(McGregor, Texas) I drove to the outskirts of the Tesla Roadster reveal last night to be close to the historic event, the last of the cars Tesla will build that will be designed for manual driving by a human. Elon said, “Life cannot just be about solving one miserable problem after another. There need to be things that inspire you, that make you glad to wake up in the morning”.
Elon Musk has long been a man who wants to max out happiness for the general population. The Roadster does that, and you can bet people will love going to future events that feature this wild car with its thruster and suction stunts. I recall as a kid people lining up in stadiums to see Evel Knievel jump over a line of cars. People will be beyond excited to see the Tesla Roadster do this.
One writer, M.C.A. Hogarth, put it well when he said that not everything is about whether you can imagine it being useful to you. He is correct: with art, things are lovingly created simply for the act of making them.
Hogarth goes on to write (and I reference him because Elon Musk chose to highlight his words): “we do not know if what we’ll learn will make your toaster work better and you will never realize it because you take for granted that things get better without thinking through how that happens”.
Elon knows that he will not inspire people with everyday toasters, or a “Tesla” phone, but he knows he CAN inspire some kid, somewhere, with a real car that can drive upside down. This is the reason for the Roadster.
Despite the grind of daily life and the routines and obligations that kids often have, I know there will be many kids who will see the videos shared from the event by Tesla, and even by people I consider friends from the Tesla community. These people’s videos will start to spread, and everybody will see them.
When Elon said that he knew we would need real people there to prove it really happened, he was right. This DID happen last night. It WAS reality. It was super cool. It WILL inspire minds and bring them great excitement. What a huge gift to us all. Thanks to Elon Musk. He was once a kid too, who found excitement. Thankfully he made it to the US where he could build great things like this Roadster.
Adding a compilation of posts here by people who shared their videos from their iphones from the actual event!
From Elon Musk himself!
From Sawyer Merritt (volume UP for the crowd’s priceless reactions!):
From Ben Schaffer (darling of the Tesla community, from UnPlugged Tesla):
From John Stringer (seeing this car up close, in all its brilliancy):
From Alexandra Merz (what a kind lady, who also appeared on my recent podcast!):
Bret Winton captured the childlike wonder at the event, in this spontaneous video that I reshared, and has over 400,000 views at time of publishing!
More from Sawyer Merritt, (let’s climb into the Roadster with Sawyer):
Here are newly released images of the Roadster (there are many more) for media usage by the Tesla Media website, below shows off the Gold Glazed tinted glass.
Above shows the Ano White paint, which is an aerospace-derived finish w/ UV & cryogenic protection, electrostatic dissipation & corrosion resistance. Concealed headlights are another asset, bringing a a minimalist, highly technical form. My old Mazda RX7 had this and seeing it on the Roadster just makes perfect sense!
Below is a close-up of the super light wheels w/ thin spokes that reinforce structural strength when earthbound.
Thanks for reading. I’m Gail Alfar. I write about Elon Musk, Tesla, SpaceX, and the things that make the future feel real. You can find me on X at @gailalfaratx and on Gail’s Tesla Podcast.
This is an independent personal account. All opinions are my own.
Interior of the Roadster
For the interior of the Roadster, Tesla explains, “Interior– Ultrawhite interior w/ gray microsuede detailing & seat bolsters for added grip – Manual controls & a fixed seat position reduce overall vehicle mass – Lightweight, high-strength materials throughout, including magnesium, titanium & carbon fiber help reduce it further This allows Roadster to respond to driver inputs almost instantly”.
