Generally, I’m okay with lending my car out to people I trust. I sort of rely on other people being willing to do this for me as well when I shoot videos of weird and interesting cars. But there has to be some level of trust and respect. Those are two things that seem to have been gone when a Volkswagen Golf R owner let two of his friends borrow his car, along with the lining to his clutch and an undamaged bumper.
What happened wasn’t all that unusual. Golf R owner Jaremy was at a work party, came home, had some friends over to keep having fun, got drunk, and, like so many of us do when we’re drunk at 3 a.m., decided he wanted a burrito.
I’ll let him describe what happened from here:
I didn’t at the time know the driver was drunk, and they offered to go pick it up.... At this point I fell asleep/passed out from time + impairment. Woke up the next morning to find my bumper (which had just been replaced and repainted 2 months ago) was damaged.
Outside that I don’t know why someone would disrespect someone to such great lengths. I have known both kids for about 10 yrs and wouldn’t have thought the driver would do that. Which they played it off until I presented the video to them. Driver has accepted some blame but we are still working on estimates and getting it paid for. I actually just got my dashcam in Oct for my birthday and I am glad I did. Though that video was extremely hard for me to watch and still is.
During the video they spill beers in my car and drop cigarettes, etc. Now I understand I am responsible for giving them my keys, but I 1. Didn’t know the driver was drunk 2. You don’t give your keys to people and expect that kind of thing to happen. So I can see both sides of the blame, but definitely a good lesson in letting other people drive your cars.
I’m sure now you want to see the video, because of course you do. We all do. Here you go:
The owner also has these comments about the video:
Around 21 mins they bottom out my car so hard it ends up resetting the camera, camera GPS has them at 74 in a 25 and blowing the stop sign. Around 32 mins they try to do burnouts in my AWD .:R and fry the clutch to the point it is burning and slipping. Around 42 mins thank god the clutch was slipping as they tried to race down a street that happened to have 4 cops at the next intersection.
It’s pretty hard to watch. The two dipshits in the car do sound pretty drunk, and they are either pretty shitty at driving with a clutch, or just deeply troubled people, deep down. Maybe a bit of both.
It seems like the “friend” who was driving has agreed to pay for the damage to the clutch and the bumper, so that’s good at least, but as far as the state of the friendship in the future goes, the friend-o-meter is reading pretty deep in the red. Here’s Jaremy’s take:
Needless to say, I have two fewer friends.
I don’t blame Jaremy here, really. If he knew and trusted these guys, the burden isn’t on him for them to not be assholes who drive someone else’s car when they know they’re drunk, and at least suspect that they’re bankrupt-enough humans to abuse the car to the point of real damage. Plus, even if they owned the car, driving drunk at 60-70 mph through neighborhood streets is a pretty shitty idea on its own.
I won’t blame this guy if he never loans anything to anyone ever again.