Why do we need such fast cars?

I’ve been recently thinking about it, and no matter how hard I think it makes no sense to me at all. So the question is: why so many cars can drive much faster than usual speed limits? As there are only a few countries without a speed limit (A-roads in Germany for example), let’s pretend these are only exceptions of the general speed limit rule.

It is well known truth that the lowest fuel use is while driving at about 110 km/h below the 2500 rpm (petrol) and 2000 rpm (diesel) which is about 90-100 km/h in my case (I figured it out after couple of months of driving). Because of that many countries have a speed limit set at about 100-130 km/h. As it is also a safety barrier when driving (keeping in mind state of roads, human reflex, trust in other drivers etc) then looks like it’s a reasonable limit.

So why the heck are there cars with speed limit up to 200, 250 or even 300 km/h? For street racers? Boasters? Road hogs? Probably all of them. There may be also another reason which comes from car corporations: diversity! If they want to sell multiple car models, then differentiation is crucial. There are various segments which differ by car size, maximum speed, acceleration, engines, quality of work, etc, but really only the maximum speed drives the imagination of future owners. “- You know what? My new car can do 120 miles per hour! – Oh, you are boring. My can do 150!”. Got it, right? It’s something easy to compare and boast about. Not a surprise car companies care a lot about this, but you don’t, do you?

PS) If you are careful reader of my blog, then you may be surprised by this topic. “Cars? What happened to him? Is he sick?” ;-) Actually, not. I passed my driving license exam about a week ago and we will be buying the first car really soon!! Hurrah!! :-)