There are plenty of reasons why someone might not be driving at the speed limit, but that doesn't mean they can't pull over to let others past.

We’ve all been there. It’s a long weekend and you’re going on a long roadtrip.

You’ve got up early to beat the traffic and you’re making good time. Piopio is only 50 minutes away and the café there does a pretty good eggs benedict.

You’re cruising along at 100km/h, the sun is shining and your favourite song is on the radio. In the fields next to the highway, baby alpacas jump around as if they have springs for legs. Life doesn’t get much better than this.

Then it happens.

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You catch up to a convoy of 18 cars, stuck behind a slow vehicle. You’re going nowhere fast and your blood starts to simmer.

Some drivers aren’t confident driving at the speed limit, given the poor quality of our roads; some vehicles are legally restricted to 90km/h; tourists may like to actually cruise along and enjoy the scenery; and it simply isn’t safe or even physically possible for some vehicles to be driven anywhere near the speed limit.

I understand all of these things.

However, the New Zealand Road Code states that any driver travelling at below the speed limit "must" pull over as soon as it is safe to do so, if there are vehicles following them. This guy isn’t.

EXPERIENCED DRIVER

A wave of relief washes over you as you see a sign advising drivers that there is a passing lane in 2km. After what seems an age, the road splits into two lanes. You flick on your indicator, pull into the right-hand lane and go to overtake.

We all know what happens next.

The person at the front of the queue suddenly, magically, finds another gear. All of a sudden, this vehicle that hasn’t exceeded 85km/h for the past 15 minutes, is now doing 105km/h.

The temptation is to floor it, get up to 125km/h for a couple of moments, and get past. It’s dry, visibility is good, you’re an experienced driver, you’ve got new tyres, ABS, traction control, and all the rest. What’s the harm in giving it a little squirt for a couple of seconds?

It isn’t like cars suddenly blow up or lose control if they exceed the speed limit for a few seconds. They wouldn’t make them capable of going 180km/h if they did.

SPEEDING TOLERANCE

Besides, if this was Europe or even Australia, the speed limit would be more like 110km/h to 120km/h. So it surely can’t be that dangerous if I were to momentarily exceed the speed limit.

All of these thoughts go through your head.

The main thing from stopping you is that the cops have lowered the speeding tolerance to 4km/h over the long weekend. So you don’t floor it.

Thirty seconds later, the passing lane ends and only two or three of the 18 cars have made it past the slow vehicle. And, predictably, their speed has dropped to 85km/h again.

That simmer is now a boil.

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No time to stop for breakfast now. Eggs benedict with bacon and a mocha will be replaced with an Up & Go from a Caltex. And it’s starting to rain. Life doesn’t get much worse than this.

Some people reading this will accuse me of being a boy-racer. Not at all.

I don’t want to speed. I simply want to drive at the legal limit so I can get from A to B as quickly as I can, because I’d rather be relaxing at the beach than sitting in my car behind a guy towing a caravan.

Some will accuse me of acting like I own the road. Like the guy in the caravan isn’t! He’s the one inflicting his speed on 18 other drivers. He’s the one robbing people of their precious time. He’s the one not obeying the road code and deliberately making it difficult for people to pass, by speeding up in the passing lane.

Some people will also argue that going at 100km/h will only save me a couple of minutes. That may be true if you’re driving 10km to your local mall, but over long distances it soon adds up.

I drove 800km last weekend. At an average of 100km/h that would take 8 hours. At an average of 85km/h, it takes 9.4 hours. That difference of 1.4 hours is a fairly hefty chunk of a weekend.

If you go away four or five times a year, then that’s potentially seven hours you’ve spent behind a slow driver when you could have been swimming, fishing, skiing or playing with your kids.

By all means, take your time, enjoy the scenery, and travel at a speed you’re comfortable with, but please use your rear view mirrors, pull over to let others by, and don’t speed up for passing lanes.

It’s not just a matter of courtesy, it’s also the law.