Peter Egan
 

I just got a Road & Track in the mail; apparently, Peter Egan will no longer write a monthly column. He'll do some writing; probably road adventures, that sort of thing that he's done all along.

That's too bad, because, frankly.....

. . . he's the best.

I just decided to kill my subscription - the (non-Egan) articles have less and less technical content and the writing style is more and more teenagerish - was going to say sophomoric, but that would be too great a compliment.

That is too bad. His articles were the best part of R&T which is my favorite of the non-specialized US car mags. One of these days, I want to get the compilations.

With the revised format (good for ADHD) and now the end of Egan "Side Glances" column, I see no reason to renew.. and I've read almost every issue since the 1950s!

Shoot! I just renewed earlier this week. Side Glances is the only reason I read R&T.

Sad state of affairs. Rumor is R&T is going bye bye, or it will be rolled into Car and Driver. The print industry as a whole is going down the tubes. i like the internet, but love car mags that you can hold in your hand. my buddy cuts articles that he likes out and keeps them in binders, mainly technical or how to stuff. good idea, don't have to keep the whole mag.

Wow, this sucks. I've been reading Peter Egan since he first appeared in Cycle World in the late '70's. Today, pretty much the only thing I read in R&T, especially after they destroyed their format, is Peter Egan.

Hopefully he's enjoying semi-retirement life with "Barb" and restoring the occasional car or motorcycle.

He will be missed.

Well. Sorry to see Peter go. Peter Egan's column is the first thing I read in R&T. I have been a subscriber to R&T and C&D since the early 60's. In the last few years, both magazines have been rather low quality in my opinion. I guess they are both trying to appeal to a younger crowd.
With what seem to be yearly revisions of the format of both magazines, as "racer" said in his post, R&T and C&D seem to be after the ADHD audience. They both seem to be comic books for car guys.
"Teenagerish" as RWebb says. I agree.

+1 Peter Egan was the best thing going for R&T.

Peter Egan was the only thing that kept me as a subscriber for as long as I did, I still dropped the magazine several years ago.

Been reading Peter in Cycle Mags, seems like 40+ years....I even looked up his address and went by his house once passing thru that part of WI........

Nah Nah Nah Nah. Nah nah nah nah. Hey! Hey!

Goodbye!

I dropped my subscription over a year ago as well. Egan's articles were the first thing I read when I used to get R&T. Sad to hear him leaving that publication...

Road and Track was a huge influence in my life. I had a subscription when I was 12 and read it religiously, cover to cover, every word, and over and over. It influenced me to write and to a career that has involved much reading and writing.

I let the subscription lapse many years ago, but recently got a ridiculous offer in the mail (something like 3 years for $8), so I gave it another try.

Holy *****. Just horrible. Just like you guys have said, so amateur. Layout etc I don't care about so much, but the writing is so poor. Where did they get these guys ( Jack Baruth and these other no names)? These guys are very amateur, no where near what you'd expect from a (former) powerhouse like RT.

Someone needs to tell them that linking a bunch of worn out automotive cliches does not make you an automotive writer.

Fortunately 15% of the magazine is now made up of weather tech floor mat ads, which make for better reading than the articles.

A truly gifted writer. So many amazing columns. :)

We are fortunate to have some great writers right here on the Pelican forum. If our own Higgins would submit some of his posts to R&T, they would probably hire him. Always very funny and outstanding writing, just like Egan.

__

By far.

I was on a phone meeting this week with a young man, Patrick Egan. I called him Peter twice.

He, Patrick, is a car guy, thank god.

Gave up R&T several years ago. I read Peter Egan in cycle world, I am a devotee.

I think they need to clear out all their writers and hire a really good editor in chief to put in some quality control.

They should offer Pete Stout $1 million a year. It would be worth every penny.

(What Pete did with Panorama is pure artistry and genius).

It seems like most magazines are in bed with the manufacturers. They never seem to trash a car even if it is crap.

How can you be biased when your test cars are coming from the manufacturers?

There are lots of complaints about the formatting, but I am mostly ok with it. I liked it better before but I can adapt. The thing that irritates me to no end is having the last page of every article put to the back. WTF!?:mad:

I still find that there are a few funny bits and the performance test results and technical stuff is still there on occasion (the Corvette issue). The weird thing is Car and Driver used to be side-splittingly funny but less technical. Road and Track was serious and technical. Now the two seem to be blending into one, meeting somewhere in the middle but all jumbled up. Car and Driver measures the CG heights and other vehicle dynamic parameters that interest me now that they team up with Cayman Dynamics. So Car and Driver is more techy than Road and Track.

With Peter Egan gone though it makes more sense to only read Car and Driver.

I was hoping he'd take a chance on buying an old 911 and driving it for awhile before the end but alas, he's got that incurable Brit car fever.

He owned a Boxster S for a while and loved it. Not sure if he still has it or not. He also likes American cars- the Cadillac and Bullit come to mind.

Don't forget the 356.

He's gone through a bunch of stuff. He had an early miata, one of the new minis when they came out, a boxster, etc...

Every column/article of his was a pleasure and interesting to read.

"Fortunately 15% of the magazine is now made up of weather tech floor mat ads, which make for better reading than the articles."

That Weather Tech stuff does look nice ! I wish Weather Tech was around back in the day 35 years ago when I was living in Northern Illinois.
Too bad the rest of R & T is not so good. I wonder what Rob Walker would think of R&T these days?

Peter was the only reason I kept r&t for so long. Now, so long r&t.

Read Side Glances in the October issue. There won't be a SG in every issue from here on out, but he is not leaving, he is scaling back (by choice) and will still be doing articles from time to time.

I'm not crazy about the new R&T either, but I'm warming to it, and he is Editor-at-Large. I wonder if there was a mass exodus because he's not in every issue, if it might end up cutting into his slice of the pie. Probably not, but I'm staying for now.

I cancelled my subscription when they went to the new format. They just tried to get me to re-up last month for 3 years for $8.00- I was tempted, but then I remembered why I opted out in the first place.
Too bad about Peter - I ran into at Sebring (the 12 Hours) a couple of times.
Bill K

....so..... Cycle World has a new ADD format too, all articles look like ads.... awful, awful. Magazine version of the once trendy "phrentic" style of film editing.

Fixed for you ;)

I stopped reading Weathertech when they dropped this woman from their advertising.

http://www.autotoys.com/pics/weather...-ventvisor.jpg

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/support/smileys/pray.gif

Peter was in a Brit-com back in the eighties. I just watched him in a film on Netflix Death at a Funeral. I'll have to see if I can read some of his articles.