Remember the Canadian automotive journalist who was caught driving a Dodge Charger at 222 km/h (approximately 138 mph) on a public road in Quebec? Apparently Dodge does and they think alluding to the story might be a nifty way to market the car he was driving at the time, the Charger SRT8. The story received a ton of press attention in Canada, so making a reference to the incident shouldn't be lost on consumers. The new ad campaign shows a black Hemi-powered Dodge Charger SRT8 and the following text: "A roulé trop vite, vite, vite. À vendre vite, vite, vite. SRT8-88-8888"Roughly translated it means, "Drove fast, fast, fast. Sell fast, fast, fast," followed by a telephone number that will get you more info. Dodge has also wisely added a disclaimer telling readers they should only drive that fast on a track. Of course, the Canadian auto journalist in question, Philippe Laguë, had been testing the Dodge Charger SRT-8 on highway 132 in Longueuil, near Montreal. His fine was $958 CDN ($845 US), and enough points on his license to have it suspended. Laguë brought up an interesting point, explaining that car manufacturers will warn journalists to watch out for police, but they usually will also discourage them from testing on closed tracks.
[Source: Kicking Tires]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Bert @ Oct 31st 2006 9:18PM
Actually the number may be a tie in to a local paper's (Journal de Montréal) classified adds department. For the past 4-5 years the Journal's class add number has beeen 514-888-8888. Otherwise it's a huge oversite.
It's a mnemonic of sorts. In French 8 is pronounced (kinda): weet; vite is pronounced (kinda): veet. Vite is French for fast or quick or speed.
So the mnemonic is to help you remember that by dialing weet-weet-weet 8888 you can sell your stuff veet-veet-veet fast-fast-fast-fast.
As of 9:10pm eastern 514-888-8888 the number still rings to the Journal de Montreal and has no mention of the Dodge add.
I regularly drive the section of road the tester got nailed on and he was really unlucky. There is not much shoulder for a cruiser to hide. There are a couple of on-ramps with overpasses for chasers. I have not seen any cruisers in at least a year or so.
Jason @ Oct 31st 2006 9:32PM
I used to own a Charger SRT-8, they are amazing cars, they pull harder, go faster, brake better, and turn quicker then most people would imagine, or more to the point, want to belive.
Only reason I ditched it for the gt500 is I wanted to build a 10 second streetable car, sadly mods for the 6.1 are comming up short, most of the FI engines have gernaded themselves.. and many of the functions of the cars are locked out thanks to hal.
stirlo @ Oct 31st 2006 9:34PM
wouldn't SRT8-88-8888 be
7788-88-8888 ?
Ryan @ Oct 31st 2006 10:45PM
Hyundai should have exploited that dude in Arizona that apparently was going what? 158mph in a new Sonata?
AutoFan @ Nov 1st 2006 12:25AM
Manufacturers are fine with track testing as long as you tell them beforehand. The main thing is they want to make sure the car gets a thorough going-over after the track test. Otherwise, they're just cars, man. The company will make more.
GhostDoggy @ Nov 1st 2006 5:18AM
Something about hauling ar$e down a local road in the family sedan. Four-door funmobiles are not what makes a Charger great. Why not put the Hemi on a baby stroller, get a speeding ticket inside a shopping mall, and then allude to that, too?
mattlach @ Nov 1st 2006 9:56AM
It's as if they are trying to say that 138mph is fast...
Lame.
Homer @ Nov 1st 2006 1:19PM
For what it's worth, translated non-roughly it means:
"Was driving too fast, fast, fast. For sale fast, fast, fast."
Dodge Charger @ Nov 8th 2006 1:02AM
It is very easy to speed in a Charger, it doesnt feel like you are going nearly as fast as you are.
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