In the past, I have brought you examples of what occurs in the area of the Venn diagram where technical aptitude, too much free time, and a total disregard for personal safety overlap.

This, however, will be hard to beat:

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A while back, I brought you the Ken Block Gymkhana video that posed the question, “how many cars do you have to wreck to get this good?” Turns out the number is somewhere between zero and one, as you’ll see in the just-released outtakes:

(video after the jump to defeat the obnoxious auto-play)

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Winter does funny things to people. All that bad weather, stuck inside, you might take it in mind to join the body from a kid’s ride-on F150 to an ATV chassis, or put a big gas engine on a Barbie Jeep. You might even discover your friends have all had the same idea…

Why settle for the metaphorical chariot racing of stock car competition when we could be watching the real thing? This is pure, condensed awesomeness.

Who are these guys? Why did they do this? Kudos for the period-correct driving suits, as well… Turns out it’s not exactly a new idea, though:

The car - a 600-horsepower Group B Audi S1 Quattro.

The driver - Walter Rohrl

Any wonder why this class only lasted from 1982 to 1986?

It’s just a small preview of the rainbow-powered unicorn factories and strawberry-scented welfare checks to come over the next four years, but on Inauguration Day, Krispy Kreme is giving everybody a free donut to celebrate. No word on whether you’ll be required to dip your finger in blue ink to prevent cheating…

You may recall the video of Rhys Millen trying to kill himself practicing for last year’s aborted truck flip attempt. Well, this year he did it. Sort of.

ProTip: When your sponsor puts their logo on the underside of your vehicle, it’s time to rethink your profession.

How many cars do you have to totally destroy to get to this level of skill?

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Nitro-powered RC helicopters are breathtakingly expensive, noisy, hard to fly, and dangerous. So why not add a wireless video camera and a .45-cal 1911A1 pistol on the front?

It seems like you’d be better off with something in a smaller caliber with more magazine capacity and less recoil, like a 9mm Glock or even a .22LR, but I suppose that when one is working on a project like this, one uses that which is just laying around the shop at the time…

The next logical step here is to make this thing web-enabled so people from all over the globe can log in and fly it remotely!

For those who weren’t at the 2008 NMRA awards ceremony at PRI (or those who were, but want to see it again), here’s the video we shot:

In Australia, it’s not good enough to just get the tires hot with a burnout - you gotta rub the sides of the Ute on the pavement, too…

Somehow I doubt these two morons ended up getting a second chance at their failed flip…

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Last New Year’s Eve, Rhys Millen was supposed to backflip a truck on live TV. One problem - he broke his spine in practice. He’s going to try again this year, and to promote the stunt, Red Bull has released a one-minute video that shows, in sickening clarity, what went wrong last year. Enjoy!

While perusing Dan Rutter’s blog he introduced me to the glory that is DealExtreme. If you want to kill a couple hours looking through all the crazy stuff, just follow the link. It’s kind of hard to describe the mix of stuff - everything from novelty items to USB-powered gadgets and RC airplane electronics. I’ll give you a little taste of a few of the items…

How about a nice Personal Cell Phone Signal Blocker?

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In California, even minor car-to-car contact is reason enough for everyone involved to stop right in the middle of the damn road and discuss the situation in great detail, while traffic backs up for miles behind the crash.

In Germany, you just keep driving, apparently…

More importantly, would you buy it from Sears? Sure, it’s “Accurate to +/- 1% of reading from 20% to 100% of wrench capacity. Operates in up to 7 common torque units including in-lbs, ft-lbs, in-oz, Nm, cNm, mKg and cmKg. Allows 99 preset torque values to be programmed into the wrench and manually or automatically advanced during use. Stores up to 1,000 torque readings in memory for extended use before download of data is required. Alternately, the data can be downloaded continuously to a PC during use.” But $2500? And Sears? I’ll stick to “a quarter turn before it strips.”

Update: It’s possible to spend even MORE money on a torque wrench from Sears…

So the geniuses in San Francisco have decided that the solution to the 30-plus suicides a year from the Golden Gate Bridge is a giant net. Not just any net, either - a $50 million plastic-coated steel boondoggle, and that price tag is just for parts and installation. The best estimate is that the net, which will hang 20 feet below the deck of the bridge and extend out 20 feet to either side, will cost an additional $78,000 a year to maintain (no word on whether that cost includes the labor and equipment involved in fishing jumpers out of the net, or if that’s extra).

Some questions occur to me.

I have no idea what the projected lifespan of the net is. The bridge itself has stood for 70 years, so assuming that the net has a similar longevity, and the net is 100% effective, taking fatalities from 30 a year to zero, this has the potential to save 2100 people from themselves. At a cost of $55,460,000, or $26,409.52 per life saved. Seems like a bargain when you break it down that way, when you consider that what this really amounts to is a PR campaign. Let’s say that the net really does work, in the keeps-you-from-hitting-the-water sense. It doesn’t really address the issue of why you wanted to jump in the first place, and if we’re talking about planned suicides, as opposed to “what the hell, I’m here, so I might as well kill myself” impulse jumpers, won’t people just go someplace else? Maybe San Francisco would be better off just offering $25 grand in cash to those willing to agree to leave their hearts (and other body parts) elsewhere…

If this doesn’t fit the “Batshit Insanity” category, nothing does. Let me set the scene for you: Twin sisters from Sweden, walking down the center median of the M6 in England, are approached by cops in a patrol car. So they do the sensible thing, and hop the guardrail straight into traffic, where both are immediately struck by cars, though neither is seriously injured. When more police and paramedics arrive to treat their injuries, both once again run into traffic, and get hit AGAIN. Think that’s the end of the story? Not even close. Well, fortunately, the whole incident was captured on Britain’s ubiquitous CCTV cameras and by a BBC crew.

The real victims here are the poor bastards these crazy broads stepped in front of…

First up, a 650cc-powered cart:

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If you’re a fan of precision driving, royalty-free industrial video soundtracks, or Hyundais, you’ll enjoy this eight-minute video…

I can’t imagine how many cars you have to wreck in the process of getting this kind of mad skill. I guess that explains why you’d want to do it with Hyundais, though - no big loss when you do wreck one (or six)

I’ve seen some over-the-top pit vehicles at our races, but this is something else entirely. A Yamaha R1 motorcycle engine that puts 125 horsepower to the wheels? Seems like an elaborate way to kill yourself, and I mean that in a good way.

I really, really hope that this is satire. The alternative, that it’s sincere, is just too absurd and horrifying to contemplate.

From a friend of a friend, I bring you this video of the British Steam Car undergoing static testing:

Based on the copious amount of steam coming out the back, you might assume that it’s powered by a reaction motor. You’d be wrong.

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Land speed racing is known for more than just the pursuit of maximum velocity - novelty is also important, and there are literally hundreds of record categories, including some recent ones for electric and hybrid vehicles. What you see here takes the novelty factor to the extreme; it’s a lakester powered by giant rubber bands. I got these photos in an email forwarded from my buddy (and land speed record holder in several two- and four-wheel classes) Jack Dolan, but not much in the way of information. I’ll try to get more details and update this post when I get a chance. Until then, enjoy the photos…

Update: Popular Mechanics has a few more photos (but no more information) on their website.

All things panda-related are near to my heart, so I bring you this news from the Big Apple - Apparently, a group of people dressed as giant pandas got roughed up by the NYPD. Coverage and photos on The Gothamist here, and the Pandamonium blog here.

I was aware of the fact that the internet has made it possible for people with all sorts of fetishes to find strength in numbers, and that there are plenty of websites that take advantage of this fact by catering to the odd things that turn some people on.

Today, though, I stumbled across what may be the most weirdly-specific kink I’ve ever seen: Girls ‘hopelessly stuck with their car.’ CarStuckGirls.com is best described as a professional modeling site devoted to pictures of women spinning their tires in mud, sand, snow, or what have you. Did I mention that they also sell videos?

Looks like everybody keeps their clothes on, so it should be SFW, but be prepared to get some odd looks from the IT department anyway…