Prueba de Manejo

So a friend asked me to go with him to test drive a car.  Um. of course I said yes.  What I didn't realize is that test driving in Mexico is a WHOLE different story.

First of all, when you test drive a car in the US, you go to the dealer and ask to try out that car on the lot.  They get the keys and you drive THAT car.  That's it, that's the test drive.  You test out the car you are going to buy... unless you happen to want a different color or something... then you order the car... but either way it's generally accepted that in the US no car on the lot is BRAND NEW.  It always has a few miles on it due to test drives.  Not so in Mexico.  You say, hey, I want to try out that Ford Focus.  So, they go get the keys to a DEMO car.  You don't actually test out the car you pointed at.  I find that so odd, but I guess it makes sense... plus if the car gets scratched up from some stupid test driver, no biggie, it's a demo.

Secondly, you don't drive at first.  I was so confused when the saleslady drove up and she didn't get out.  I was thinking, "Ummm, isn't she going to let him drive?"  The answer is yes, but not after some intense driving that I like to call the "Test Drive of My Life" or the "My Life as Crash Test Dummy".  We get in and she starts explaining about all the amazing things about the car.  Typical salesperson.  But here's where it gets interesting, she all the sudden starts explaining the test she is going to do.  I'm kind of in shock and wondering if I understood her right cause she starts saying, I'm going to take this round about at 40 km/hr and go two times around and test the equilibrium on this car.  I'm thinking... ok... well I have no idea how fast 40 km/hr is without a conversion calculator, but it can't be that fast cause safety first right?  HA HA HA HA HA HA.  I thought we were going to roll... the force was that strong.  I seriously felt like my stomach would fly out through my rib cage at any moment.  It was super intense.  Afterwards, she says, "is everyone ok?" and I let out a squeak... that was my best response at the moment.  Next she says she's going to test the car's equilibrium in a sharp 'dodge-ball' type move.  Basically the situation is this, we're assuming a box fell off a truck in front of us and we don't have time to brake, so we swerve out of our lane into the other and back into our lane at 60 km/hr.  This time before she did it she counted down.  I had no idea how intense a "tres-dos-uno" count-down could be until that moment.  She swerves very sharply and it was CRAZY.  It felt like a roller coaster.  After that she does the final test... the brake test.  This one had me the most worried as I've just heard too many stories of seat-belts cutting into people and getting whiplash... all that jazz.  I've never done a full on brake-for-your-life type move.  I can't lie, my heart was pounding just a bit.  She again counted down.  I remember thinking about where I should put my hands... I was that concerned.  We did a full stop in about 30 feet from 60 km/hr.  It. was. AWESOME.  Oh, and the seat-belts worked great by the way.

After that, she let my friend drive the car.  No, he didn't pull any stunts... though we did joke with saleslady about him doing them.  My favorite statement of hers was her saying to my friend's dad, "Please tell him not to" with a semi-worried expression on her face.  It was priceless.  Overall it was a test drive I won't forget.

P.S. Just a note that this is pretty rare in Mexico to have a salesperson be able to test a car like that... they have to have a certification to do it, so don't go off thinking that's what everyone goes through on a test drive... we just got lucky.