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Journal: Who Gets To Drive Your Car?

Who Gets To Drive Your Car?

By Michael Banovsky
March 11, 2016
20 comments

I don’t have a specific set of rules per se regarding who gets to drive my car, but once it’s out of my sight I worry less about my partner Kay crashing—she’s a fantastic driver—and more about the Abarth picking up parking lot dings or a curbed wheel. Between the two of us, there’s little to worry about because we both care for the car and aren’t driving around like yobbos all the time,

In someone else’s hands, I’m not so sure. Valet? No, never…

For anyone else, it’s mostly by gut. This is a $20k compact car that I fret over, let alone those of you with multiple $100,000-plus vehicles in your fleet. Who gets to drive your car? How does one ‘pass muster’ before you’ll let them out for a jaunt?

Image sources: 1, 2, 3, 4

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Alan giger
Alan giger
6 years ago

Nobody. It’s an entirely egocentric indulgence. But I like to take as many people with me to share the experience.

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bisondacier
bisondacier
7 years ago

I would let any experienced “old sports car” driver behind the wheel of my 87 carrera. Fact is, I am surrounded by people that have very little to no experience with sports cars at all, forgotten classic sports car, which require totally different skills. Actually the car wears 225F/275R tires and without any electronic help nor power steering, it needs a hell of a lot of concentration and quite some strengh to keep it where you want, depending on the road shape. So I imagine the only guys who would ever drive my car is the mechanic, a friend that used to drive old BMWs, my brother who has tons of miles behind his 90 hp Beetle, and my father, because it’s my father and I owe him everything I got. Oh and yes, before I forget, even I am not allowed to drive if roads are not completly dry.

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oldSCCAguy yah
oldSCCAguy yah
7 years ago

At the very least, someone who does autocross. Although I’d feel much more comfortable with someone who has an SCCA or NASA racing license.

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Pedro‎ Wald
Pedro‎ Wald
7 years ago

I have a Bmw 325Ci 2003, and a Mercedes E 320 Cabriolet 1994 that I love more than life, My girlfriend is the only one allowed to drive my cars, when other person have to move it, I got worried like an overprotective father…

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Nils Kapahnke
Nils Kapahnke
8 years ago

Everyone who likes it can borrow my VW T3 (everyone likes it) I give it away very often because its so practical and everyone needs a big car from time to time. I love when my bus makes other people happy! Friends used it for weekendtrips, flea market, transporting furniture, band gigs, etc

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Simon Lockie
Simon Lockie
8 years ago

I’ll let most people drive my cars when I’m in them. Out of my sight… The list shrinks a lot, but it also depends on the car and how much I think they would cane it.
That said, some of the best drives I’ve had have been in cars that someone else loaned to me.

1
John Cochran
John Cochran
8 years ago

My wife has driven it, a few close friends, and one of the coolest parts about Porsche ownership is that all of a sudden, people are trusting me to drive their Porsches, and all I have to do is hand over the keys to mine.

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Arnaud FD
Arnaud FD
8 years ago

Absolutely no soul on earth ever touches my own personal keeper car but in a case of emergency my parents could. For the cars i buy and resell, i dont mind as much but i go to great extent to avoid being in any situation forcing me to let someone else drive!

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Patrick Johnston
Patrick Johnston
8 years ago

I trust my father to drive my vehicle safely, as well as my mother seeings she was has driven race cars. That being said I made the mistake of letting my then girlfriend drive my vehicle. Won’t do that again.

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Ricardo Rodriguez
Ricardo Rodriguez
8 years ago

You can drive my car, if and only if you can do it without adjusting the seat, mirrors and steering wheel.

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timmy850
timmy850
8 years ago

With my classic mini, the way I see it is, if you can start the car (choke, throttle, key, starter button, no synchro on first) and drive it around the block without stalling or crashing you’re good to go! It’s been passed through the family for years and I’m the current keeper so I can’t be stingy with it as it was given to me.

But then with my Mazda I bought new in ’11 I’m a bit more picky as it’s always been “my” car and I don’t really share it (except with my wife), despite it being a less exciting new car and thousands of them around..

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Alex Wiens
Alex Wiens
8 years ago

It depends on the car. I’ll let almost anyone borrow my truck. My bikes, a select group of riders.

My BMW (330i), well that’s a bit more picky. There is a small list I’d let drive it without supervision, but that number grows substantially if I’m in the car and they promise to leave the TCS on. This BMW has about 100 more ponies than my last one, so I’m a little more cautious about it.

Yet, I want other people to enjoy this type of car. Honestly, it isn’t all that rare, and the more people I can expose to well handling, moderately powerful, inexpensive for what it does, vehicles, the more enthusiasts we potentially have. One of my most vivid car experiences is a friend of the family who took me for a ride in his rally prepped Celica All-Trac. I had never really understood what you could do with that kind of setup. I was on my way to being the proverbial “car guy”, but that set the trajectory pretty quickly.

I read an article recently about a Petrolicious writer given the opportunity to drive an F40. I admire that owner (whomever it may be) a huge amount, because Trailer Queens and Garage Kings are in my opinion, a shame. While I wouldn’t buy a car I could not drive and I admire those with grail cars. I want to thank the ones who still put them on the road regularly, so both they, and the rest of us, can enjoy them in the environment they were built for.

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M3racer
M3racer
8 years ago

My sister once asked to borrow my E30 M3 for her junior prom. She had a better chance of seeing god than my driving car.

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Brandon Herrera
Brandon Herrera
8 years ago
Reply to  M3racer

lmao! My dad drives my 93 vette every now and then. My mom never asks me, but I would let her.

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Sean Whelan
Sean Whelan
8 years ago

My cars are far from priceless so let that be the filter. The first criterion is they must be able to drive a stick and the second is they have to be interested enthusiasts.
My wife and I let just about anyone drive our cars, we love sharing what we’re passionate about. In all the time we’ve been doing that we only had one incident; someone hit a pheasant and I was plucking the feathers from behind the bumper for days.
When my brothers and I are together for holidays all our keys are piled on a table and anyone can grab any car they want and take it out for a thrash. My nephew just bought his first car, a 91 Miata and was eager for his uncles to take it out, so the tradition continues.

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Guitar Slinger
Guitar Slinger
8 years ago

Other than occasionally my wife .. when I’m in the passenger seat and needing a break during a long drive / journey … and my mechanic ….

Nobody ! Not valets , not friends .. not even the rest of my family . Nobody !

The funny thing was with my AutoDelta modified Alfetta GT …. It .. wouldn’t let anyone other than its mechanic drive the thing . Seriously … it had a ” Christine ” complex ! My ex wife back in the day would get into the drivers seat and it refused to start . A friend or family member … the same … but should I or its mechanic jump in right after ? Zoom … started right up without a hitch ! No exaggeration . No storytelling . Just a simple case of Fact sometimes truly being stranger than fiction .

Funnier thing is … when it came to the ex-wife … methinks the car might of been a whole hell of a lot smarter than I was …. sigh …

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Maxime Veilleux
Maxime Veilleux
8 years ago

The only person I know who I feel absolutly safe about borrowing my car is my dad.

He had multiple Beetle in his life and many more classic car, Hes been driving since 1978 and he’s largely capable of repairing the car if it broke down on him.

Other than that some of my friends drove it like around a block with me inside and thats about it.

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Matthew Lange
Matthew Lange
8 years ago

For my Daytona four people have driven it in the in the last thirty five years. Me obviously, my late father, our mechanic and a journalist for Octane magazine when the car was used for an article. For that I was sitting alongside him the whole time.

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Andrew Golseth
Editor
Andrew Golseth
8 years ago
Reply to  Matthew Lange

I’m willing to let just about anyone drive my cars… so long as I can drive their car(s).

Life is too short to be stingy and if you can swap vehicles for a drive, why would anyone turn down a new experience? They’re insured and at the end of the day, they’re just cars. You can’t take them to the grave and time/money dictate what’s in the stable. So, drive everything you can and enable others the same.

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Christopher Gay
Christopher Gay
8 years ago
Reply to  Matthew Lange

As long as they are not a complete doofus, I would let other people drive my cars.
I think it’s nice to share the experience.
My father had so many different cars when I was growing up that I can’t even begin to make the list or remember them all. They weren’t show cars, they were in varying conditions, but all were wonderful in their own, disparate ways. My father was/is a mechanic, so cars came and went regularly, but I always had a choice of vehicles to take out if I needed. On any given day, I might take an old Datsun ute, a ’74 Jensen Healey, a ’63 Suburban, a ’65 Mustang GT, or even a Meyers Manx. They changed so often, but none were too precious to jump in at any given moment and take to school, the the desert, the mountains, the beach. They’re just cars.

The only reason I would NOT let someone drive my cars is on account of safety.

Now, who WORKS on my cars is another story.

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