Charming a State Trooper with an Audi R8 | Thank Frankel it's Friday

‘Licence’. Pause. ‘Passport’. Pause. ‘That is the most goddam beautiful car I have ever seen, sir. It would be a shame to find it on its roof. Do we understand each other? Good. Have a nice day.’ It is, of course, entirely possible he didn’t know exactly how fast we’d been going a couple of minutes earlier and I wasn’t about to ask. But of all the incredible things the then new Audi R8 did the day I drove it from Las Vegas to Death Valley, charming the pistol out of the hands of the Nevada Highway Patrol was by far the most memorable. So memorable, indeed, that, 16 years later, I remember every detail.

It wasn’t just the trooper upon whom that car had such a profound effect. In Furnace Creek, California (population 88 and, since the thermometer hit 56.7deg C in 1913, the hottest place on earth), a waitress advised me not to be surprised to find puddles by the car when I returned. I was too frightened to ask of what. I lost count of the number of pick-up trucks I was offered in part exchange, and the drivers who swerved dangerously across the Interstate, just to get a better look. Then again, cars that striking were rare out there in the desert and, to date, none had been called an Audi.

Every time I’ve driven an R8 in the intervening years, I’ve thought of that trip. It was excellent. Essentially, me and my mate John Simister (also of this parish from time to time) nicked that car. We were in Vegas for its launch and we saw the prescribed route, a rather dull looking loop out of city and back and decided we’d find something more interesting to do instead, hence breaking for the California border, Furnace Creek and the headquarters of the appropriately named Death Valley National Park.

The road from there to Badwater could have been made for the R8. If it seems strange that in a country of 3.8 million square miles, its hottest and lowest places (Badwater is 282 ft below sea level) should be only 24 miles apart, I am assured by those who understand such things that it is no coincidence at all. What I recall is a road that dove and swept its way past strange-looking almost subterranean geological formations upon which I could press the R8 as hard as I liked. And fun though it was, it was important too, because even then Audi’s reputation for making cars that weren’t as much fun to drive as they were cool to look at was already firmly established; I was determined to find that point at which the veneer of sophistication cracked revealing same old understeering approach beneath. It never came. However good was the R8 to look at, it was better by far to drive. And that was an absolute revelation. Here was an Audi which was in every meaningful way save the provision of tiny rear seats, the closest, most capable rival the Porsche 911 had ever seen.

And, in many ways, it still is. Parked outside now is another, rather younger R8, a ‘base’ car (though still £150,000) with a 570bhp, 5.2-litre V10 driving its rear wheels alone. And while it is showing its age in some respects – its infotainment system is pretty clunky by modern standards and there’s not enough legroom for my 6ft 3in frame – it still finds that same balance of what you want from a car as a driver and what you need as an owner that has guaranteed the 911’s place in history.

It’s so easy to drive, so quiet and reasonably riding that you can forget entirely you’re in a supercar, until that moment when the road clears and you find yourself wondering why on earth anyone would ever want more power than this. It is electrifyingly rapid, and because no factory R8 has ever been troubled by turbochargers, delivers its gorgeous sounding power over ridiculously wide band from around 3000rpm to, well, this particular car only insists you grab another gear at 8900rpm, by which time you’re wondering what modern road car ever sounded better. Not many, I can assure you.

One last tale from Vegas, which my editor may delete because it has nothing to do with cars. However, when we got back from Death Valley there was a mood among the assembled hacks – as there often was in that era I’m afraid – to find the dodgiest club in town and spend the evening there. Myself and couple of others demurred and headed instead for the tables of Caesar’s Palace – I’d never been and had a slightly appalling fascination with the place. 

I was prepared to lose $50 and no more. But my very first spin of the roulette wheel netted me $120, so I pocketed $50 figuring that I could punt the profit and come what may the worst that could then happen was that I’d break even. So I happily stretched out my winnings over the remainder of the evening, getting happier by the hour as soon as I’d realised that so long as you were actually playing, all your drinks were free. Someone had clearly done some cost/benefit analysis and figured out the Casino made far more money from punters because they were drunk than the cost of getting them that way. 

But not me: yes of course I lost almost all the money, but not quite: what remained paid precisely for the cab back to the hotel. Which makes me one of I’m guessing not many people to have spent a whole evening at Caesar’s Palace, got thoroughly plastered and for the entire experience to have neither cost nor gained me a single bean. All in all, one of my better days in the job.