Doubtless petrolheads will be familiar with Jalan Ulu Yam – the fast, twisty road is a favourite of enthusiasts on both two and four wheels, who enjoy a quick blast through the corners, usually on a Sunday morning. It’s also extremely treacherous, especially at night, where many stretches are unlit.
The right-hander just before the intersection to the town of Ulu Yam Bharu, which you’ll see in the video above, is particularly dangerous – it comes after a fairly straight stretch where drivers can get up to speed, and although the corner is lit up, it’s rather dim and the way it tightens before reaching the junction quite often isn’t immediately apparent until it’s too late.
As you can see, the driver of the Proton Suprima S in the video appears to be carrying a lot of speed into the turn and does not slow down enough, and as the car loses grip, the rear washes wide and threatens to pitch into unrecoverable oversteer. On the tight two-lane bridge with a car on one side and a barrier on the other, this could have spelt disaster.
Thankfully, the Suprima S’ stability control – which comes equipped on all but the base Standard variant – seems to step in at exactly the right time. Looking at the video closely, you can actually see two places where the loss of control could have been catastrophic and where an unseen helping hand appears to stabilise the car’s movement.
The first part is when the rear slides onto the sandy road shoulder, where the car might have continued oversteering and hit the barrier, or spun and crashed into the oncoming car. Here, ESC brakes the outside front wheel to quell the slide, bringing the car into a stable position before anything untoward could happen.
Next, the driver could have overcorrected the slide by countersteering while also braking for the intersection; such violent changes in input might have swung the car the other way – commonly known as fishtailing – and cause it to careen into the barrier. When it senses that this could happen, the safety net slows down the front right wheel, again to stabilise the car.
In both instances, the lack of ESC could have caused the Proton to crash into the oncoming car, or worse, plow through the barrier and into the river below. The stability control worked overtime to make sure that none of those instances happened and, soiled underpants aside, both the occupants and the car made it through in one piece.
Through watching the video, you’ll see why we champion the safety net as hard as we do. The message here is clear – when purchasing your next car, make sure it comes fitted with stability control. Your life could very well depend on it.
But there’s one more lesson to be learnt. Stability control, as much of a lifesaver it can be, can’t bend physics to save you from absolutely reckless driving. So whenever it is you’re on the road, whether you are on a fast, wide, well-marked and well-lit highway, or on a difficult winding road with little to no illumination – even if you’ve memorised the route a million times – drive safe and keep speeds down to a sane level.
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It’s clear that these 2 cars were racing each other.
And obvious the reason for many accidents are speed. ESP is not the answer for having stupid drivers. The only way to remove these irresponsible drivers is death. They deserve it
I assume both are racing right?
Noob driver , enough say
Noob driver, superb car.
Noob driver , enough say
proton has improved significantly in the past 10 years… its not a mercedes ofc.. give credits where its due.
keep it up!
Did you even notice the reckless driving? ESP or not, they’re endangering other road users who are up and about their normal life.
This is not the first time a new Proton has saved their owner, and it won’t be the last.
Just because you know your new Proton has ESC and 6 airbags, you should not speed and drive recklessly, like the two geniuses in the video. ESC and airbags are not designed to work above a certain threshold, and you must wear your seatbelts, front and rear. It’s called Supplemental Restraint System (SRS) for a reason… it’s only a supplement to the seat belt and not a replacement.
What to do, our cars are getting safer, but our road fatality rate is growing more and more with each year. What does that say about us Malaysian drivers ?
Malaysian drivers thought they are auditioning for F1 each time they are driving on the road.
Another reason is those Nissan, Hyundai, Unser, Hilux, Innova, Camtakpro, Honda all like to go 60kmph on the right-lane when speed limit is 90kmph while lorry at the mid-lane going 80kmph.
Hello driver, Please get crashed and die. I dont wan u stay on the road and hit my beloved in the future.
Your england is hurting me…
#ohmyenglish
Oh sorry. Do you need ambulance?
You’re supposed to put the word ‘an’ in front of ambulance… #ohmyenglish
Stick to the designated line & never speeding. that’s the key to avoid crash on road.
But its still Proton
but still better than Vios
but still better than Vios
Still Proton
If myvi or viva, big possibilities will end up in front page newspaper the next day.
U forgot to add in Saga and Persona too.
if in that video is toyota or honda, ppl will clap hand regardless the driver racing or not
memandu secara merbahaya = mahkamah
speeding = 300
langgar double line = 300
forget the esc thingy, these 3 should be the headline.
double line – mahkamah,sorry
Noob
Noob
From the contents of the writeup, paul tan is trying to encourage those drivers whose car with vsc to drive like hell drivers. This is very unprofessional. VSC is assist those drivers who unexpectly encounter skid especially on wet roads. For those hell drivers, it is better for them to end up in the ravines rather to cause other decent drivers ending up in unnecessary trouble
The last paragraph itself states that any time they are on public roads and no matter what the road and weather condition, motorists should drive safely and responsibly and not speed. If that sounds like an encouragement for speeding drivers then I don’t know what doesn’t.
Regardless, you are right in saying that reckless drivers should learn their lesson. But – and this is the fundamental message that we are trying to put out – by telling these individuals that they deserve to “end up in the ravines [sic]” by removing stability control from their cars, you are inadvertently harming the very people you are trying to protect.
Remember, when a car loses control and crashes, it’s not just the driver and the passengers in the car that are at risk, but also every single person who is near or around the car when the accident happens. As I mentioned in the article, the Suprima S could have spun and hit the oncoming car – do you think risking the life of those in that car is worth teaching the Proton driver a lesson? For us, getting the car out of shape and nearly ending up in an accident should serve as lesson enough.
One last thing – the notion that stability control is only meant to help you in wet conditions is a common misconception. Cars can lose control in the dry, too, such as when doing an emergency lane change manoeuvre, or, in this instance, when you come into a corner too fast.
Yes, this is an extreme case, as the Suprima S looks to be speeding, but even cautious drivers can misjudge cornering speed – especially on a dimly-lit, poorly-sighted corner like this one – and lose control of their vehicle. These kinds of situations are exactly the kind that stability control is meant to save your skin in.
If you are still not sure as to the message we want people to understand, here’s the abridged version – stability control can save your life, so look for it in your next car; but stability control is not infallible and can’t bend the rules of physics, so even if you do have ESC, drive safe and keep speeds sane.
asd
Yes I do agree with you that ESC is important to look for in the next car, which is the main point you are putting across here.
What WE want to say as your loyal readers is that: 1.That driver should be put to jail for driving recklessly and we have videographic evidence.
2. As a digital publisher advocating road safety online, the article did not emphasize on his reckless driving at all.
True, as advocates of road safety, we should highlight instances of reckless driving whenever we see them. But as journalists, we are also beholden to absolute impartiality and seeing both sides of the story before casting an opinion – favourable or otherwise – towards the people involved in a particular incident.
The fact of the matter is, it’s not clear-cut whether the drivers in the Suprima S and the car following it were driving very dangerously, let alone in a way that deserves a jail term. The video makes it seem that they were both driving pretty fast, but unless we have an actual speed reading, we can’t say for sure; in any case, you can’t be telling me that none of the people here have ever driven fast over a good winding road before.
More pertinently, it’s shown quite clearly in the video that despite the apparent speed that they were carrying, both manage to brake in time before the corner, and that the driver in the Suprima S would have just carried on through as normal had he braked just a little harder. What possibly happened was that the Proton driver assumed the corner was not too tight, let off the brakes, and only saw how tight it really was when it was too late (of course, the driver could have just as easily have tried to show off to the one behind that they could really take the corner that fast – but again, we don’t know the full story, so it’s not fair for us to judge).
We are not in any way trying to condone the driving shown in this video – regardless of what has been said, these two really shouldn’t be driving so fast on such a dimly-lit road, and to say the way the Suprima S cut into the oncoming lane was reckless would be an understatement. But let’s be honest, as car enthusiasts, we’ve all been there before, and even though we do fervently advocate safety on our roads, sitting behind a screen witch hunting any form of enthusiastic driving is absolutely the wrong way to do it. We want people to enjoy driving, but at the same time be safe and conscious of the others around them while doing so – and of course, take any form of aggressive driving to the track.
Sometimes we all want to drive fast but we need to choose the right place and the right time. What’s the point in owning a nice sports car (if you think the Suprima is one) if you can’t have some fun.
However, choosing death for someone just because he was driving recklessly is something extremists would do. Are you one? I am pretty sure someone in your family must have driven recklessly before once in their life, do you choose death for them as well? Think before you speak, otherwise get some education for you and your kind.
you view the text negatively….. thst video supposed to show how effective safety device on car…not to encourage people drive recklessly
toyota Malaysia ah… U see this.. This alrdy prove malaysian ah sure love to drive like their father’s road here.. So install la esp as standard to give this kanak kanak like this a chance to insaf
Toyota Malaysia showed the public that their Vios is so awesome in drifting that it doesn’t need anything because it’s the God car lol.
The safety is coming from the brain. If that driver cares about safety. he doesn’t even took space on the opposite road. The road line is to keep the driver in the right space.
Article title should have been “Jerk almost caused an accident”
Stupid. This is kampung area. He should not even put on throttle at this area. He can touge before and after that kampung. Have some respect to villagers there. If it was an accident, I bet those villagers will whack him first rather than helping him
holy mother
this webpage condones illegal over limit speeding and dangerous driving?
so is it like when you got a speeding ticket from the police and right away you say ‘its okay officer my car has ABS’?
how about yobbos to the police their cars got traction control and its okay for them to drift on bukit bintang roads?
this webpage has a moral obligation to report this matter to the authorities and failure to do so will only show ignorance has crept wilder these days
Its obvious that this article is more on complimenting proton. I believe most reader do not agree this to be ‘reported’ as car technical advancement, Mr. Jonathan, the jounalist.
opinion : I think that it would be a bit presumptuous to assume that just based upon that video , that car’s recovery was due to its electronic stability control.
i always see vios & myvi owner drive very fast w/o concerning their safety/condition of their car while at high speed. tailgate other cars like their king of the road.
hopefully they’ll have a deep search more on ESP/ESC. Its better to learn from others than to learn the hard way.
Kereta dah cukup selamat. Pemandu tak kurang hebat. Cuma jangan la memandu secara merbahaya di jalanraya. Litar Sepang kan ada. Kalau tak mampu, pergi la game arcade main car racing simulator. Bahaya sangat tu.
My least favourite article on this website. Writer goes to great lengths explaining what is happening in the video, going all excited seeing ESC in action but just 10 words on the last line of the article that says you shouldn’t be driving like that kiddo.
SPEEEEEED bole membunuh.