Way back (!) in the late 60's, I was riding behind 8444 (now 844, of course) back to Denver from Laramie. We had been delayed for a couple of hours at Cheyenne. The crew was running short on time. I was told later that the "brass" told the crew to ignore the speed limits and try to make Denver before they "died on the law." We had to make an intermediate stop in Greeley on the way, to boot.
Well, I found out what an "800" could do. We AVERAGED over 80 mph between Cheyenne and Greeley. There were many miles that we were travelling in excess of 100 mph (on jointed rail!).
Well, to your question. Several cars were attempting to pace the train. You know the routine: get ahead of train, pull off, shoot picture, get ahead of train again, repeat. This, of course, meant that these crazies would have to go 120 mph or so to get ahead of the train again. Fortunately, there was not a lot of non-railfan traffic.
The biggest crazy was a guy in a 911 Targa Porsche pacing the train. He had his buddy standing on the passenger seat (the top was off of the car) and had him filming with an 8mm movie camera (at 100 mph+).
Well, the State Patrol got wind of all of this. A few miles north of Greeley, they had a "reception committee" of about 8 troopers waiting. Needless to say, our "entourage" was left behind to explain their "hobby" to some unsympathetic listeners.
South of Greeley, there was a lot more traffic. No one could keep up with the train on the highway. That was fun. Oh yeah, we made it to Denver before the crew "outlawed."
That line north of Denver was a racetrack, and the 844 could run like the wind. The lawyers and bean-counters would never let anything like that happen today. Too bad, it was FUN!
