140 MPH in my 73-340 Challey. To quote Paul Harvey, "and here's the rest of the story."
It's 1985 and the national speed limit in the US is 55 and Chevy had recently introduced the first modern Vette to the world. So I'm travelling from Asheville, NC to Greenville, SC on a divided, 4-lane highway one fine Sunday afternoon, enjoying the nice breeze coming through my 255 A/C and being a law-abiding citizen when I pass 3 Vettes travelling together; a 72 convertable, an early 80's L-82 (so the plate said) with T-tops off and a new '85 C4 with the top on.
Well, they didn't particularly like me passing them, so they sped-up and I pulled back into the right lane. Now there's 4 of us in this little convoy. We pass a BMW 3 series who joins us and then a RX-7 who does the same. With all that horsepower and testosterone on tap, the pace begins to pick up little by little. The Vette's kept swapping the lead position and all was well, until......here comes the RX-7.
The Vette's did not tolerate this well. All of a sudden, the green flag was dropped and all hell broke loose. The Vette's took-off and I wasn't about to let the imports show me their taillights either so I hit the gas too. We left the imports without much time wasted but the Vette's kept their feet on the Loud Pedal and so did I. I caught the 82 in short order and the 72 soon after, but cathcing the 85 was a different matter. He just rolled up his windows and shifted that 6-speed into overdrive and flew. But I wasn't about to give up.
Remember the breeze I was enjoying earlier? Now it's a typhoon in my car 'cause there's just no rolling up 4 windows when your turning 6000 rpm and the needle is buried at the dead bottom of my 120 speedo. (Judging from the other marks, that's about 140) Janet Jackson flew out the window along with my AC/DC and Def Leppard tapes, the passenger side turbo muffler became increasingly louder as the seam blew out, but I kept my foot in it. I didn't care if I had the aerodynamics of a brick and was already at redline, I wasn't about to give up.
The C4 was about 100-150 yards ahead of me on this long downhill straightaway when he came up on a curve ....
and slid!! 
"
Holy Sheep Dip!", I thought. If he's sliding, then I'm dead meat! Slammed on the brakes but I didn't have enough time before the curve. Sure enough, I'm understeering BIG TIME and sliding towards the guardrail and the oblivion that's just beyond. The suspension finally catches up about 2/3 of the way through the curve and now I'm oversteering and headed right for the center divider wall. The sport mirror scrapes the wall for an instant but nothing else touches.
I caught up with the C4 soon after and pulled up beside him. We both looked at each other and went, "WHEW!" I didn't know it at the time but
were riding with me. It wasn't the first time, but it was the last time I ever pushed it that hard.
