Automotive journalists are generally presumed to be above-average--if not very good--drivers. Driving cars, after all, is an essential element of the trade. Hence, car companies trust us with brand-new cars for weekend test drives. Heck, car companies even trust motoring hacks with ultra-expensive supercars on the racetrack.

And this, basically, is always a recipe for disaster, as there are always two unfortunate realities at work here. First, there are journalists whose confidence in their driving skills far exceeds the actual skills. Second, there are those journalists who simply don't have driving skills to begin with.

The latter, apparently, was to blame when a Chinese motoring journalist driving a Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG panic-braked as he approached a corner of the Zhuhai International Circuit, causing a C63 AMG (photo below) closely following him to ram the back of the SLS. The incident, which supposedly occurred at an "SLS AMG Track Xperience" event, was reported by Car News China. (Although if the recounting of the story is accurate, we wonder how the front part of the SLS got damaged as well. Perhaps from the sheer force of the impact?)

Anyway, incidents like this one will no doubt make car companies think twice about lending special cars to so-called automotive journalists. Just our luck then.