Street Racing

The Fast and the Furiously Illegal: Street Racing in Suburban New Jersey

Long after the sun goes down, in the late hours of the night, a counter-culture of adrenaline junkies take to the streets in incredibly fast, expensively and expansively modified automobiles. This is the world of underground street racing.
At about 11 p.m. on a balmy night in early February I found myself with a friend awaiting the call. The call we were waiting for was going to be from the individual who organizes and sets the location for the street racing. The ideal place to hold such a street racing event is generally out of the way of any type of residential traffic or police patrol, on a straight, double lane road in generally good repair. Just such a place is where we were headed after the call came through.
We drove up to the particular road, which will remain unnamed for privacy reasons, in a pair. My friend and I were at point, with a follower, whom we met up with prior to the call, both driving American Muscle Cars. On the other side of road we saw a few Import Cars with their headlights out hiding in a small cove just off the shoulder. We drove up the road, made a U-Turn and met up with them in the cove. My friend got out of the car and met up with the organizer to speak with him about racing and attendance for the night. When he came back to me by his car, he said there would be quite a few racers tonight. Looking down the road I saw the bright headlights of cars, one by one, slowly pulling in and turning off their headlights, filling the cove and overflowing onto the shoulder and even the road itself. Before long the entire road was blocked off by modified street racing cars. It was a surreal scene, right out of the movie The Fast and the Furious.
I watched from a distance as the cars were pulling up and staging. There was an overwhelming majority of Import Cars: Honda Civics, Toyota Corolla’s and Mitsubishi Eclipse’s, just to name a few. Cars lined up in pairs next to each other. Before each race started, the drivers would warm up the cold rubber tires by burning out: spinning their tires to create friction with the road. I heard the squeal of the rubber on the pavement and saw the clouds of smoke being created from this preparatory ritual. After both drivers were satisfied with their burnouts, the organizer flagged them off to fly down the road at dangerous, breakneck speeds. When one of the street racers were far enough ahead that there was no possibility the other driver could catch up, they would switch on their hazard lights to signify that they had won the race.
Lives aren’t the only thing at risk in this dangerous practice. The organizer collects bet money from the two opposing drivers; anywhere from three hundred dollars, to three thousand or more. Some drivers are even racing for pink slips, or ownership of the loser’s vehicle. Participation in this sport of street racing is dangerous even if you aren’t in a race. Passing motorists will usually alert the local police as to what is going on. Getting caught illegally street racing can cost a driver any number of expensive tickets, from speeding to illegal modification, and even getting their car impounded or appropriated as evidence.
This night was no exception to such danger. The driver of a tractor-trailer, which passed just minutes earlier, must have alerted the local police dispatch to send a patrol out. The massive gathering of street racers on the road was more then obvious. Just as my friend was about to queue up for a race we saw a set of headlights staring down the road, then a third light, a spotlight. It was a police car. With the windows open I could hear fellow participants and onlookers shouting; “Dipset! Cops! Cops!” The engines roared in the rush to escape. We spared no time cutting across the road and going the opposite direction of the approaching squad car. My friend accelerated around some of the others trying to escape, reaching speeds of eighty miles an hour and over in seconds. With some quick turns and an exit off the road we managed to escape.
It took the ride home and meet-up with the friend that followed us to the race earlier in the night to realize the authenticity of it all. I had been a spectator in something I had once only seen in movies and television. I gained a real appreciation for the rush of the race, the chase, and the observation of such an event. The underground culture of street racing is alive and well, thriving on the back roads of suburban America.