My car does not have a built-in navigator ndash; this time I did not want to add $2K to the price tag of the car. I bought this great little navigator from Garmin for under $400. It “s very simple to use, and the UI is very friendly.

After you enter an address of the destination, it “ll show you the route and will display the estimated arrival time. I “ve been watching how this time changes based on the traffic and came to a pretty interesting conclusion: speeding does not really help.

Say, I “ve entered an address that “s 30 miles away from my current location and the arrival time is 5:22PM. I assume that this little thingy knows the allowed speed limit for each road and “assumes rdquo; that this is going to be the speed of your vehicle. This is a fair assumption (drivers who are over 80 years old do not count).

It became sort of a game for me ndash; I started to turn on the thing even if I knew the directions. I was trying to see if the ETA is correct. Then I noticed , the when I run into a slow traffic situation, the estimated time of arrival is changing pretty damn fast: 5:23 hellip;5:24 hellip;5:25 hellip; Then, all of a sudden the congestion ends and everyone starts driving fast. I start speeding trying to bring the ETA back to 5:22PM but it “s sooooo difficult? I “m speeding – 15 miles over the limit, but this damn number does not get lower! A couple of miles of such speeding will shave off just one minute of your ETA.

It “s easily explainable from the math point of view, cause while driving in traffic you can go as slow as 50 miles below the speed limit so unless your speed is 50 miles higher than allowed, catching up will be always slower.

The bottom line: If you got stuck in traffic, do not try to catch up after the normal speed is resumed. If you are late for the important meeting, call them up and say that you “ll be late. Do not put yourself into a stressful and dangerous situation. There will be another day and another meeting.

The conclusion: After doing all these semi-scientific experiments, I won “t follow my own advice and will continue speeding. I just like driving fast.

P.S. I ‘ve also noticed that there is not speed limit of 60 mph. There is 55 and the next one is 65. Have you ever seen the speed limit of 60?