Originally posted by: marvdmartian
Fastest I ever went, and got ticketed for speeding (tho not for as fast as I was going) was back in 86, driving across the San Rafael bridge, from Point Richmond toward San Rafael. It was half past midnight on a Sunday morning, the highway was EMPTY......or so I thought! I paid the toll to cross the bridge, and smoothly accelerated from the toll booth area. For whatever reason, I decided after maybe 15 seconds that I needed to punch the accelerator (chalk it up to being 25 and driving a sports car).
For those that have never been on the San Rafael bridge, it's shaped like a stretched out
upside down W, with two peaks for shipping to go underneath the bridge. I kept the car floored all the way up the first rise, over the top, and down the first decline, when I let off the gas completely. I coasted up the 2nd (short) rise, and as I hit the top, the speedometer finally came off the peg (my Camaro had an 85 mph speedometer, with a trip odometer, the reset for which kept the needle from going anywhere past it.....I figure the trip odometer reset was ~100mph). I figure I was probably going between 110 and 120 at one point, but have no way to prove it with the speedo.
As I was coming down the 2nd decline (coincidentally, right toward the exit for the San Quentin prison!!), close to the bottom, a set of bright headlights comes
flying over the top of the bridge behind me. Believe me, I'd kept an eye in my rear view mirrors, and there'd been no headlights showing, so I'm betting that CHP car was running without 'em. Right after he came over the top of the rise, probably as he noticed I'd slowed down, he flipped on his red blinky light to pull me over. I made certain to pull over AFTER the prison exit!! :laugh:
When he came up to my car, he first asked "Where's the fire??" (don't ya hate smartass cops?), to which I replied, "Fire??" (yeah, I know.....witty!! :roll: ). He mumbled something about me being in a hurry, there must have been a fire, to which I pretty much gave him a whatever look.
He then asked me if I knew why he'd pulled me over, and I said no......he said it's because I'd been speeding while crossing the bridge (a 55mph zone at that time). He then asked me if I knew how fast I'd been going?? Yeah........dumb question lesson from a Chippy!
I responded (since I knew I was getting a ticket anyways, "The more important question is, do YOU know how fast I was going???" He then explained that they'd clocked me with their speedometer all the way up to 70, and knew I was going much faster than that, but couldn't write me a ticket for more than that. When the cop got back to my car with the ticket for me to sign, he'd written it as a 70
+ in a 55 zone! Yeah, okay. I figure he thought I'd be less inclined to fight the ticket with that one there. No biggy, think the fine was ~$150 or so. Well worth it for the speed I got up to!