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SALT LAKE COUNTY -- It's a new twist on street racing. Instead of using surface streets, racers are using our freeways.
Street racing is a dangerous activity. Add in freeway traffic, along with stopping and starting, and the Utah Highway Patrol calls it absolutely reckless. A witness to one of these races alerted both UHP and KSL News to what he saw this past weekend.
"It was beyond kids acting like kids for sure," Matt said.
Matt didn't want his full name revealed, but told us he was driving south on Interstate 15 Saturday night around 11:30. When he got to 4500 South, he saw nothing but brake lights in front of him.
"Ten to 12 cars in a group, and they had spread out across all the freeway lanes," Matt explained.
"They actually stopped and formed, like, a starting line and raced on from there," said Utah Highway Patrol Sgt. Anthony Carrubba.
The stopping and starting continued until the Interstate 215 interchange, but the erratic driving went on into Sandy. At around 7200 South, Matt's wife got out her iPhone and started recording.
"They're kind of like regrouping and terrorizing other drivers," Matt explained while showing us his wife's video. "They're driving from one side of the freeway to the other. They were doing spurts of acceleration and racing each other."
At one point, Matt said he was driving in the carpool lane as a car nearly ran into him.
"A white Jetta that tried to push me into the barrier wall," Matt said.
Carrubba said he's seen freeway races before, but this is the first time he's heard about stopping, then going.
"If you're talking about forming a starting line just so you can race, you're almost praying for something bad to happen," Carrubba said.
"I was surprised that it didn't cause an accident or cause an incident of road rage," Matt said.
He said he called UHP dispatch once he got home and gave one license plate number. No one from highway patrol called him back.
E-mail: ngonzales@ksl.com
