While showing off and being arrogant is completely not cool, taking your gleaming sports car for a little stroll every day is an act of public interest — you’re providing visual stimulation to onlookers and also offering the aspirational factor.
I’m all in favour of flaunting it if you’ve got it. That’s the conclusion I came to, anyway, when, as a member of the Tag Heuer Celebrity Club, I was recently invited for a lavish brunch at the Armani Hotel, and offered an opportunity to drive a stunning summer-yellow dream-on-four-wheels: a McLaren 12C sports car.
I’ve driven a Ferrari before but this was the first time for me in a McLaren and I couldn’t wait to get behind the wheel and hit the fast lane on Shaikh Zayed Road on that beautiful sunny winter morning.
I — grudgingly — kept within the 120km/h speed limit, knowing very well this was no justice to my yellow beauty. Completely enjoying the adrenalin rush, it took me a while to notice passing cars slowing down next to me, some deftly trying to click pictures of my McLaren and me while others made do with getting a closer look. As a TV personality, I’m used to attention but the kind of obsessive glances I got that day surprised me a bit.
It made me ponder — is it this need for attention and admiration that inspires people to buy sports cars? Or is it the need for speed — then again, you can’t exceed the (suddenly conservative) 120km/h unless you keep aside a budget for speeding fines (I believe some people do that), and take risks with life.
Three friends — all sports car owners — told me they had bought their sports car when they felt they had “arrived” in life — in all aspects, professionally and personally.
Investment bank chairman Manoj Prasad now drives a Ferrari Italia (he’s had a McLaren and Lamborghini in the past). What he loves most about owning a luxury sports car is the stunning exterior and the attention it gets, while speed matters too. He drives his Ferrari for special events and weekends — and drives another luxury car during the week.
And it’s not just the guys. Vimi Joshi, MAC Cosmetics’ senior make-up artist in the UAE, dreamt of having a Porsche since she was seven. After years of travelling and working hard in her career, she decided to give herself something special. Though buying her bright red Porsche convertible was an impulse buy, she told me she is grateful every day that she made that purchase
There is a downside of owning a sports car, entrepreneur and Ferrari owner Ajay Bindoo tells me — the maintenance. He has to change his tyres after every Ferrari Club Autodrome drive, and also has to give the car for servicing.
With even the Dubai Police fleet now running luxury cars such as Mercedes, BMW and Lamborghini, it would be a crime not to drive a fast car in this city, he justifies.
