Richard Jordan had everything he was told to want: cars, a new house, and a fiancee. Then his fiancee left him. So he sold everything, bought a Lamborghini Gallardo and set out across America. This is his amazing story.
This is a love story, but not a conventional one. Sure, there's a woman. There always is. But it's when the woman split that the real romance began. This is the story of Richard Jordan, a man who lost love and then found it again in an exotic Italian sports car and the open American road. Jordan's journey would take him across the country and back again multiple times as he racked up nearly 100,000 miles on a car so expensive, most owners rarely drive at all.
Independence Day
It was early 2006 and Richard's version of the American Dream lay crumbling at his feet. After giving his girlfriend of five years a ring and a house in suburban North Texas — purchased with the proceeds from selling his business, his old house and a few of his cars — she left him.
"I bought us the house and planned on moving in and, as soon as I did, she left," explains Richard. "So I got stuck in a house I didn't want, in an area I didn't want to be in... it was kind of emotionally traumatic. So I bought the car and wandered around."
It wasn't actually as easy as that. No one wanted to buy his new house so he was stuck with it. It took him months to sell the rest of his possessions and he used this money to afford a $90,000 down payment on a Lamborghini Gallardo — one of the most expensive vehicles on the market.
The Gallardo is named for a famous Spanish bull and unleashes a massive 512 HP through its mid-mounted V10. Its sharp looks hint at the performance: 0-to-60 mph in just 4.0 seconds with a top speed of 195 mph for the model Jordan purchased. The price? A steep $180,000 at the time of purchase.
After locating the right model and arranging the financing he picked up his black Lamborghini Gallardo Coupe from Lamborghini of Ohio. The date? July 4th, 2006.
Independence Day was an almost intentionally ironic choice, as he picked that day to separate from everything he'd created but now no longer wanted, including the house.
"I'd become a prisoner to my house, to everything, to my fantasy of an American Dream or anything I could remotely call home."
"I'm Not Moby"
With one of the fastest cars in the world but nowhere to take it, Jordan just started driving. For more than a year he wandered from place to place, living in motels and making new friends. He'd cross the United States three times and make trips from Ohio to Colorado to Texas to North Carolina on just a night's rest.
"It was just a feeling that I didn't really have a home, there was no place to safely be but the Lambo. That was the one thing that felt like it worked for me."
He visited the ghost towns and big cities and retraced childhood trips. As soon as he'd settle down somewhere he'd get the itch to move and pack up to drive somewhere else. He had trouble paying for the house in Dallas — his one remaining possession he couldn't shake — and was burning through what cash he had to afford gas. He almost lost the house numerous times.
"I have a few hundred grand against me, I don't like debt, but I'm used to it," Richard says. "I've accumulated a lot and paid it back several times in my life."
His wanderings yielded as much joy and humor as they did introspection and isolation, including a trip to strip club in Ohio where Richard, then 32, was mistaken for Moby by an a waitress who was convinced he was the musician because of his shaved head, glasses and fancy car.
"This girl comes up and was a waitress and she's like 'You're Moby, aren't you?' and I said 'I'll be anyone you want me to be,' and she took it as 'I'm Moby.'"
Richard is not Moby, but he's also not completely against accepting free bottles of champagne when offered.
"It was just ridiculous, the manager's like kissing my butt, I maybe spent $100 the whole night and it was just really, really silly and absurd."
"It was just like The Blues Brothers!"
Driving across the country in a Lamborghini means occasionally driving above the speed limit. Richard's honest about his desire to go fast and has a drawer full of 53 tickets to prove it. But it wasn't speed, exactly, that landed him in the handcuffs of an Indiana State Trooper.
Though generally jumping from hotel room to hotel room, Richard did have family responsibilities like serving as the best man in his cousin's wedding. While en route to the wedding he was stopped for speeding but ran afoul of the Indiana State Police and suddenly found himself staring down the highway at a roadblock.
Because his car's registration was one-day expired the troops were able to search the car and found a handgun.
"I don't travel without guns, I've been in too many situations so I always carry one or two guns with me," Richard says. "A car like that is an assault on the senses, and you could be in a decent area and just be barraged by people and you never knew who you're dealing with."
At first he didn't grasp the gravity of the situation — the police thought he was moving drugs — so his calm demeanor and jokes about hating the town he was in and a general Blues Brothers schtick didn't go over well. They kept him in the back of a squad car for four hours, eventually releasing him on his own recognizance when they realized they weren't able to drive the car on the back of a flatbed without his help.
He eventually got the car back and the charges settled, but the whole endeavor cost him $25,000 in fines, travel, and legal fees.
Source & More: http://jalopnik.com/5559767/
I really loved this story, he follows his dreams.
