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Yuri Geiko
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Yuri Vasilievich Geiko (August 28 ( 19480828 ) , Moscow, USSR) - Russian journalist, member of the Union of Writers of Russia and the Union of Cinematographers of Russia, winner of the awards “Best Journalist of Russia” (1995), “Automotive Journalist of Russia” (2003), candidate for master of sports in motorsport.

Biography and scientific activities

Yuri Geiko, a participant in the 1989 round-the-world car trip “Columbus Caravan”, traveled around the globe along approximately the 40th parallel driving a “Moskvich-2141”, which then stood in the AZLK museum for many years until the plant was plundered. For this trip he received the status of “Honorary Citizen of Columbus” (the capital of Ohio in the USA). Yuri Geiko made his second circumnavigation of the world in an Izhevsk-made KIA Spectra car in 2006.

In March 2010, he signed the appeal of the Russian opposition “Putin must leave.”

On February 3, 2011, he posted an appeal to his former colleague Valentin Yumashev. In it, Yuri Geiko harshly criticized the results of the activities of the country's leaders over the past two decades.

Essays

Artistic:

"Saiga", story. Magazine "Youth", M.,

• Stoker of “Russian Distances” (story)
• Stoker of “Russian Distances” (continued)

Stories

Journalism:

• How to survive and survive while driving and have fun. M., 1996
• Auto-education program. St. Petersburg, 2000.
• Autolikbez (co-authored with Vyacheslav Varyonov). M., 2002.
• Auto encyclopedia. M., 2006.
• Auto-education program. M., 2009.
• A thrill on wheels. M., 2009.
• Driving skills and safety. M., 2009.
• How they deceive us. M., 2009.
• A woman driving and other devilry. M., 2009.
• Something from history. M., 2009.
• Winter. M., 2009.
• Advice in its purest form. M., 2009.
• Trips. M., 2009.
• My friends, my heroes. M., 2009.
• Auto-education program. M., 2010.
• Autolikbez-2. M., 2010.
• Fools, roads and other features of national driving. M., 2011.
• My love is the car. M., 2011

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An excerpt characterizing Geiko, Yuri Vasilievich

Only many years later I was able to understand what this strange, wise old woman really wanted to say. But then I just listened to her very carefully, trying to remember every word, so that later more than once I could “scroll” in my memory everything that was not understood (but, as I felt, very important for me) and try to catch at least a grain of what could would you like to help me in my ever-continuing “search”...
“If you took on too heavy a load, you’ll break…” the old woman continued calmly, and I realized that she was referring to my contacts with the dead. - Not all people are worth it, dear, some must pay for their actions, otherwise they will unreasonably begin to believe that they are already worthy of forgiveness, and then your good will only bring evil... Remember, my girl, good should always be SMART. Otherwise, it is no longer good at all, but simply an echo of your heart or desire, which does not necessarily coincide with who the person you gifted truly is.
I suddenly felt uneasy... It seemed that this was no longer being said by a simple sweet old lady, but by some very wise and kind sorceress, whose every word was literally imprinted in my brain... She seemed to be carefully leading me along the “correct” path so that I , still small and stupid, did not have to “stumble” too often, performing her, perhaps not always very correct, “tender-hearted deeds”...
Suddenly a panicked thought flashed through my mind - what if right now she just disappears?!.. After all, I really wanted her to share as much as possible with me and teach me as much as possible!..
But I understood that this would be precisely the “getting something for nothing” on my part that she had just warned me about... Therefore, I tried to pull myself together, drowning out my raging emotions as best I could , and childishly rushed to honestly “defend” her rightness...
– What if these people simply made mistakes? – I didn’t give up. – After all, everyone, sooner or later, makes a mistake and has every right to repent of it.
The old woman looked at me sadly and, shaking her gray head, said quietly:
– Mistake is different from mistake, dear... Not every mistake is atoned for with mere melancholy and pain, or even worse, just with words. And not everyone who wants to repent should get their chance to do this, because nothing that comes for free, due to the great stupidity of man, is not valued by him. And everything given to him free of charge does not require effort from him. Therefore, it is very easy for someone who has made a mistake to repent, but it is incredibly difficult to truly change. You wouldn't give a criminal a chance just because you suddenly felt sorry for him, would you? But everyone who has insulted, wounded or betrayed his loved ones is already to some extent, albeit an insignificant one, a criminal in his soul. Therefore, “give” carefully, girl...
I sat very quietly, deep in thought about what this wonderful old woman had just shared with me. Only I, so far, could not agree with all her wisdom... In me, like in every innocent child, an indestructible faith in goodness was still very strong, and the words of the unusual old woman then seemed to me too harsh and not entirely fair. But that was then...
As if she had caught the train of my childishly “indignant” thoughts, she affectionately stroked my hair and said quietly:
– This is what I meant when I said that you are not yet ripe for the right questions. Don't worry, honey, it will come very soon, even perhaps sooner than you think now...
Then I accidentally looked into her eyes and literally got chills... These were absolutely amazing, truly bottomless, all-knowing eyes of a person who was supposed to live on Earth for at least a thousand years!.. I have never seen such ones. eye!
She apparently noticed my confusion and whispered soothingly:
– Life is not exactly what you think, baby... But you will understand this later, when you begin to accept it correctly. Your lot is strange... heavy and very light, woven from stars... Many other people's destinies are in your hands. Take care of yourself, girl...
Again, I didn’t understand what all this meant, but I didn’t have time to ask anything more, because, to my great chagrin, the old woman suddenly disappeared... and instead of her a vision of stunning beauty appeared - as if a strange transparent door had opened and a marvelous figure appeared, bathed in sunlight. the city, as if entirely carved out of solid crystal... All sparkling and shining with colored rainbows, shimmering with the sparkling edges of incredible palaces or some amazing, unlike anything else buildings, it was a marvelous embodiment of someone’s crazy dream... And there, on the transparent On the step of the carved porch sat a little person, as I later saw - a very fragile and serious red-haired girl who waved her hand at me in a friendly manner. And suddenly I really wanted to approach her. I thought that this was probably some kind of “other” reality again and, most likely, as had happened before, no one would explain anything to me again. But the girl smiled and shook her head negatively.
Up close, she turned out to be a very “tiny” person, who could have been given at most five years of age at most.
- Hello! – she said, smiling cheerfully. - I'm Stella. How do you like my world?..
- Hello Stella! – I answered carefully. – It’s really very beautiful here. Why do you call him yours?
- But because I created it! – the girl chirped even more cheerfully.
I opened my mouth in shock, but I couldn’t say anything... I felt that she was telling the truth, but I couldn’t even imagine how such a thing could be created, especially speaking about it so carelessly and easily...
- Grandma likes it too. – The girl said enough.
And I realized that she was calling “grandmother” the same unusual old woman with whom I had just had such a nice conversation and who, like her no less unusual granddaughter, put me in real shock...
-Are you completely alone here? – I asked.
“When?” the girl became sad.
- Why don’t you call your friends?
“I don’t have them...” the little girl whispered quite sadly.
I didn’t know what to say, afraid to upset this strange, lonely and such a sweet creature even more.
– Do you want to watch something else? – as if waking up from sad thoughts, she asked.
I just nodded in response, deciding to leave the conversation to her, since I didn’t know what else could upset her and didn’t want to try that at all.
“Look, it was yesterday,” Stella said more cheerfully.
And the world turned upside down... The Crystal City disappeared, and in its place some “southern” landscape blazed with bright colors... My throat caught in surprise.
“And this is you too?” I asked carefully.
She nodded her curly red head proudly. It was very funny to watch her, as the girl was truly and seriously proud of what she managed to create. And who wouldn’t be proud?!. She was a perfect baby who, laughing, in between times, created new incredible worlds, and the boring ones were immediately replaced with others, like gloves... To be honest, there was something to be shocked about. I tried to understand what was going on here?.. Stella was clearly dead, and her essence was communicating with me all this time. But where we were and how she created these “worlds” of hers was still a complete mystery to me.
– Is there something you don’t understand? – the girl was surprised.
– To be honest, yes! – I exclaimed frankly.
– But you can do much more? – the little girl was even more surprised.
“More?..” I asked, dumbfounded.
She nodded, tilting her red head comically to the side.
-Who showed you all this? – I asked carefully, afraid of accidentally offending her.
- Well, of course, grandma. – As if she said something for granted. – At the beginning I was very sad and lonely, and my grandmother felt very sorry for me. So she showed me how it's done.
And then I finally realized that this was truly her world, created only by the power of her thoughts. This girl didn't even realize what a treasure she was! But my grandmother, I think, understood this very well...
As it turned out, Stella died in a car accident several months ago, in which her entire family also died. All that was left was grandma, for whom there was simply no room in the car that time... And who almost went crazy when she learned about her terrible, irreparable misfortune. But, what was most strange, Stella did not end up, as everyone usually did, on the same levels in which her family was. Her body possessed a high essence, which after death went to the highest levels of the Earth. And thus the girl was left completely alone, since her mother, father and older brother were apparently the most ordinary, ordinary people who were not distinguished by any special talents.
– Why don’t you find someone here, where you live now? – I asked again carefully.
– I found... But they are all kind of old and serious... not like you and me. – The girl whispered thoughtfully.
Suddenly she suddenly smiled cheerfully and her sweet little face immediately began to shine like a bright sun.
- Do you want me to show you how to do it?
I just nodded in agreement, very afraid that she would change her mind. But the girl was clearly not going to “change her mind”, on the contrary - she was very happy to have found someone who was almost her same age, and now, if I understood something, she was not going to let me go so easily... This “ perspective" completely suited me, and I prepared to listen carefully about its incredible wonders...

I've never seen anything like this

- Yuri Vasilyevich, why did you allocate exactly 80 days for your trip?

In general, our trip is designed for 70 days. We keep it in reserve for ten days. And 80 days were invented by PR people, by analogy with the novel by Jules Verne. And I must say, we are a little offended by this. After all, Jules Verne's heroes traveled in a hot air balloon and in other ways, but we travel by car. Well, are we... not better than them?

- Do you follow the rules while driving?

Of course, we follow the rules, except for the speed limit. If we follow the rules, we won't get anywhere in time. Signs, you know, are sometimes placed at random. There’s just a sea of ​​“bad” signs! Here, by the way, there are fewer of them. There are road markings everywhere in your region. And marking is a great thing. It saves many lives, especially in bad weather. This makes me happy. And the roads here are not the worst in Russia. Omsk and Novosibirsk, for example, are generally beyond competition. I have never seen such roads in Moscow. Perfect clean concrete. But these roads, as far as I know, were built in Soviet times with the expectation of landing strategic bombers.

- Give an example of the “bad” signs you mentioned?

Repairing a road, for example. You drive, but there is no repair... There are dozens of such signs. Accordingly, the “Speed ​​Limit” sign is displayed. And the police are standing near these signs. And our roads are often such that it is difficult to follow the rules. It is difficult to drive 40 km per hour when it is not clear why such a speed limit is set and when it will end.

- Could you compare how people drive in the European part of the country and how they drive here?

In Moscow, people drive much more professionally than in the cities we passed through. In Novosibirsk they rush around the city at a speed of 120–130 km per hour. But these, apparently, are not entirely sane people. In addition, I came across many examples of inept driving. People here are not ready for a drastic change in the road situation. Any critical pre-emergency situation here, as a rule, leads to an accident. In Nizhny Novgorod they caught up with us from behind. The impact was strong, but fortunately the car did not suffer serious damage. And in Novosibirsk, the nine rushed to the main road, as if there was no one nearby. The cars are rushing, and this one is taxiing onto the main road. I've never seen anything like this.

And we say - they are fierce

- Yuri Vasilyevich, how much time do you spend driving on average?

Almost all daylight hours. We drive from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. I drive less time than Zhenya, about a third of the time. Evgeny Kalugin, editor of the special projects department of Za Rulem magazine, accompanies me on my trip to Russia, because I have phones and everything else.

- Do you have habits or techniques that help you drive?

Everyone has their own habits. With Zhenya, for example, here different styles driving. I prefer the hard style. I was once involved in sports, a candidate for master of sports in rally racing, and worked as a stuntman at a film studio. I won’t say that I’m taking a risk while driving, but my efficiency is higher than Zhenya’s. Zhenya drives more reliably. He's the only one I can sleep with in the car while driving. I generally don't sleep when someone else is driving. And with him I can sleep peacefully. As for, for example, fighting sleep while driving, I never fight it. It was because of sleeping at the wheel that many of my friends, most experienced testers, whom I knew from working at AZLK, died. Therefore, my principle is to never fight sleep. But I have three ways to drive him away. First, get some sleep. Secondly, sit on the right. Then the dream immediately disappears. And the third way is for people with a strong heart: put two spoons of instant coffee in a half-liter vessel, and then pour Pepsi or Coca-Cola into it in a thin stream. A large head of brown foam rises. All this needs to be drunk. The eyes immediately pop out of their sockets, the heart is pounding, and sleep disappears for an hour and a half. This is the hard way. But the main thing in driving is constant, very keen attentiveness. You go 120–130... Bang! Pit! There is no sign. You know that we have a lot of such situations.

- Do you think traffic police inspectors work well in Russia?

I watched the road very carefully this time. My website is full of complaints: the Tatar traffic police are fierce, the Bashkir traffic police are furious. We really see that there are a lot of inspectors on the roads. By the way, you have less. But the guys work, and don’t fight. Try to follow the rules and no one will stop you. I once reported from France. He talked about police work. Their inspector loses two to three kilograms per shift. He runs around there like crazy to avoid traffic jams. And ours work, they do what they are supposed to do. If we had roads like in France, and well-placed signs, we would say thank you to our inspectors. And so we say that they are fierce.

I'm going for the sake of the listeners

- This is not your first trip around the world. What do you think has changed since then?

The difference is gigantic. First of all, I have aged 17 years. Secondly, the car then was a Moskvich 2141 with a VAZ 2106 engine. We also covered a part of the Chita-Khabarovsk route on a transport plane. There was no road at all.

The journalists who were traveling with us (then a convoy of ten cars - Italians, Germans and one American) went on the trip - became millionaires. They filmed the first miners' strike in Kemerovo in 1989, and filmed the aftermath of Typhoon Julie in Vladivostok. They passed on information from every city in which they stopped. The video material was sent by plane to their homeland, where it was edited, voiced and sold to global agencies. We came here with a few thousand dollars and left millionaires. But we were stupid and worked like crazy for five dollars a day.

- Why did you go on this trip?

I've seen it all before. And he passed America along the same route. I won't find anything new there. And I don’t receive a lot of money for my trip. The budget for the run is 40 thousand dollars. The calculation is simple: 50 euros for food per day per person, 90 euros for a hotel. Gasoline, flights - everything! There is no extra money. I'm going only because of my listeners. I want to take them with me on a trip.

But to be honest, I’m already drawn to home. It feels like three weeks have already passed. The compression of events gives the feeling that life is lengthening. I feel like I'm 120 years old. How do you remember everything that happened...

- On this journey you had to accept many gifts. Which city stood out? And what is the most valuable gift for you?

The most valuable gift lies in the car on a shelf under the rear window. This children's drawing. They gave it to me in Vladimir; a woman came up with her daughter in her arms and handed it to me. I looked at this drawing and realized that they had been drawing it all evening. The most touching gift. In general, there were a lot of gifts. And we have already distributed this sea. There was a lot of everything, from cognacs to skullcaps. We give gifts as actively as we receive them. Otherwise we wouldn't have left.

- What do you wish the Kemerovo residents before leaving?

In previous cities, I wished motorists a reserve of centimeters under the crankcase. And your roads are better. Therefore, I wish you plenty of braking distance!

It just so happened that my life was intertwined from three components: writings (writing and journalism), a car and a woman.
The earliest feeling, of course, is from the car. Or rather, a motorcycle.
I'm two and a half years old. Some uncle, a pilot, a friend and colleague of my father, puts me in a loose rubber saddle. I remember well the delight of a strong and hot animal trembling beneath me, the pungent smell of gasoline and rubber.
Second acute sensation from the car: I am a first-year student at the Moscow Automotive Institute. Summer. The intersection of Kashirskoe Highway with the Moscow Ring Road. I get into the sports Moskvich of the captain of the AZLK rally team Viktor Shchavelev - we are going to the 1968 USSR Championship in Yerevan. I, as an errand boy, got a job for the holidays through friends. I get into this car, as usual, like many other cars, not realizing that my life will turn upside down in a few minutes: Shchavelev started the engine, drove off, and!..
The world blurred into colored speed stripes. The speedometer needle hit the limiter. My soul sank from every overtaking and my palms sweated, but until I believed in Shchavelev, I did not understand that he wants to live no less than me and drives with a large margin of reliability. After that, every time he overtook me, I felt delight, sheer delight. I discovered that in Everyday life We know only the tip of the iceberg called “car”. Even driving “with the breeze” with a reckless driver is driving blindly, it does not give any idea of ​​​​the possibilities; a car driven by the hand of a true master is getting closer to the edge beyond which its obedience ends.
...Exhausted by delight, I woke up late at night from the squeal of cylinders. My body, although pulled by a belt, was thrown in different directions, my back was burning and seemed to be worn to the point of bleeding - this was the beginning of the Caucasian serpentines. The light of the headlights jumped from the asphalt to the steep walls of the rocks and for a moment disappeared completely - in the blackness of the sky and abysses. When it dawned on me that the fireflies on the side of the road, a meter from the wheels, were not fireflies at all, but the lights of villages at the bottom of valleys and gorges, I was seized with an animalistic, sticky, real fear.
“What are you, Viktor Alekseevich,” I asked Shchavelev plaintively, “are you training?”
- No, I’m dispelling sleep.
Now I understand that we were then going at 60-70 percent of the car’s capabilities, that an ordinary private owner would have been at 10-15 percent, a taxi driver at 20-30, a reckless driver at 30-40, no more.
The line that I spoke about, beyond which the machine’s obedience ends, is 100 percent of its capabilities. Often this is the line between life and death. The closest people to it are, as you understand, the champions. And, of course, not on city streets, not on highways, but on special routes blocked from traffic. Only once was I lucky enough to be close to this edge and forever scorch my soul with the happiness of approaching the Absolute - I rode several high-speed sections in training with Ivan Astafiev, Honored Master of Sports, multiple champion of rally and circuit tracks, participant in the supermarathons of the century: “London - Mexico City” ", "London - Sydney".
But in my book you will not find a description of this case - here I am helpless. Believe me, a car is a powerful source of pleasure in human life, standing perhaps in second place after the King of pleasures - sex.
Now about the third component, about love for a woman, which is mentioned, along with the car, in the very first sentence of my book. A car literally brought me to her: a stuntman and an actress - this is how the beginning of our story can sound in a beautiful, romantic version.
Before her, I worked as a tester at Moskvich, and next to her I became a journalist. Without going into details, I will say that in the long-term and daily struggle for this woman, I became what I became - a happy person. Even now, twenty-five years later, having two sons with her, I admire her.
That's all the components of my life. At first, out of stupidity, I tried to separate them - I wrote a book about a car with a stupid title: “How to both survive and enjoy driving.” She was an unexpected success. Then I wrote a book about Her, about how it all began for us. This book was not successful because it was not published, since it was written only for my sons. But individual chapters from it, entirely related to the car, in oral retelling aroused the constant delight of any audience: “Well, right, “Man and Woman” in the Russian version! Why don’t you write about it?”
And one day I realized: this is what no one can say better than me. And it’s not at all because there are no drivers who drive better than me, there are many of them. And not because, of course, there are no writers and journalists who write better than me, there are plenty of them too. And it’s not at all because there are no men who know how to love stronger, more beautiful than me - there are probably tons of them in general. But there are very few who combine, forgive the immodesty, these three talents - writing, traveling and loving.
And therefore allow me, albeit for your money, to present you with this book with the following inscription, leaving the intimate beyond its scope:

What is a car?

Whether you have it or not yet, get ready for the fact that it, the car, is a living creature that you take into the family. She will change everything in your life - the pace, the budget, your salary, she may well change your mistresses or lovers (if you have them), she will to some extent dominate you, change your habits, she will force you to plow in the capitalist field much more efficiently than you have done so far, and at the same time will dramatically increase your efficiency.
A car is a special world into which only initiates are allowed, it is a door that can only slam behind you. If you feel very bad and need privacy, she will give it to you at any time of the day and at any time of the year - a dry, warm and comfortable piece of space awaits you under the window. Turn the key - and you are alone with yourself, with your problems and even sometimes with eternity. A machine, like a dog, will never cheat on you, will not betray you, will not tell your friends or enemies about your other secret life, which only it, the machine, knows; your car knows your habits better than your closest friend, it waits for you in the parking lot on long nights, it rejoices at your appearance early in the morning, but is silent because it is made of iron.
Your car becomes a part of your life, whether you want it or not, by its very existence it is embedded in your gene cells, it becomes a part of you, your “I”, and to be completely honest, your car is you.
And what follows from this? It follows from this that you need to know as much as possible about the car, because too much in your life depends on it.

Major milestones in the life of a car

In defense of the domestic auto industry

Probably, each of us, especially if he is a motorist, has ever asked himself a simple question: why do we make the best airplanes and rockets in the world and very imperfect cars? I will try to answer it. And you, dear friends, first answer this question: why does every child here know the names of aviation and space designers - Tupolev, Mikoyan, Ilyushin, Korolev, but does not know a single name of an automobile designer? Why don’t we have our own Fords, Pirellis, Renaults, and Opels? In order to answer this question, we cannot do without history.
The car appeared in Russia almost simultaneously with the famous Daimler-Benz, but its fate was different. Due to the enormous distances and lack of roads, the rapid development of the automobile industry did not even work out: in 1915, when all of Europe was already driving cars, Russia remained horse-drawn, having almost 33 million (!) horses.
We had a lot of wonderful designers. A striking example is naval officer Boris Lutskoy, about whom you read in the previous chapter. But... The “revolution” broke out. The country of the Soviets wanted to become great and invincible. To do this, it was necessary to build factories and factories that would produce modern military equipment. Design bureaus - Tupolev, Ilyushin, Mikoyan - were created, and a popular cry was thrown: “Youth - get on the plane!” Money for the development of new designs military equipment and they did not spare any effort to put them into production - the government set a task for the head of the design bureau: the aircraft must have such and such a flight range, such and such speed, payload capacity, and such firepower. The head of the design bureau for these tasks was free to select employees from any sector of the national economy, to demand such and such materials, such and such machines, equipment - and he received it all. The defense industry is the defense industry.
Meanwhile, the automobile industry developed according to the residual principle - GAZ was born from Ford, later from Opel - Moskvich, and even later - from Fiat - VAZ. And for the country in all decades up to the 70s, this turned out to be enough, because its “cargo” needs were provided, and its “passenger” needs...
Before the war and in the 50s, none of the normal people even dreamed of having their own car. It would be as wonderful as having your own airplane today. Automobile factories were stewing in their own juice, falling further and further behind Western world. They were not given any parameters for the final product; they only had to create the type of machine and ensure the quantity of output per year. And therefore, the factories received from the state not the funds, resources and materials that they needed, and not even those that were left over from the defense industry (it itself did not have enough), but only those that were available. In the country of the Soviets, a car was both a luxury and a commodity at the same time.
For the first time, this principle of residuality was violated during the construction of VAZ, when the Italian side demanded from ours previously unknown in the automotive industry leather substitutes, oils, laminated glass, plastics, rolled products and much more. When, for example, we sent our best, latest at that time oil for the V-shaped engine “AS-8” for examination to Italy, we received the following answer: “AS-8” is the petroleum base for obtaining high-quality oil.” I had to master what is now called MG - “Zhiguli” oil.
If in the defense and space industries the chief designer was “god and king” and plant directors trembled before him, obliged to materialize his ideas, then in automotive life the chief designers of automobile plants were always and everywhere subordinate not only to the directors, but even to the chief technologists. How many wonderful design solutions have died for this reason! I am a witness - a drawing board designer comes to the management at AZLK with an absolutely original door stop, and the technologist tells him: “Wind this spring in the other direction, because we don’t have such machines. And at the stop, this fillet must have a large radius, because our steel will break, but we don’t have limits on high-alloy steel, and where can we get bronze bushings?” As a result, the design is adjusted for production. This is how we lived, and this is essentially how we live now.
Misunderstanding of the laws of evolution is perfectly illustrated by the historical call of the Secretary General of the CPSU for VAZ to “become the trendsetters of world automotive fashion.” With all due respect to Gorbachev (for his subsequent courage), a combiner lawyer is a combiner lawyer.
It is known that if you gather nine pregnant women in the first month, the child will still not be born. If you gather our best automobile designers into a bunch and shower them with money, they will not surpass Mercedes, because the chasms in the evolution of consciousness, design thought, and technology are not jumped over overnight, but are overcome by Sisyphean labor, generation after generation. In addition, you need to have a huge and modern experimental base, where even before mass production the best would be selected from the best. You need to use the best, highest quality materials and equipment. The Western auto industry is following this path, as is the Russian defense industry.
So, maybe we shouldn’t “reinvent the wheel”? Don’t try your best, but build American, European, Japanese car factories in Russia and live “like everyone else”?
It won’t work, because there is no one to buy their new cars from us - they are for a different standard of living and are too expensive for the income of Russians. All that remains is to produce their own cheap but bad cars. By the way, they became bad after we “sniffed” foreign cars, and before that, remember, they stood in queues for years behind “Zhiguli” cars, and then they drove them for decades and were happy. The second option is to remove customs barriers and drive a cheap imported second-hand car, burying the Russian automobile industry.
The trouble with the second option is not that Russia will turn into a giant recycling enterprise - God bless it, we have enough space. The point is that the billions of dollars we have accumulated will flow not into our native industry, not into the future of our children, but into the West, improving their lives, not ours. Therefore, the most optimal option is the third, the one that the government proposes - to raise the level of customs duties on foreign cars to a level that would weaken competition for the domestic auto industry - it is needed not only to be viable, but also profitable.
Even a schoolchild knows that the country’s automobile industry is the locomotive of its entire industry due to its quick liquidity and the high “cash intensity” of its products. "The car created America" ​​- widely famous saying Henry Ford. It also applies to Russia - what a country, what is the standard of living in it, so is the car, no matter how bitter it is to admit it.
Following the disappearance of the auto industry, dozens of factories supplying other industries will emerge, and millions of people will be left without work. We will live much worse. Why do we need this?
We will make good cars, but not soon. Both quality, comfort, and their price will increase in proportion to the growth of our incomes and our standard of living. But - if the government, after increasing customs duties, continues to rob our car factories to the last thread, if the management of the factories does not learn to think and work in a modern way, if the funds earned by the car factories are stolen or spent ineffectively, then the gap between our cars and Western ones will remain forever.

Which brand of car should I choose?

This must happen - you have money, and you decide to buy yourself a car. Which one exactly - “Zhiguli”, “Moskvich”, “Volga”, “Oka”, “Tavria” or a foreign car?..
I completely agree that once you have driven a Mercedes, you will never drive a Lada again. But this applies to those who have a lot of money. You and I can easily switch from a Mercedes to a Zhiguli, because driving them is much cheaper.
My friend and colleague, a connoisseur of elite life, was watering his Lada with all his might, having purchased a Mercedes ten years ago.
He continued to water them even when this Mercedes, on its last legs, sold and bought another one - eight years ago. Now he walks because he has already received immunity to the Zhiguli, the eight-year-old Mercedes had to be sold for spare parts, and he does not have any “mania” for the six-year-old Mercedes.
And I still drive a “ten” from three years ago and even successfully give a ride to my friend to the metro.
Let's talk about foreign cars on Russian roads and start with the fact that, of course, they are sheer delight and pleasure at seemingly the same prices. The only difference is that for the same money you can buy either a new “ten”, or a ten-year-old “BMW”, “Volvo”, or a twelve-year-old “Mercedes”.
The new “ten” will serve you for two years with unforeseen costs of no more than 150-200 dollars per year. Six- to eight-year-old BMWs, Volvos, and Mercedes will require at least $600-800. And this is only subject to emergency malfunctions, excluding car service. But not everything on foreign cars can be done by “Uncle Vasya” - there are things that cannot be done without a branded service: injection cars, automatic transmissions or cars stuffed with electronics. In this case, the annual cost of maintaining such a machine reaches $1,500-2,000.

A car is not a luxury, but a means of polluting the environment.

(Folk wisdom)

Did you know that not a single Western car company is making serious attempts to penetrate the huge Russian market? Assembly - yes, production - no.
And all the things we sell today are not car companies, they are intermediaries, businessmen, grabbers: they will cut profits, and then at least the grass will not grow. Companies do not come to us not because this requires huge investments in the service and dealer networks. That’s why they don’t go because they have nothing to go to Russia with. Do you think we haven’t tested foreign cars? We carried out, dozens of models were tested both by the companies themselves and by us both at the test site in Dmitrov, and in the North, and on the cobblestones of the South, and in deserts, and in Russian potholes and mud. When the companies look at the results, their hair stands on end - their creations are not suitable for Russia, where, as we know, there are no roads, but only directions.

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| collection website
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| Yuri Vasilievich Geiko
| Auto encyclopedia
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//-- Life in three paragraphs --//
Geiko Yuri Vasilievich, journalist, member of the Union of Writers of Russia, the Union of Cinematographers of Russia, author of several books for car enthusiasts, published in our country and abroad. Winner of the “Best Journalist of Russia” awards for 1995, “Automotive Journalist of Russia” for 2003.
Graduated from MAMI (Auto Mechanical Institute), Gorky Literary Institute. In the army he served as an officer - head of the motor-tractor service of a missile site in Kazakhstan. He worked as a test engineer at AZLK, a stuntman at a film studio, a receptionist at a car service center, and a correspondent for the Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper. Candidate for Master of Sports in motorsport. Married to actress Marina Dyuzheva.
A participant in the 1989 round-the-world car trip “Columbus Caravan”, he traveled around the globe approximately along the 40th parallel driving a “Moskvich-2141”, which stood in the AZLK museum for many years until the plant was plundered. For this trip he received the status of “Honorary Citizen of Columbus,” the capital of Ohio, USA).
//-- Life on three pages --//
I was born in Moscow, on the day and even the hour when the great Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy was born (according to the old style), but exactly 120 years after him, that is, 10 periods. (The period - a complete replacement of cells in the human body - is 12 years.) This fact, of course, does not mean anything, but it’s funny.
I was born in Moscow, but my mother’s contractions began on the train, on which she was traveling to the capital to see her mother to give birth from Vypolzov, which is halfway between Moscow and St. Petersburg, where my father served in the aviation regiment. The guides persuaded her to go to Klin, where they reported about the woman in labor by telegraph, they drove a cart there to the station, but my mother was adamant, despite the fact that her water had already broken - she brought this valuable fruit to Moscow and made me a full-fledged Muscovite. This is how wheels entered my life from my mother’s womb and forever.
Who did I not dream of becoming in my childhood, divided by two military aviation towns - Vypolzovsky and Pskovsky! But it so happened that at the age of seven, someone gave me an album for poetry and thereby determined my life - the album was still “Stalinist” and so beautiful, with gold embossing and monograms, that it simply obliged me to write poetry in it and nothing else. And I began - in the spirit of my time and upbringing:

A lonely flame burns
A gloomy peasant sits over a book...

And a couple of years later he tasted the sweetness of fame, reciting something from his “creativity” from the stage of the Pskov House of Pioneers.
True, I read a lot - to the detriment of lessons, in defiance of my father’s prohibitions, furtively, even with a flashlight under the blanket.

But it was my father who truly shaped my life by forcing me to keep diaries since the third grade - how grateful I am to him for that! I consider this absolutely necessary for any person striving for perfection, and especially for those who want to clearly express their thoughts on paper!.. Systematic recordings of what they saw and experienced give vigilance, teach the ability to isolate and realize the main thing, a diary is the main universities of the soul.
I also owe my father the knowledge of the origin of our rare surname; he read this story in local church books, this is how it sounds...
Peter the Great allegedly traveled to the Battle of Poltava in Ukraine. He was riding and his horse's girth broke. And on the horizon there was a village. “What kind of village? Are there any saddlers there?” - asked Peter. No one answered, and the village was named Popruzhna. And after some time it was granted to the landowner under some name I have already forgotten, let it be Kovalenko. And a family went from him to half the village - Kovalenki. And the rest of the village are Geiki. So Geiki are those who were “geaked”: “Gay, gag”, “Gay, lad, fuck to mane!”
My parents, as often happens in Russian families, didn’t care what I would become - whoever I wanted, as long as I went somewhere. At the end of school, I wanted to become a journalist, and I bought subscriptions to Moscow State University for applicants to lectures on Russian, history and literature. I listened to them with great interest, but when I came to submit my documents to the journalism department, I was intimidated: how smart and thieves everyone there is, with their dads and moms, and already with publications! And out of grief, I, a Muscovite, went with my classmate Yurka Kosenko to enter the Kharkov Higher Command and Engineering School to become a rocket scientist: almost space, which everyone was raving about. Yurka got in, but I missed one point, which made me terribly upset and went on Sunday to the dacha of the general, the head of that school, to persuade him to accept me. The general, naturally, sent me through my mother.
Returning to Moscow, I bought a handbook for applicants to the capital's universities and poked a pencil three times into its table of contents. MIEM (electronic engineering), MAMI (auto-mechanical) and something else fell out. I went with the documents to “something else” - I didn’t like the building: it was some kind of barn, I didn’t even go inside. MIEM seemed too luxurious for me. And I liked MAMI, I looked at the faculties: foundry (then the strongest in the Union) - damn molten metal; internal combustion engines - never mind gasoline and oil; Automotive (the coolest department) - never mind tractors; mechanical engineering technology - but this sounds solid and incomprehensible. I submitted my documents, passed them, and got admitted.
And I did - I fell in love with the car. Already in my second year, I began to wander with friends around the racing tracks of the Union: “Chaika” in Kyiv, Bikkirnieki near Tallinn, Pirita near Riga. At the same time, he became the “son of the regiment” of the AZLK rally team, traveled with them around the country, and after graduating from MAMI, he became an AZLK research engineer. He specialized in strength testing of bodies and was involved in motorsports. In 1976 he entered the Gorky Literary Institute.
At the turn of his 33rd birthday, he abruptly changed both his wife and profession - he became a journalist for Komsomolskaya Pravda, where he worked for 22 years.
In 1980, on the set of the film “The Kidnapping of the Century,” in which I performed stunts, I became too close to the actress Marina Dyuzheva. We were united not only by our first failed marriages - Masha (she preferred this name) was born on the same day as my mother. On our second night together, it turned out that our fathers were born on the same day. Further – more: our parents’ weddings happened within one day of each other! But God continued his hints - she gave birth to our first son, Mishka, on her birthday and on my mother’s birthday. But when she gave birth to her second son, Grishka, on my birthday, I realized that this was Fate.
Since my wife is a full-fledged co-author and the object of study of this book - a few words about her. Born in Moscow, graduated from the State Institute theatrical arts. I started acting in films already in my first year. She has about 50 film roles, big and small: “Townspeople”, “Tavern on Pyatnitskaya”, “Mimino”, “For Family Circumstances”, “Pokrovsky Gate”, “At the End of Summer”, “Shadow”...
But 30 “film” years did not make her a “realized” actress. And only recently she truly found herself - on stage, in the performances of the Independent Theater Project: “They shoot driven horses, don’t they?”, “Boeing-Boeing” and others.
She writes amazing poetry, but only for herself, she doesn’t allow it to be published. She adores her sons, cats Kuzya and Sery, her dacha and her four-wheeled Ksyusha, a Citroen Xara. Before her, she drove a Moskvich, a G8, and loves to leave the traffic lights so that “everyone swallows dust.”

There are two misfortunes in Russia - fools and roads.
Gogol N.V., 1840

In Russia, the main problem is fools on the roads.
Geiko Yu. V., 1977

No, after all, the biggest misfortune of Russia is fools showing the way.
Geiko Yu.V., 1995

Yes, after all, Russia’s biggest misfortune is still fools showing the way!
Geiko Yu.V., 2006

It just so happened that my life was intertwined from three components: writings (writing and journalism), a car and a woman.
The earliest feeling, of course, is from the car. Or rather, a motorcycle.
I'm two and a half years old. Some uncle, a pilot, a friend and colleague of my father, puts me in a loose rubber saddle. I remember well the delight of a strong and hot animal trembling beneath me, the pungent smell of gasoline and rubber.
The second most acute sensation from the car: I am a first-year student at the Moscow Automechanical Institute. Summer. The intersection of Kashirskoe Highway with the Moscow Ring Road. I get into the sports Moskvich of the captain of the AZLK rally team Viktor Shchavelev - we are going to the 1968 USSR Championship in Yerevan. I, as an errand boy, got a job for the holidays through friends. I get into this car, as usual, like many other cars, not realizing that my life will turn upside down in a few minutes: Shchavelev started the engine, drove off, and!..
The world blurred into colored speed stripes. The speedometer needle hit the limiter. My soul sank from every overtaking and my palms sweated, but until I believed in Shchavelev, I did not understand that he wants to live no less than me and drives with a large margin of reliability. After that, every time he overtook me, I felt delight, sheer delight. I discovered that in everyday life we ​​only experience the tip of the iceberg called “car”. Even driving “with the breeze” with a reckless driver is driving blindly; it does not give any idea of ​​​​the capabilities of the car, driven by the hand of a true master, ever closer to the edge beyond which his obedience ends.
...Exhausted by delight, I woke up late at night from the squeal of cylinders. My body, although pulled by a belt, was thrown in different directions, my back was burning and seemed to be worn to the point of bleeding - this was the beginning of the Caucasian serpentines. The headlights jumped from the asphalt onto the steep walls of the rocks and for a moment disappeared completely - in the blackness of the sky and abysses. When it dawned on me that the fireflies on the side of the road, a meter from the wheels, were not fireflies at all, but the lights of villages at the bottom of valleys and gorges, I was seized with an animalistic, sticky, real fear.
“What are you, Viktor Alekseevich,” I asked Shchavelev plaintively, “are you training?”
- No, I’m dispelling sleep.
Now I understand that we were then going at 60–70 percent of the car’s capabilities, that an ordinary private owner would have been going at 10–15 percent, a taxi driver at 20–30 percent, a reckless driver at 30–40 percent, no more.
The line that I spoke about, beyond which the machine’s obedience ends, is 100 percent of its capabilities. Often this is the line between life and death. The closest people to it are, as you understand, the champions. And, of course, not on city streets, not on highways, but on special routes blocked from traffic. Only once was I lucky enough to be very close to this edge and forever scorch my soul with the happiness of approaching the Absolute - I rode several high-speed sections in training with Ivan Astafiev, Honored Master of Sports, multiple champion of rally and circuit tracks, participant in the supermarathons of the century "London - Mexico City" , "London - Sydney".
Believe me, a car is the most powerful source of pleasure in human life, perhaps in second place after the King of pleasures - sex.
Now about the third component, about love for a woman, which is mentioned, along with the car, in the very first sentence of my book. A car literally brought me to her: a stuntman and an actress - this is how the beginning of our story can sound in a beautiful, romantic version.
Before her, I worked as a tester at Moskvich, and next to her I became a journalist. Without going into details, I will say that in the long-term and daily struggle for this woman, I became what I became - a happy person. Even now, 26 years later, having two sons with her, I admire her.
That's all the components of my life. At first, out of stupidity, I tried to separate them - I wrote a book about a car with a stupid title: “How to both survive and enjoy driving.” She was an unexpected success. Then I wrote a book about Her, about how it all began for us. This book was not successful because it was not published, since it was written only for my sons. But individual chapters from it, entirely related to the car, in oral retelling aroused the constant delight of any audience: “Well, just “Man and Woman” in the Russian version! Why don’t you write about it?”
And one day I realized: this is what no one can say better than me. And it’s not at all because there are no drivers who drive better than me, there are many of them. And not because, of course, there are no writers and journalists who write better than me, there are plenty of them too. And it’s not at all because there are no men who know how to love stronger, more beautiful than me - there are probably tons of them in general. But there are very few who combine, forgive the immodesty, these three talents - writing, traveling and loving.
And therefore allow me, however, for your money, to present you with this book with the following inscription:

A journalist friend of mine who now lives in Switzerland comes to Russia once every three to four months. He doesn’t come for business – only for the “feeling of life,” as he himself puts it. “You see, the symbol of Switzerland for me is a sleek cow grazing on a green meadow. She grazes today, tomorrow, a year, five, ten years, she grazes, eats the grass, and nothing happens around her! A well-fed, measured and wildly boring existence!! But here, with you, time is compressed by events. You live as much in a month, or even in a week, as “civilized nations” live in years!”
It's hard to disagree with him. When I look at the changes, so to speak, in the automotive mentality of Russians in just my 50-year life, I am amazed at what a giant leap has taken place here. Judge for yourself.
When I was young, having your own car was like having your own airplane today. In our military town on the outskirts of Pskov, only two people - the owners of the Pobeda and the Volga with a deer on the hood - looked at them the way they look at dollar millionaires today - with admiration and hostility at the same time. These were the years of the 50s.
In the 60s and even in the 70s, when Fiat injected 660 thousand cars a year into the USSR, the situation changed little, except that the Pobeda disappeared, and the Zhiguli, Muscovites, Volgas and humpbacks constipations" began to be produced more, but still there were queues for them, but still "Moskvich-412", for example, cost 4900 rubles, "Zhiguli" - 5500 rubles, with the average salary of that time being 120 rubles - more than 40-50 salaries per car !! And yet, on the black market, cars were worth twice the store price - we were the only country in the world where, as Western radio stations said, an old car was worth more than a new one. The family saved half their life for a car so that they could drive it for the rest of their lives, and then pass it on to their descendants.
Only some 30 years have passed, and today Russia is terrible force car ownership - with an average salary in the country of $180, a family of two can buy a second-hand car for $500-1000 - six months of savings in total!
But our “middle class” domestic “second-hand” does not accept either new Ladas and Ladas, or used foreign cars for the same 5-8 thousand dollars.
In order to understand what our consumer wants to take on the car market, we must first define the concept of “middle class”. It is extremely vague - from the income of a family of three or four people of a thousand dollars a month to 5 thousand dollars. Next comes the “new Russianness”.
In the first half of the 90s, when “free entrepreneurs” received easy money for any move they made in business, there was no “middle class” yet. There were only “new Russians” and we, the servicemen on the payroll, were beggars. Our new rich differed from Western ones in that, having, say, 200 thousand dollars “in their bosoms,” they took cars for 80-100 thousand. While Western burghers and businessmen, having, say, the same 200 thousand in their accounts, could not afford to take a car more expensive than 17-20 thousand, and even then on credit. They always counted and kept every cent.
Now there is a “middle class” in Russia. And he chooses cars. Which?
The most economical and practical ones still buy new domestic cars or new cheap foreign cars on credit - a simple example: in the parking lot one night, thugs broke the side windows of a "Ten" and an "Audi A-4" and stole the radios. So, without taking into account the cost of the radios, the restoration of the side windows cost the owner of the “ten” 200 rubles, and the owner of the “Audi” - 220 dollars. Further, during two years of operation, the “ten” had about two dozen failures and defects, the elimination of which (without warranty) cost about 7 thousand rubles – 220 dollars). During the same time, the Audi had only three failures that were eliminated under warranty, but the contract for this very warranty plus scheduled maintenance 1, 2, 3 resulted in a total of $900 - is there a difference? I'm not even talking about accidents - an “element” of a wing or hood or door, subjected to straightening, putty and subsequent painting on a domestic car costs a maximum of one and a half thousand rubles (50 dollars), and on an average-priced foreign car - 150-300 dollars. It follows from this that those who count money and do not dream of splurging buy domestic cars or new cheap foreign cars on credit.
I will say more - among rich people who value their lives, there has emerged a Last year the fashion to drive discreetly, not to be conspicuous by the 600s that they can easily purchase; “Ninety-nine”, “ten” - these are their favorite cars. They can come to a “party”, to a reception, to visit a desired client, or to sign an important contract in a Ferrari, but they prefer to travel to and from work without any fuss.
Our “middle class” does not have patriotism in choosing a car, like the French who choose Renault, Peugeot or Citroen, like the Germans who choose Mercedes, Audi, Volkswagen or BMW. ; They have these models - a wide range of prices and a smaller range of quality, and there is service at every kilometer, and they themselves do not delve under the hood. Our "burghers" have a choice - a new VAZ, a Western second-hand car, at worst - a Japanese right-hand drive, at best - new cheap foreign cars on credit, and what model depends on their living conditions. If a person lives in a small town, in a rural area, then he chooses carburetor or “single-point” injection “sixes”, “sevens”, “fours” and “ladas”, since he can repair them in any rural garage. Servicing complex “distributed” injection engines, and even more so automatic transmissions, is not available in every regional center, which still needs to be reached.
Over the past 10–15 years, a tremendous shift has occurred in the minds of our compatriots - we recognized foreign cars. Both new and old, albeit 10 years old, but BMWs and Mercs for the same 5-7 thousand “green”. And when you sit down in them, when complete silence embraces you, and the doors slam shut not with the sound of a tin can, but dully, solidly, when you press the pedal and fly away, and the “torpedo” “like a tree” winks at you with not Russian luxury at all - how can it not send the entire Russian auto industry to any letter! And they send us, unable to change from a 12-year-old BMW to a new “ten”. And one can understand them - the “purely Russian” auto industry is slowly dying under the onslaught of better “co-produced” cars. They are yesterday for the Western automobile industry, but for us they are today.
If earlier people, families, were divided into those who “have a car” and those who do not, now it becomes important - what car? If you answer: “Mercedes”, they will immediately ask you: “What year?” Which?" and instantly determine your level of well-being. As he grew older, our man for the first time began to strive for his car to become an extension of his comfortable world - an apartment, an office: it should not be “lower level”. Higher please. And that's okay.

Whether you have it or not yet, get ready for the fact that it, the car, is a living creature that you take into the family. She will change everything in your life - the pace, the budget, your salary, she may well change your mistresses or lovers (if you have them), she will to some extent dominate you, change your habits, she will force you to plow in the capitalist field much more efficiently than you have done so far, and at the same time will dramatically increase your efficiency.
A car is a special world into which only initiates are allowed; it is a door that can only slam behind you. If you feel very bad and need privacy, she will give it to you at any time of the day and at any time of the year - a dry, warm and comfortable piece of space awaits you under the window. Turn the key - and you are alone with yourself, with your problems and even sometimes with eternity. A machine, like a dog, will never cheat on you, will not betray you, will not tell your friends or enemies about your other life - a secret that only it, the machine, knows.
Your car knows your habits better than your closest friend, it waits for you in the parking lot on long nights, it rejoices at your appearance early in the morning, but is silent because it is made of iron.
Nowadays people choose a car completely differently than they did 10–15 years ago – as just a means of transportation. The car is a continuation of the life that you managed to build for yourself - it must correspond to you, your apartment, salary, standard of living, your temperament, the comfort to which you are accustomed, your character, sense of beauty, outlook on life. She should only give you positive emotions, because there are so few of them in life...
Your car not only becomes a part of your life, whether you want it or not, by its very existence it is embedded in your gene cells, it becomes a part of you, your “I”, and to be completely honest, your car is you .
And what follows from this? It follows from this that you need to know as much as possible about the car, because too much in your life depends on it.

This must happen - you have money, and you decide to buy yourself a car. Which one exactly?...

I completely agree that once you have driven a Mercedes, you will never drive a Zhiguli again. But this applies to those who have a lot of money. For the vast majority of Russians, foreign cars, even used ones, are still unavailable due to very low incomes. Let's talk about foreign cars on Russian roads and start with the fact that, of course, they are sheer delight and pleasure at seemingly the same prices. The only difference is that for the same money you can buy either a new “ten”, or a 10-year-old BMW, Volvo, or a 12-year-old Mercedes.
The new “ten”, “Kalina” will serve you for two years with unforeseen costs of no more than 200-300 dollars per year. Six- to eight-year-old BMWs, Volvos, and Mercedes will require at least $800-1000. And this is only subject to emergency malfunctions, excluding car service. But not everything on foreign cars can be done by “Uncle Vasya” - there are things that cannot be done without a branded service: injection cars, automatic transmissions or cars stuffed with electronics. In this case, the annual cost of maintaining such a machine reaches 2–3 thousand dollars.

Here is a letter from Valery from Obninsk, which came to me by e-mail, it is no exception to the rule.

Life in three paragraphs

Geiko Yuri Vasilievich, journalist, member of the Union of Writers of Russia, the Union of Cinematographers of Russia, author of several books for car enthusiasts, published in our country and abroad. Winner of the “Best Journalist of Russia” awards for 1995, “Automotive Journalist of Russia” for 2003.

Graduated from MAMI (Auto Mechanical Institute), Literary Institute named after. Gorky. In the army he served as an officer - head of the motor-tractor service of a missile site in Kazakhstan. He worked as a test engineer at AZLK, a stuntman at a film studio, a receptionist at a car service center, and a correspondent for the Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper. Candidate for Master of Sports in motorsport. Married to actress Marina Dyuzheva.

A participant in the 1989 round-the-world car trip “Columbus Caravan”, he traveled around the globe approximately along the 40th parallel driving a “Moskvich-2141”, which stood in the AZLK museum for many years until the plant was plundered. For this trip he received the status of “Honorary Citizen of Columbus” (the capital of Ohio, USA).

There are two misfortunes in Russia - fools and roads.

Gogol N. V., 1840

In Russia, the main problem is fools on the roads.

Geiko Yu. V., 1977

No, after all, the biggest misfortune of Russia is fools showing the way.

Geiko Yu.V., 1995

Yes, after all, Russia’s biggest misfortune is still fools showing the way!

Geiko Yu.V., 2006

It just so happened that my life was intertwined from three components: writings (writing and journalism), a car and a woman.

The earliest feeling, of course, is from the car. Or rather, a motorcycle.

I'm two and a half years old. Some uncle, a pilot, a friend and colleague of my father, puts me in a loose rubber saddle. I remember well the delight of a strong and hot animal trembling beneath me, the pungent smell of gasoline and rubber.

The second most acute sensation from the car: I am a first-year student at the Moscow Automechanical Institute. Summer. The intersection of Kashirskoe Highway with the Moscow Ring Road. I get into the sports Moskvich of the captain of the AZLK rally team Viktor Shchavelev - we are going to the 1968 USSR Championship in Yerevan. I, as an errand boy, got a job for the holidays through friends. I get into this car, as usual, like many other cars, not realizing that my life will turn upside down in a few minutes: Shchavelev started the engine, drove off, and!..

The world blurred into colored speed stripes. The speedometer needle hit the limiter. My soul sank from every overtaking and my palms sweated, but until I believed in Shchavelev, I did not understand that he wants to live no less than me and drives with a large margin of reliability. After that, every time he overtook me, I felt delight, sheer delight. I discovered that in everyday life we ​​only experience the tip of the iceberg called “car”. Even driving “with the breeze” with a reckless driver is driving blindly; it does not give any idea of ​​​​the capabilities of the car, driven by the hand of a true master, ever closer to the edge beyond which his obedience ends.

...Exhausted by delight, I woke up late at night from the squeal of cylinders. My body, although pulled by a belt, was thrown in different directions, my back was burning and seemed to be worn to the point of bleeding - this was the beginning of the Caucasian serpentines. The headlights jumped from the asphalt onto the steep walls of the rocks and for a moment disappeared completely - in the blackness of the sky and abysses. When it dawned on me that the fireflies on the side of the road, a meter from the wheels, were not fireflies at all, but the lights of villages at the bottom of valleys and gorges, I was seized with an animalistic, sticky, real fear.

“What are you, Viktor Alekseevich,” I asked Shchavelev plaintively, “are you training?”

- No, I’m dispelling sleep.

Now I understand that we were then going at 60–70 percent of the car’s capabilities, that an ordinary private owner would have been going at 10–15 percent, a taxi driver at 20–30 percent, a reckless driver at 30–40 percent, no more.

The line that I spoke about, beyond which the machine’s obedience ends, is 100 percent of its capabilities. Often this is the line between life and death. The closest people to it are, as you understand, the champions. And, of course, not on city streets, not on highways, but on special routes blocked from traffic. Only once was I lucky enough to be very close to this edge and forever scorch my soul with the happiness of approaching the Absolute - I rode several high-speed sections in training with Ivan Astafiev, Honored Master of Sports, multiple champion of rally and circuit tracks, participant in the London-Mexico City supermarathons of the century. , "London - Sydney".

Believe me, a car is the most powerful source of pleasure in human life, perhaps in second place after the King of pleasures - sex.

Now about the third component, about love for a woman, which is mentioned, along with the car, in the very first sentence of my book. A car literally brought me to her: a stuntman and an actress - this is how the beginning of our story can sound in a beautiful, romantic version.

Before her, I worked as a tester at Moskvich, and next to her I became a journalist. Without going into details, I will say that in the long-term and daily struggle for this woman, I became what I became - a happy person. Even now, 26 years later, having two sons with her, I admire her.

That's all the components of my life. At first, out of stupidity, I tried to separate them - I wrote a book about a car with a stupid title: “How to both survive and enjoy driving.” She was an unexpected success. Then I wrote a book about Her, about how it all began for us. This book was not successful because it was not published, since it was written only for my sons. But individual chapters from it, entirely related to the car, in oral retelling aroused the constant delight of any audience: “Well, just “Man and Woman” in the Russian version! Why don’t you write about it?”

And one day I realized: this is what no one can say better than me. And it’s not at all because there are no drivers who drive better than me, there are many of them. And not because, of course, there are no writers and journalists who write better than me, there are plenty of them too. And it’s not at all because there are no men who know how to love stronger, more beautiful than me - there are probably tons of them in general. But there are very few who combine, forgive the immodesty, these three talents - writing, traveling and loving.

And therefore allow me, however, for your money, to present you with this book with the following inscription:

Auto mentality of Russians

A journalist friend of mine who now lives in Switzerland comes to Russia once every three to four months. He doesn’t come for business – only for the “feeling of life,” as he himself puts it. “You see, the symbol of Switzerland for me is a sleek cow grazing on a green meadow. She grazes today, tomorrow, a year, five, ten years, she grazes, eats the grass, and nothing happens around her! A well-fed, measured and wildly boring existence!! But here, with you, time is compressed by events. You live as much in a month, or even in a week, as “civilized nations” live in years!”

It's hard to disagree with him. When I look at the changes, so to speak, in the automotive mentality of Russians in just my 50-year life, I am amazed at what a giant leap has taken place here. Judge for yourself.

When I was young, having your own car was like having your own airplane today. In our military town on the outskirts of Pskov, only two people - the owners of a Pobeda and a Volga with a deer on the hood - were looked at the way they look at dollar millionaires today - with admiration and hostility at the same time. These were the years of the 50s.