squid and Chinese broccoli in garlic
sauce. Just before the fun began, a gleaming white RSX Type-S takes the
right lane from an inside street. I think nothing of it, since the RSX has a
primitive Mc Pherson strut, I figure I'll easily lose him and the guy in the
RSX would be nuts to try and keep up with me. What actually happened, was I
was pushing myself and my car to the limits and couldn't catch him!!! We're
about the same on the sharper turns, I had an edge on sweeping turns, but on
the straight away, he'd take off as if I was standing still (which is crazy
considering the road condition). I was able to catch him on the DVP because
of some traffic. On the DVP to Gardner ramp, I was able to gain a bit, but
when the Gardner straightened out, he basically disappeared on me and my
hunger reminded me that the Spadina exit to Rol San was coming up. (It's a
good thing the wife is used to my driving and she was there to give my car a
bit of extra balance for the turns)

I'm a believer, If I could afford a second car, it'd be the 05 RSX-S.

Pars