Speedster Crosses US at 90 mph, No Tickets
Even though Alexander Roy has published a book about his illegal speeding, authorities apparently can’t throw the book at him.
The 35-year-old outlaw racer describes in detail the 2,794-mile trip he claims to have made from New York to Los Angeles last year in 31 hours at an average speed of just over 90 mph. But speeding tickets require a police officer as a witness, Sgt. Toby Smith, an Ohio State Highway Patrol spokesman, tells the New York Times. There is also, he notes, a six-month statute of limitations.
“The patrol has a reputation among rally drivers as one of the nation’s most feared,” the newspaper says, but nonetheless apparently follows the letter of the law.
How Roy, a high-end car rental car company president in ordinary life, reportedly avoided being ticketed at any time during his 90 mph trip is a story in itself. Even a single ticket would have spelled disaster for his effort to set an illegal speed record, by adding another 15 minutes to his time, he says.
So Roy set out on the speeding odyssey equipped with “a laser jammer to scramble police speed-enforcement equipment, ground-to-air radio, two night-vision monitors, four global positioning system units and a CB radio,” the Times writes. His modified 2000 BMW M5 also featured high-performance brakes, a racing clutch and an additional 20-gallon fuel tank in the trunk.
He and his driving partner, David Maher, additionally had help from a Cessna speed-trap spotting plane, and, at least once wove around to the far side of a tractor-trailer to get out of police radar range, enabling them to proceed at speeds of up to 150 miles per hour, according to the article.
During the trip they made a total of six carefully choreographed stops, with one man refueling the car while the other raced to take a bathroom break.
