[wannabe]

Ok..on that one road RWD is safer.

[CC 330i]

Safer or not safer, I don't know.

When I had my 83 GTI, I tried to take a turn too fast in the rain and ended up plowing straight into the the curb front wheels first. Problem was, I was thinking the back end would come out and it didn't. If the handling had been more neutral, I probably would have made the corner, because I would not have lost total traction in the front end and I would have been able to correct for the slight oversteer. There is no correction for understeer other than to continue going straight.

Of course, I might have also hit the curb with the back wheels if the car had oversteered too much, so who's to say which is safer. I can only tell you that I didn't expect the radical understeer I got that day. As a result, I tore my left front alloy in half when it hit the curb.

I guess it just depends on which end of the car you want to hit first. Personally, I find mild oversteer the most controllable and safer situation for peak handling performance. In the hands of an idiot (like me that rainy day) FWD doesn't do anything but make you damage the front of the car (the most expensive part) rather than the rear.

I later added suspension mods to the car to make it more neutral, and I was able to take corners much faster.

There is no question that a RWD car will handle better than a similarly sized FWD car at the limit, however. For example, the Honda S2000 handles way better than a RSX type S. My 330i handles way better than my Jetta GLX. I am getting into handling territory with my 330i that I would have never dreamed about in my Jetta. Safer or not safer depends on the situation. I can tell you that it would not be safe for my Jetta to try to keep up with my 330i on a racetrack.