513 Comments
Comment deleted
Oct 2, 2023
Comment deleted
Expand full comment

Camden Thrasher is incredible, and as great as his automotive and motorsports photography is, his aviation photography makes it all look somehow pedestrian by comparison. Also, he took photos of both my sons in the Bentley Continental GT3 at Lime Rock Park, which I cherish.

Expand full comment

Hoping he gets a picture of my son in an A-10 someday, preferably going weapons free on the Meta campus from 500 feet.

We hired him for Sam's "jedi canyon" piece.

Expand full comment

That was a good piece.

Expand full comment

I may or may not know that canyon really well, both from a flying and plane spotting perspective.

Expand full comment

Just got the reference!

Zuck go boom! 😂

Expand full comment

Derek I didn't know you shot professionally. Cool.

Expand full comment
Comment deleted
Oct 2, 2023
Comment deleted
Expand full comment

I'm in the street photo world, do workshops, talks etc. By day middle age lawyer, by night art dude..

Expand full comment
Comment deleted
Oct 2, 2023
Comment deleted
Expand full comment

Sure, if you're ok with it, post yours and I'll follow you. I prefer to keep my personas separate if you know what I mean.

Expand full comment
Comment deleted
Oct 2, 2023
Comment deleted
Expand full comment

Check out the EYExplore YouTube channel for Tokyo street photography, it’s mesmerizing.

The nighttime videos are so amazing you’d think they’re enhanced, but nope, it’s the real thing.

Expand full comment

Thanks will do.

Expand full comment

I think I'll check that out, myself.

Expand full comment

I know nothing about photography other than having two eyes (and plenty of opinions).

But even I can discern Camden’s abilities.

Expand full comment

Chiming in to say that the blue Viper T/A 2.0--that specific one in the photo--is one of my favorite cars of all time. That was a fun week.

Expand full comment

BRILLIANT CAR.

Just stunning. In all conditions.

Expand full comment

Best advice I ever received, re: my initial trepidation with the Viper was from you:

"Pretend it's a giant Miata."

Only good times from that moment forward. I liked that car more than the GT3 that won that PCOTY.

Expand full comment

The GT3 that

"won"

the PCOTY

because it was

11-1 for the Mustang

Expand full comment

Is there not a long list of dubious “winners” of PCOTY?

NSX (I believe Bark M was empaneled on the jury), a Mustang that popped its motor, the Veloster N?

Expand full comment

I can't speak to the Veloster N because I wasn't there -- I've driven one on track, it deserves some praise.

The GT350 blew its engine because it was being abused by our Editor in Chief. A replacement car was immediately provided.

The GT3 was chosen by that same Editor in Chief over the new 2014 Mustang which had EVERYONE else's vote.

The NSX won because Bark M is a better and more persuasive salesman than anyone else on the staff, and because he had personal relationships to maintain with Acura PR. But it's also a great car.

My favorite PCOTY was when I convinced everyone to vote against Kim Wolfkill and he threw his notebook before storming out of the room.

Expand full comment

What’s Kim up to these days?

I met him at the Long Beach GP (2018?) in the Weathertech VIP. I was smoking a cigar on the terrace with a young Weathertech employee with whom I am friendly. Kim complained about this; David MacNeil’s long-time #2, who is another friend of mine, made the executive decision that I would be allowed to indulge myself (this fellow later told me about Kim’s complaint and pointed him out to me).

I introduced myself to Kim later that day and made to sure to name drop my close, personal friend Jack Baruth. Perhaps already predisposed against me, Kim looked at me like you’d look at the bottom of your shoe after stepping in dog shit.

Expand full comment

Wolfkill is a douche bag! I hate every word he ever wrote and hate myself for reading them.

Expand full comment

Oh yes! The incomparable Veloster N! That was the last Issue of R&T that I read. I recall some phrase like, "before you throw this in the fire . . ". I happened to be parked next to a delicious fire enjoying a fine glass of wine and the magazine went straight into the flames.

Expand full comment

Is this the right article to post "Pics or it didn't happen?"

Expand full comment

PCOTY is what put me onto JB. The one where someone crashed a car.

Expand full comment

That someone is an ACF subscriber! :)

Expand full comment

The things that always bugged me about automotive journalism were stuff like:

1: Making the prose too cool by half.

2: Declaring every car a bargain, be it Chevy or Koenigsegg.

3: Acting like the reader gives two shits about trim levels on a fucking Lamborghini.

4: Excoriating American cars for subjective crap and faults they casually dismiss on Euro iron.

5: The endless parade of blowjobs, handies and anal they give the M3.

Did I miss anything?

Expand full comment

Do a story on the replacement of said vehicle a few years down the road, and then call the previous one a POS, which wasn't said at the time. It results in a bit of hurt feelings, but the car makers understand that sometimes you have to put yourself on the line of fire over a discontinued vehicle.

Expand full comment

LOL. I came in just a second late with the same sentiment.

Expand full comment

The sole exception to this was Porsche IMS and RMS failures, which everyone pretended didn't happen even after Porsche settled a lawsuit and fixed cars!

Expand full comment

I never heard of that!

Expand full comment

EXACTLY.

Expand full comment

Pay no attention to the IMS Bearing behind the curtain, I am the great wizard of oz! Trust me! hahaha. Wasn't he BMW E46 M3 rod bearing thing pretty bad, did anyone mention that ever? Kind of doubt it.

Expand full comment

Heute ze rob bearing clearance, morgen die Welt!

Expand full comment

I DID write "rob" instead of "rod."

Fucking Chiclet keys...

Expand full comment

The S54 engine had quite a few issues.

Expand full comment

I like that the throttle position sensors are wear items. Like the motor is only good for 60,000 miles and then it sort of needs refreshing.

My biggest mistake was not buying EVERY failed SMG pump car ever for like nothing. I took mine apart because Fuck the $5k for a new one. Turns out is just machined aluminum and stuff, nothing to really fail. Like a power steering pump. things last forever.

But then I took this black cap off and found a shit little electric motor with a plastic armature that was barely empregnated with copper or whatever which wore through to the plastic. So I started googling the little weird numbers on the motor and a company in California sold me a new armature and brushes that I soldered in. $250 bucks instead of $5000. Plus it's a labor nightmare.

The company is Eurton Electric, in CA. They now sell kits for the SMG and ABS pump motors in case one you makes the mistake I did and buys an E46 M3. Btw I love the car, but it fucking exploded in massachussets and cost me a fortune to get back home. Now Im back to E36 era cars because I fix them in parking lot. Even swap an engine in, if I have to. Much easier to spend a few months on the other side of the country, away from your garage, when you can fix your car anywhere.

Expand full comment

I debate constantly whether to get mine retrofitted. On one hand, it’s $3000 into a ratty old Boxster that goes away in 13 months in favor of a 911 Turbo or F Type SVR or some combination of spec Miata and old Silverado. On the other, I’d like to enjoy my Boxster and go on a variety of wild adventures in it. However, currently exigent is a key replacement (the original key with its “Porsche Southampton” tag is either lost in my apartment or a Pittsburgh club or the trash) which is managing to cost a lovely $800 (for it has to be towed from my driveway in Morgantown, WV to Pittsburgh). If I’m rocking the Audi or Miata in Hocking Hills, you know why.

Expand full comment

It took me about 25-30 years to figure that one out. I'm a slow learner. Took more than a couple of "Hey, wait a minute"'s to finally see the light.

Expand full comment

Oh wait!

Forgot about all the fawning adulation for EVs and Our Safe, Clean, Sustainable Nonbinary Future of Mobility Solutions.

Expand full comment

The idiots I work with were having a conversation about just that thing today. I turned up my Metallica on my headphones and focused on my deeds. I can only take so much idiocy.

Expand full comment

Yeah, can't wait for a bloodless, anodyne future full of Amorphous Transportation Modules made of edible plankton.

It's "Star Trek: The Next Generation" with the neutered humanity, but none of the cool technologies like starships and phasers and deflector shields.

Expand full comment

Not sure if you watched the same Star Trek TNG as me but I remember people being horny AF throughout the whole run.

Expand full comment

You’re absolutely right. Huh.

How long before some zillionaire builds a functioning Enterprise replica? I know we gotta figure out how to warp first, but these are minor details....

Expand full comment

I have a thing for Vash. I like her better than Voyager's 7 of 9.

Expand full comment

Those things are only cool if you go to war, and war is not conducted by neutered humans.

Expand full comment

I’M SURROUNDED BY STUPID. I really wish you’d told to stop being morons.

Expand full comment

I've called them out before. They were complaining about a local TV weatherman getting himself fired for not getting the covid vaccine (they thought he was being stupid and stubborn about it). The TV weatherman had said something about how you wouldn't put brakes on your car without some sort of warranty, why would you trust a pharmaceutical company you can't hold accountable? Well, these two dolts thought he was being stupid, so I called them out on it ("You DON'T think it's a little weird those huge-ass companies are without liability in this case?") they were DESPERATE to come up with an excuse to cling to their worldview. I still remember the darting eyes on the one dolt's face as he sought the farthest corners of his mind for something, ANYTHING to maintain his idiotic worldview. It had been a waste of my time then, and it isn't any better now.

Oh, and there was also the day when Rittenhouse got his not guilty verdict. The one dolt was astonished to learn that the people he killed in self defense were white guys. It was like you see in movies, his "THEY WERE WHITE????" shout reverberated through the entire building. Nothing I say matters. He and the others are all still dolts.

Expand full comment

Carrying the Our Bodies Of The Our Democracy

Expand full comment

I really started to notice this when the Mustang finally got IRS and the '10-'14 car suddenly became the most antediluvian piece of shit ever made. Pepperidge Farms remembers when most publications lauded Ford's suspension work on the 2010 car, with at least one claiming it out handled the Camaro's IRS.

I owned both generations of Mustang. I can't drive worth shit. I didn't notice a difference on all but the worst pavement.

Expand full comment

The 2011 Coyotes that were built for the press intro event didn't get limited-slips due to production issues, but it was still on the sticker.

At least three of the tests I read after the fact praised the diff for its fast locking action.

Expand full comment

...it's painfully obvious when an LSD is absent or has failed. I could have used some "fast locking action" when I learned this in my first car, the first time I tried to show off after an after-work store meeting at the Whole Foods I was employed at, and instead of doing a glorious donut almost drove into a parking island because the outer rear tire didn't get the memo.

Expand full comment

Yeah a one-tire donut is a plow

Expand full comment

The main reason Ford put an IRS in the S550 was because it was sick of taking all that shit from the auto press about the Mustang's live axle.

Funny, I seem to recall the S197 punking the M3 on road courses.

Expand full comment

Maybe I have too much 'MURCA in my blood, but I'd take a Mustang almost every time over an M3. (exception: E46 in Laguna Seca Blue)

Expand full comment

I'd take a Mustang becuase V8s are cooler than inline sixes, doubly so when the six has puked coolant on the road.

Again.

Expand full comment

When we were seriously considering settling down in Japan forever, I was looking for old Mustangs to put in my driveway after we had our house built. Instead we had a third kid and moved back, but I still sometimes daydream about driving my Mustang GT convertible up and down the 135 coastal road in Izu at full throttle.

Expand full comment

In stock trim that could well be true. When you set them both up with equal allowances in terms of tire and aero, the E46 M3 is faster than a Coyote Mustang. Hell, my World Challenge Accord with 282 frwhp made easy meat of Spec Iron 5.0 S197s.

Expand full comment

See, that's the ugly little secret of the independent rear suspension: On a smooth surface, it has almost no advantage over a well-sorted live axle, and a few disadvantages.

Expand full comment

From what I saw and heard, it was driven the by the younger hard core mustang fans. You might be surprised how many hard core Ford guys actually worked at Ford. Not as many as I would have liked but it was enough.

The old guys claimed that IFS couldn't handle 500hp and there new engines that were coming. And the young guys were like we don't care how much power it makes if it's a sold axle and your customers won't either. The game changer was the ford GT. They shoved that suspension design down every drag racer's throat at ford for the years when anyone ever brought up a live axle. I think we got IFS in the mustang because it worked in the GT. Halo car for real.

Expand full comment

I worked for Ford back in 2003 in the marketing department with the brand managers. There was a massive push for the new mustang to have IFS and while I can't remember all the details from just the conversations, my feeling was that the younger teams lost to the old side of Ford that was arguing the Mustang was more important to drag racers than road racer types. But I remember them being pissed and telling me to wait and watch... No way the next Mustang(10-14 I guess) will still have a live axle. I remember that day well.

Oh also, don't hate me Jack, my presentation to Mgmt was to pull the crown vic out of showrooms. Special order only. I toured the east coast talking to dealers and everyone of them begged me to stop sending crown Vics and showed me a pile in the back of lot that were way off floorplan and costing them a fortune. I also found out that day that dealers don't really get to order their cars. Sure they can ask for some, but the truck shows up with a bunch of stuff they didn't want either! I was like how the hell?

The answers were kind of awesome. It's Ford and Im Ford, if they want me to sell it, I'll do my best. BUT PLEASE FIND A WAY TO GET THE CROWN VICS OFF THE TRUCKS.

I'm sure it was discussed forever at Ford, but when I came back from trip and my group asked what I learned, I was like Ford needs to stop selling the crown vic in showrooms.... You should have seen their faces and the silence.

YOU CANNOT TELL SENIOR MANAGEMENT THAT!

Watch me! There was a lot of infighting, but I was like you're screwing dealers every time you ship them one and I bet the head of Ford has no idea, bc you are too afraid. Tell them truth. Let them make good decisions.

Expand full comment

The Vic was showroom poison from about 1995 onwards. Which was a shame, because it was a good and durable car.

Expand full comment

Only limo services, taxi companies and police departments wanted the Panther, and that was only because they couldn't get Caprices anymore.

Expand full comment

Not quite. I sold four of them over the course of year, all special ordered for businessmen or professors in their sixties. One of them was a notable architect who had done some really neat buildings over the years.

Expand full comment

Probably the last time anyone told the truth up the chain at Ford. No sarc.

Expand full comment

6. Audi understeer.

7. Porsche 911 oversteer.

8. Wagons are cool.

Expand full comment

BROWN DIESEL MANUAL wagons, that no one with working synapses would actually buy.

Expand full comment

Oh please, the fetish for manual wagons of any kind is so stupid. You really want a 15 year old BMW wagon so you can change gears on your way to Home Depot? really?

Expand full comment

Ahem.

84 LeSabre with a tow truck dually rear end, a 572 crate and a T-56.

Expand full comment

i request multiple servings of whatever inspired that idea for a vehicle

Expand full comment

Mustard greens and possum innards.

It was part of my "Build A Tow Truck Out Of Anything!" fever dream.

I think I need professional help.

Expand full comment

you, sir, are a hero. and you must provide photos.

Expand full comment

Let's hope the commenter who drives a 22 year old manual BMW wagon to Home Depot doesn't see this!

Expand full comment

Hah, I just sold an E91 with a ZF for about $10,000 less than if it had a manual. There are actually people swapping transmissions in these.

Expand full comment

The only good kind of tranny swap in today's world.

Expand full comment

I gotta look that up. My daily driver is an automatic 2007 E91. Luckily I have a great German mechanic over here in Hooterville.

I had it on a road trip this weekend and the 2.8 liter inline-6 is just great on the highway.

Expand full comment

I saw it. LOL. For the record, I only go to Home Depot after going to the local TrueValue, ACE, and Lowes first...

Expand full comment

I'm a Menards man myself. Often hum the tune in the shower.

Expand full comment

Don’t understand the hate here. Why wouldn’t I want a nice driving practical car? It’s no different than a BMW sedan except having more cargo capacity.

Expand full comment

I LOVE wagons!

Don't care WHO makes them.

Expand full comment

Now, now, the rear suspensions are often different, and not in a good way! :)

Expand full comment

I wager for anything up to 8/10ths driving it doesn't matter.

Expand full comment

In the early ‘90s, I had a 10 year old Volvo 240 wagon, manual, vinyl seats, no a/c. Nice, had ipd sway bars and Tokiko shocks, so it handled ok enough to autocross, but it was slow. Liked it, but not enough to ever get another one. Don’t understand the current view of them...

Expand full comment

As the owner of two e46s (sedan and wagon) that are used for daily driver duty, the wagon is super handy for hauling stuff and it drives no different from the sedan. Subjectively I think the wagon is a better looking car.

Expand full comment

A hauler that hauls!

Expand full comment

I don't think this is subjective.

I reckon it's something to do with the long clean line of the roof. I've always hoped Sajeev would write an article explaining the principles.

Expand full comment

I never understood the brown and diesel bullet points, beyond being purposefully contrarian. Regular 3-series wagons don't do anything for me, either, but if I were shopping E63s, the wagon would have most of my attention. On the off chance I ever live in Europe, a V10 manual M5 longroof with the most extended coverage I can find will be at the top of my shopping list next to a TVR Sagaris, too.

When you grew up collecting baseball cards, wagons check a lot of the same boxes that made some cards more desirable than others. The rarity makes fast wagons a lot more interesting than their run-of-the-mill sedan counterparts - the reverse would be true if wagons were the decades-ling go-to ride of rich non-car guys that just walk into the Bimmer showroom and select the most expensive one.

Expand full comment

Diesel is the ultimate fuel. Torque in all the right places like an ev and the convenience of internal combustion. Greater range than petrol and less carbon too. Just a bit of a shame about the babies that die from the nitrous oxides☹️

Expand full comment

Soot is the real killer. Getting rid of that is tricky, and goes some way to explain all the exhaust treatments for diesels.

Expand full comment

I think the idea is a sort of shorthand complaint about the NHTSA interfering in the availability of certain cars here in America.

Expand full comment

Only if it's French and especially if it's a Citroen.

Expand full comment

Oh ho ho!

Expand full comment

uh, yes. :-)

Expand full comment

MB 300D wagon creamsicle brown.

Expand full comment

BOSS WAGON!

Expand full comment

Don't forget MB-Tex seating surfaces. "NO, IT'S NOT VINYL!!!! APOLOGIZE!!!!"

Expand full comment

Aren't creamsicles orange?

Expand full comment

Just creamy brown, like soft serve chocolate.

Expand full comment

Wait, didn't David E have a Mercedes wagon in dark bronze he salivated over in print?

Expand full comment

What, was he getting kickbacks from Mercedes too?

Expand full comment

The BOSS WAGON, which was a gift from Mercedes-Benz, I believe.

Expand full comment

If I remember right it was Light Ivory (beige) and DED Jr did quite a bit of damage to it when he hit a console TV that was on a road.

Expand full comment

Oooh, I don't remember that story, maybe there was a laps in our subscription. IDK why but just the mention of DED makes me think of Turn your "Hymnal to 2002", changed the automotive direction of my life, and my dad and brother, too

Expand full comment

He wrote a few paragraphs and had a picture of the TV at the end of one of his columns I think.

My dad bought a lot of cars based on magazine reviews and previews back then.

Expand full comment

Thanks for the diagnosis.

Fortunately the wife has working synapses and I only have 1 bucket of car money.

Expand full comment

When I was growing up, so mamy times the conversation could've so easily gone:

"Now what would your mother think of you of she found out what you did?"

"Hell, it was her idea!"

Expand full comment

Wife and I love our wagons. She was devastated when I deemed our Royal Indigo Metallic 2002 Mercedes E320 wagon unrepairable due to cascading electrical issues. Still drove great at 437k miles, but it’s easier to tell you what worked than what didn’t - instrument cluster, radio, headlights. I shut her up upon finding our Fusion Blue 2006 Saab 9-5 SportCombi.

Wagons just seem to meet all my needs. More nimble than an SUV as well. But I will agree that they’re fetishized for the sake of style, and I can’t really explain why I’m disgusted with that.

Expand full comment

Don't forget when It comes to sports cars the latest version is always docile and easily controlled at the limit while the previous model was a handful and always has been just don't read the reviews from when it came out that mention nothing of the sort.

Expand full comment

Regarding #1, which applies to a lot of journalism in general: When Tom Wolfe died, I wanted to do a piece on how much he influenced automotive writing (if anything is seminal, The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby is) particularly at Car & Driver. When I asked Don Sherman about it he said something to the effect of "Wait. Were you hanging out in the C&D offices back then? Immeasurable."

I mean that, btw, in a good sense. I don't know if Jack would agree with me, but he puts a lot of himself up front in his writing and I think you can draw a line between that and TTFSB. Just because the facts need to be objective doesn't mean the craft of writing about them can't be subjective.

Expand full comment

Sherman is an astounding human being and should have been running Road&Track or C/D from about 2000 to about right now.

Expand full comment

(Folx - he means Don Sherman and not “me”)

Expand full comment

I wouldn't let you edit a fuckin' snack shop menu.

Please take that with love.

Expand full comment

Verbosity is the signifier non-pareil of intelligence, right?

I suppose I could copy edit fairly well; that it actually a significant portion of the junior banking toolkit (and virtually every day is “deadline”).

Expand full comment

You should apply to be the copy-editor at C/D. Give you a chance to earn in a year what would otherwise take you a week.

Expand full comment

And brevity is the soul of wit! No wonder I ain’t funny! 🙄

Expand full comment

The firing of Sherman as editor was the beginning of the end for Car and Driver. It's understandable that he could not have survived in a corporate environment, because he doesn't suffer fools, and he says exactly what's on his mind. I honestly believe that, as different a character as he was from David, he could have kept the spirit of Car and Drivetrain alive. Jeanes is a nice and decent man, and definitely much better at dealing with the corporate overlords, but probably lacking the fight in him to keep the old counter culture spirit alive.

Expand full comment

"The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby"

This is the best title for anything. I love it.

Expand full comment

Obviously I enjoy and subscribe, but it was a little too personal I'm the early TTAC days.

I am a big fan of the balance his writing has struck for the last decade.

Expand full comment

In my defense, we weren't getting paid for anything and we weren't really sure there was even an audience out there. It was like doing stand-up comedy during the week.

Expand full comment

I remember reading an article about some economy car where the PR shill talked about its "classic front-wheel drive proportions." I clicked off it and never went back. I can't say exactly what it is about that phrase that bothered me so much, but even just typing it as an example makes me feel like I'm about to break out in hives.

Expand full comment

Was he talking about the 1966 Toro or the 1974 Civic?

Expand full comment

If only one of those was the case!

Expand full comment

I’d like to think it was a Cord L-29 where part of the suspension does double duty as the front bumper.

Expand full comment

Would you like "understeer at the limit" with that?

Expand full comment

Only if it falls readily to hand.

Expand full comment

Like an original Mini?

Whatever that guy's smoking, it's top shelf.

Expand full comment

Hear, Hear!

Expand full comment

Hahahaha. I was bracing myself to find out where I'd land on the spectrum of this article as both a photographer AND one of those despised art directors.... I must have done something right. Glad to see you appreciate(d) me even though two of my former employers failed to.

And for the record, we got plenty of driving in on that trip to the Alps!

Expand full comment

More than I wanted, what with having 3 broken ribs and a fractured right arm!

I still tell the story of the terrifying German snack shop proprietor across the street from the Goldfinger hotel.

Expand full comment

The hairpin hotel on Furka? Check this out! Plus you can see your weirdo's shop out one of the windows. But man this story is sad. I'm only half way through hand wanted to share before I forget. But you will want to read this if you like that area. Fascinating history I never really understood. https://www.nzz.ch/english/why-the-famous-belvedere-hotel-at-furka-pass-may-close-forever-ld.1696737

Expand full comment

What a great (and sad) story! Thank you for sharing it.

Expand full comment

Thanks, Bill! That’s an amazing story. And puts to rest my fantasy of being the fool who resurrects that hotel.

Expand full comment

That Camaro at the "Thermal Club"? Where next year IndyCar is going to have a non points something, on a track where there will be almost nobody in attendance? Stupidest plucking thing I've ever heard.

I take that back. Doing the same in Argentina and then having to transport Callum Ilott's body back to Britian because the Argentines have hurt feelz will be worse.

Expand full comment

Thermal Club is three trash racetracks in one!

Expand full comment

So's the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

Expand full comment

I love the mountain section! It always seems to rain when I go through and it's usually the middle of the night with no traffic. love that section.

Expand full comment

I had a metal ramp come out of a steel deck trailer on the PA Turnpike one night. Didn't realize it until 200 miles later.

Expand full comment

Why is it trash? The layout looks a bit odd but I'm not sure if that would make it "bad".

Expand full comment

They had a wide open desert to lay out the tracks and yet there is something to hit at EVERY fast corner.

Expand full comment

You're right, that is trash.

I should apply as a track designer.

Expand full comment

I use photos and their captions to include information that would otherwise interrupt the narrative flow. Also, vintage photos and advertising can add a lot of to a piece.

Expand full comment

Bingo. When I write articles, the captions for the photos are the most fun and add to the article. For my book, I think I had 25K words in captions alone and they were a lot of fun to write and didn't duplicate the main text of the work.

Expand full comment

Just last week I added some photos and ads to an article that my editor had already edited.

Expand full comment

And you have an editor!! I find my technique of writing for publications and and websites so obscure that they don't have the budget for a real editor, or they're just thankful for someone that can string two sentences together writes for them, usually results in no, or very little, editing of my original drafts :).

Expand full comment

" I’ve never taken a single photo that anyone thought was any good. So how much could my opinion possibly matter, anyway?" you don't need to be able to cook in order to tell if a meal is good or bad.

Expand full comment

True. I mean, I don't have a vagina, but I have opinions about them.

Expand full comment

John Meyer says he still hasn't found one that's special, but that hasn't apparently stopped him from looking.

Expand full comment

It's out there and will rock your world .

-Nate

Expand full comment

I didn't say that I agreed with Meyer. I've been fairly pleased with most of those that I've encountered.

That reminds me of a joke, but you'll have to fill in the blanks. I'll give you some hints. The first might raise an eyebrow in mixed company, unless you're a female doing standup comedy. The second will get you completely excommunicated from polite society, well, unless you're British. In America it's radioactive.

A 12 year old boy asks his father, "Dad, what's the difference between a ____ and a ____?"

Dad tells him to go get the magazine he keeps stashed behind the toilet. Kid gets the magazine.

"Now see that pink slit with the fur around it?" (It was an older magazine, and an even older joke).

"Yeah, dad."

"Well that's a ____. Everything else in the picture is a ____"

Expand full comment

=8-) .

-Nate

Expand full comment

You might not be good at taking pictures of machines. Inanimate objects. Every try the human element. Like get a super wide lens and try to capture the feel of a bunch of fiends working on a race car together? I bet you would be really good. Try it next time youre not under time pressure and are prepping cars. like your cat photos dude. Ohhh... maybe that's your jam. Kittens, Cars, and Cougars.

Expand full comment

Full disclosure: I was one of those art directors who lived by the "photos or it didn't happen" law. Which is to a large degree what Jack is complaining about—but it is the reason the two of us would be on a location.

Expand full comment

It didn't help that we worked for some of the most deeply insecure people in America, at least one of whom is probably doing a bit of roleplay tonight where he pretends to be you and a warm meatloaf in a Nalgene bottle stands in for someone else we know.

Expand full comment

That's why you don't REALLY want X-ray vision.

Expand full comment

What? Huh? Do that on Only Fans and they would probably drop you and call the cops. Unless I am completely missing something, that's something I never want to see.

I'm picturing Dennis Hopper in Blue Velvet with a oxygen mask on, not hooked up to anything, degrading Isabella Rossellini, while I believe Kyle MacLachlan is watching in a closet.

Expand full comment

It's a reference to the fact that one of my valued subscribers managed to hook up with someone who was permanently beyond the reach of the other person being discussed.

Expand full comment

I'm thinking of a meat filled Fleshlight. Yeah, I know.......

Expand full comment

A vendor at the harmonica convention was selling a harmonica disinfecting chamber that looked so much like a Fleshlight that people couldn't walk by without laughing. Here's another one. https://www.thomann.de/prodbilder/512064.jpg

Expand full comment

Soooo can we discuss the harmonica convention? What does it sound like the convention hall? I'm picturing the South Park recorder episode! and now I kind of want to go! also that is a flesh light!

Expand full comment

That made my day and it's only 8:20 AM.

Expand full comment

Never seen that movie, and now I never want to.

Hollywood filmmakers are horrible, disgusting human beings.

Expand full comment

Why would anyone molest a perfectly good piece of meatloaf?

Expand full comment

I dunno. Ask Alex Portnoy (though I believe he preferred liver).

Expand full comment

Is he related to the Barstool sports guy?

Expand full comment

Unless Dave is also a fictional character, no.

Speaking of Dave Portnoy, I'm genuinely ambivalent about him. He's a prick and not very book smart, but he's pretty good on the First Amendment, seems to help small businesses, and he's demonstrated how so many journalists are biased hacks today. I just think he's an ass. That's okay, most people probably think that way about me if they don't have a stronger epithet to use. The one that hurt, though, is when my cousin told me that people considered me to be a boor.

Expand full comment

One of those small businessmen lives on my route. Drives a G-Wagen and I saw his wife the other day in an SL Roadster. I'm suspicious.

Expand full comment

He does know his pizza and is passionate about doing the videos. A few years ago he did a couple of pizza joints in Old Forge PA bordering Scranton. My nephew is from the other side of Scranton.

He was in Philly and sees Portnoy doing a video. Shouts old "Old Forge". Portnoy goes and says "Which One? Store A or Store B"? A year or 2 had passed and Portnoy probably had a 100 or so videos in between.

Expand full comment

"The one that hurt, though, is when my cousin told me that people considered me to be a boor."

You have a talent for saying what probably doesn't need to be said out loud, and for running every thread to the end. However, those are also the marks of a talented artist, so whatcha gonna do?

Expand full comment

and his sister's bra. (reading that now, as it happens)

Expand full comment

Does it hold up? I read it in high school and thought Roth owed Lenny Bruce royalties.

Expand full comment

I'm only 40 pages in, so I can't make much of a judgement. I imagine that, at the time (written in 1968), it was quite scandalous, but in this day and age, you can read about jerking off into a piece of liver (or at least a Nalgene bottle packed with meatloaf) on any hack's Substack.

Roth also seems to rely very heavily on the trope of the nagging, worrying Jewish mother and aloof, overworked (and constipated - so much emphasis on that) father. Perhaps he was the first to make such things a feature of literature, and so they were not tropes when he wrote them?

Expand full comment

For the record, I learned “you can make up the story later but not the photos” during my years at Automobile Magazine, not during my brief stopover at Hearst Autos.

Lots of chatter here about the British car magazines, which indeed had a lot to do with the move toward artsy full-color car photography. In establishing Automobile Magazine in 1986, David E. Davis (accurately described farther down by Erik) was attempting to make an American version of CAR magazine.

Expand full comment

Was Automobile ever good?

I started reading Automobile in 1998, which is the same year that I started reading CAR and Evo, and I vastly preferred the Brit rags, even as a third grader.

Expand full comment

The admirable contributions of Joe and a few others aside, I think of Automobile as the auto writing equivalent of the Prince albums where the studio stopped reining him in; turns out that unfettered DED,Jr wasn't as much of a treat.

Expand full comment

"Car" magazine's "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly" section. I still remember this entry from 40(?) years ago:

Volvo xxx:

The good: Built like a tank

The bad: Drives like a tank

Sum Up: It IS a tank

It made me chuckle back then. Decades later, it still makes me chuckle.

Expand full comment

Perfect car for listening to Sabaton in, then.

Expand full comment

Fascinating read. I've been a photographer-by-hobby for many years now, including working gratis for a vintage racing mag, and the stories of photographer privilege seemed otherworldly to me. These are not the paddocks I've walked. I appreciate the desire to control everything in a shot, but I've certainly not enjoyed that luxury. In a live event, the moment is going to happen whether you're there or not, ready or not, equipped or not. I've bumped into Jamey a couple times, incidentally, and I think some of the traits you saw in him allowed him to jump right into event coverage and kick ass. He's a favorite of mine, too.

I also appreciate the need to bring more to the table than photography. In fact, I still believe the only thing that opened a door for me at all was agreeing to do some writing along with photos (which quickly turned into "every time I'm at a track"). I can't claim to have picked up any actual skills from the writers I grew up reading in R&T and C&D, but I will claim inspiration. Those guys comprised a heavy amount of the short-form writing I consumed in my youth, and I learned to appreciate their ability to tell a whole story with a single well-crafted phrase -- the way Chapman would have drawn it up.

Expand full comment

RACING photographers are very different from MAGAZINE photographers. The former have to take the action as it comes.

Expand full comment

What would a smart and enthusiastic car enthusiast have purchased in that C&D Era?

I recently found a 1976 Arizona Republic newspaper my mom had saved from the Bi-Centennial. What did the car classifieds have? a 1953 Bentley Sedan, James Young for $6895. Hertz was selling off their 1975 fleet, from a Pinto at $2995 up to a Cougar at $4175. Pages and pages of various new and late model cars, mostly American with the occasional oddball import.

I guess the subset question is, did the car buyer in 1976 America know how bad the offerings were? Did smart folks try to take advantage of that 1967 Corvette 427 hitting its nadir in price or was it just an outdated car compared to the smog and safety complaint C3's? Imports were a rounding error on sales, largely a Cadillac price for a car of Nova features and size.

What would I have picked? What would you have picked on a realistic budget?

Expand full comment

Well, since I was/am a truck guy, I'd probably have picked some manner of a Ford 4WD pickup (probably a Highboy), a Bronco, a flatfender Jeep or perhaps some cool '60s car like a Mustang. I lived through that era as a kid and I was self-aware enough at the time to know that the cars sucked. I still have some Cars and Parts magazines from the early 70s with unbelievable car prices in them as well.

Expand full comment

Don't forget how hard it was to FIX an old car back then. Nobody stocked any parts for anything that wasn't in showrooms. There was no documentation. Most of the stuff was simple, but Rochester fuel injection?

In 1976, I'd have bought a Fleetwood Talisman! On a realistic budget? Probably a stick-shift RWD Corolla.

Expand full comment

The dealers may not have stocked it, but for domestic cars you could find parts. Heck, in the 1970s, my older brother rebuilt the brakes on the '52 Fleetwood limo his now wife's family owned. We ended up at a shop somewhere in Detroit to get brake cylinders, but we found them NOS.

And of course, there was J.C. Whitney whose catalog at least listed parts going back many decades.

Foreign cars were a whole 'nother thing. My dad and I ended up having to have the caliper pistons for a Mini Cooper machined down past the pitting, hard chrome plated, and then machined to spec because all we could get as parts were the seals.

Expand full comment

You could almost build complete Jeeps and VW Bugs using a J.C. Whitney catalog. The parts might be junk, but they had a lot of them.

Expand full comment

'63 Split window. Silver, with a 327 fuelie and a 4 speed.

One of the greatest American cars ever made.

Expand full comment

I’ve got a silver ‘65 coupe with much better rear view vision if you’re interested.

Expand full comment

If I can ever scrounge up the money, expect a call from me.

Expand full comment

The Bill Mitchell C2 is a great-looking car, but it has the same problem as the second-generation Charger: The overly-vertical windshield.

By the way, why is the split-window so desirable?

Expand full comment

It was a one-year only thing (because looking out the back and seeing stuff is rad) and it's a clear concession to style over practicality.

I love it.

Expand full comment

Oh.

Expand full comment

At least that's how I look at it.

Expand full comment

In '76? I wonder how difficult it was to find a good-condition bullet T-Bird AND keep it maintained. No Autozones or O'Reilly's on every corner like there are now...

Expand full comment

Around this same time period, my grandfather had a '55-'57 T-Bird....until someone ran a red light and it was totaled. A tragedy no doubt experienced by many over the years.

Expand full comment

Definitely a tragedy. That was a painful thing to even read!

Expand full comment

I can imagine the physical pain.....

-Nate

Expand full comment

I think I have some C/D's from that era that I won't ever look at again if you want them. Actually I'd like to send them to you on my dime even if you don't want them!

Speaking of PR, I wrote my first and only post-race PR for an off-road racing team I was on about 15 years ago. Flats are a fact of life when off-road racing. My mistake was that I actually mentioned that we changed tires during the race. I think we only sent it out to about half a dozen sponsors and within a few hours, I had the tire rep on the other end of the phone reaming me a new one. Lesson learned - PR revised and all mention of the 4-5 flats of the POS tires we ran was removed. Never wrote another one!

And speaking of text - one of my favorite all-time articles was in an early '00s issue of R&T when Peter Egan and Tom Cotter drove across the country in Tom's recently purchased 289 Cobra. I've read and re-read that article probably 10 times - and have no idea what photos were in the article....

Expand full comment

I'll take any old magazines you have. I ended up throwing away over a thousand of them when I moved.

Expand full comment

I'll send you an email for shipping info.

Expand full comment

I wish someone would get on the phone and beg Egan to write something.

Expand full comment

It's been done again and again but I think he's tired and the young people at the magazines resent his presence.

Expand full comment

We need Egan to guest post here! I have four anthologies of his R&T columns. Guy was incapable of writing a bad sentence. One of my faves - he’s pondering the latest dilapidated sports car he’s bought to restore and muses that it should make financial sense ‘at my usual free labor rate.’

Expand full comment

YES

Expand full comment

I remember truly good photography from the British car mags in the 90s. It wasn't unusual to see black and white, shutter dragging, flash. The point wasn't to show the car it was to make the feature expressive.

In defense of modern buff books, when I look at a new car what I want to see, and what is usually available, is a set of photos that show me what the thing looks like inside and out. That's it. I could give two craps what it looks like on a track. I'll take it as a give it can move -- action shots are kind of worthless along "reviews."

Ironically, there is very good photography in Panorama. Jeff Zwert is fantastic.

I find video to be unwatchable. Who wants to look at Matt Farah's fat face for 20 minutes?

Expand full comment

"Ironically, there is very good photography in Panorama. Jeff Zwert is fantastic."

Zwart is an odd creature. Kind of built his entire life around someone else's brand and a race that isn't a race, becoming usefully wealthy in the process. I wouldn't want to be him but I can understand why he is well liked.

Expand full comment

I can't comment on that but he is very talented with a camera.

Expand full comment

Jeff is a fun guy to be around. But that seems pretty spot on. And I like racers that build their own haulers and Zwart's is one of my favorites. Perfect for pikes peak too.

Expand full comment

I once wanted to watch a video of someone's hike through Yakushima. Instead of 20 or 30 minutes of breathtaking nature, I got some doofus' fuckin' face and his stupid exaggerated expressions. I couldn't make it more than 2 minutes in. I hate video, too. But I will watch Lauren Chen bitch about the left for 15 minutes.

Expand full comment

I’m with you on video, I don’t watch any of them. I’d much rather read something than watch something.

Expand full comment

"(For the record, Bedard and Sherman really were that good, while Davis, Yates, and Lindamood are much harder to enjoy than they were four decades ago.)"

Bedard actually raced at Indy (doing well enough at lower ranks to get a ride there) and Don is a mensch who likely has forgotten more about cars than I'll ever know. Michael Lamm was also pretty good back in his day, his stuff is historically reliable in my opinion.

Expand full comment

I read C/D in the 90s and I remember liking Bedard then. I liked Philips, too, because I remember him being funny. Was he actually funny or did teenage me just not know any better?

Expand full comment

He was funny in the inoffensive, family-friendly style that used to do well in this country before comedy became women YELLING about their VAGINAS

Expand full comment

Worst comedy.

Expand full comment

You know, the world could use a little more family-friendly comedy these days. Or at least be clever enough to slip it by the kids like Zucker-Abrams-Zucker used to do.

Expand full comment

Try Nate Bargatze. Clean, and I find him pretty hilarious.

Expand full comment

There’s no one talented enough today to create cartoons like Bullwinke or Sherman & Mr. Peabody that simultaneously appealed to kids and adults.

Expand full comment

While I haven't seen it myself, I've heard good things along those lines about Bluey.

Expand full comment

I’ll check it out. Thanks.

Expand full comment

Bluey is one of the best shows of the 2020s, period!

Expand full comment

I'm all about comics like Stanhope, Louis CK, before-he-got-famous Bill Burr, so the down and dirty stuff. That doesn't mean I can't listen to a half hour of Bill Engvall and remember that you don't always have to be the edgiest comic on the hill.

You can just go and imitate Jeff Foxworthy and run with it (goddamit I was trying, honestly)

Expand full comment

The trouble with family-friendly comedy is that is tends to come off as cutesy-poo, like the original "Full House."

"Family-friendly" always struck me as code for "I don't have to worry about having to explain what a necrophiliac is to my six-year-old son."

Red Green is an example of inoffensive comedy done right: Brilliant writing and good actors, but not really aimed at kids.

Expand full comment

I guess vaginal discharge is funnier than smegma.

The only way one can joke about one's dick these days is if one says that it's smaller and less satisfying for his wife than her boyfriend's.

Try the veal, I'll be here all week.

Expand full comment

EW .

-Nate

Expand full comment

phillips wrote something in the late '80s--i think--that had me laughing out loud alone; wish i could remember what it was!

Expand full comment

His book about living in small town MT was enjoyable.

Expand full comment

I don't know. Seemed like an east cost schmuck wanting Montana to be Jerszy.

Expand full comment

Philips is a great writer, and a truly good human being. The man has a huge heart.

Btw, he's written a couple of books which are good reads too.

Expand full comment

I loved Bedard's writing. He personifies the famous Roosevelt "Man in the Arena" quote. I remember the wine-and-cheesedicks putting him down for crashing at Indy and "taking up space that a real racer should have." Most of those guys couldn't fit in an Indy car, and even if they could, they lacked the skill to get out of the pits, let alone qualify for the Greatest Spectacle in Racing.

Three of his pieces I remember clearly:

"800 hp Rubik's Cube" about the difficulty of Indy car chassis/aero setup

The stupidity of car alarms in NYC, and how he broke into a car to silence its alarm so he could get some sleep

Pondering why Dodge Darts were the most likely car to hesitate when the light turns green

Expand full comment

For in-depth writing by Bedard on the efforts at Indy, I recommend "A Rookie at Indianapolis" from the September 1981 C/D; and the best one of 'em all, "The Anatomy of a Crack-Up" from the May 1985 Esquire. The latter describes the 1984 qualifying effort and the frightening effect of the aftermath of the crash. Both of these gems are in my Permanent Archive here @ home.

Expand full comment

I was there for the crash. Wanted to see Bedard race. Got my dad to pay money and drive six hours. I can't imagine any young reader caring that much about me.

Expand full comment

I don’t even have to pay to see you race! Unless you make me expend meager labor, in which case fine. Of course, Im easily the youngest person here, and few in my age cohort really care about racing or cars.

Expand full comment

I mean

A bunch of us gave you money to read your stuff

Expand full comment

Thanks for breaking kayfabe on autojournalism and how these shots are faked, Jack.

Like pro-wrestling, it was fun thinking it was real at one time, but it is a lot more interesting and entertaining knowing now how things work in the background and all the stories that happen behind the curtain.

Expand full comment

I'm like the magicians who betray the craft or something...

Expand full comment

Glad you did. Not sure I'd want to believe in the smoke and mirrors forever.

Expand full comment

Still, I'd like to think that you and Ricky Jay would have gotten along.

Expand full comment

He was one of the few watchable parts of "The World Is Not Enough".

Expand full comment

Trust me. Jack really decided to throw up a sign while drifting that Viper while I lay on the ground trackside.

Expand full comment

I have absolute confidence in myself, five percent of the time. It's a curse.

Expand full comment

I used to do photography. I also used to do the air races (for myself and friends, not professionally - though my website was very popular until I took it down).

However I did miss the shot of a lifetime - Galloping Ghost heading directly at me - because I was more concerned with LIVING than with getting what might have been the posthumous picture of a lifetime.

Expand full comment

My son got to go to Reno for the last race there - I'm glad he did, too. It sounds like an unbelievable scene - very different than I'd have pictured it. The safety concerns aren't trivial, though. He & I chatted a bit about the monumental safety improvements we've seen in auto racing, and how very few of those are applicable to air racing. I'm glad you got out of the way.

Expand full comment

My son and I were there as well -- I've been repeatedly flipping a coin as to whether or not I should write about it.

Expand full comment

FWIW, my son described it as a combination of Eldora and EAA. He went as a spectator and wound up in the pits and drafted to work on one of the jet racers. "Yeah, we need to drop some weight. Grab a wrench and help us lose the second seat and instrument cluster". Just surreal stuff.

Expand full comment

One of my buddies - you’ve met him at Petit Le Mans - was also there.

Expand full comment

Bedard and Sherman were both excellent and essentially irreplaceable, car and driver ceased being a great magazine when they started advocating for higher taxes to keep us plebes off the road. From that moment on I lost all respect, never liked Yates, always seen him as a blowhard.

Expand full comment