**You don’t need to drive faster than the speed limit. The practical response is to move right when it’s safe and let faster traffic pass.** Moving over doesn’t mean their speeding is legal.

“Fast lane” is an informal name for the leftmost regular traffic lane. Think of it as the **passing lane**: California’s DMV recommends using the left lane to pass and moving right when someone behind you wants to travel faster. “Fast” describes your speed relative to other traffic, rather than a particular number on your speedometer. [California DMV lane guidance](https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/handbook/california-driver-handbook/navigating-the-roads/), [DMV guidance on traffic flow](https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/handbook/california-driver-handbook/laws-and-rules-of-the-road-cont1/)

For example, on a freeway with a 65 mph limit:

- If vehicles to your right are doing 55, you can pass them at 65.
- If you’re doing 65 and someone behind wants to do 80, move right when a safe gap opens. You can keep doing 65.
- Their desire to pass does **not** give either of you permission to exceed the limit. CHP’s enforcement guidance treats speeds above the freeway’s 65 or 70 mph maximum as speeding violations. [CHP Highway Enforcement Manual, pages 3-4–3-6](https://www.chp.ca.gov/siteassets/policy/hpm/hpm-100.68/hpm-100.68-ch-3_sanitized.pdf)

There’s an important legal nuance here: **being at the maximum speed limit does not automatically make you guilty of illegally obstructing faster drivers.** CHP’s manual explicitly says vehicles traveling at the 55/65/70 mph maximum limits are “not in violation of Section 21654 CVC,” the slower-traffic keep-right provision. That’s distinct from the DMV’s practical advice to let faster traffic pass. [CHP manual, page 3-6](https://www.chp.ca.gov/siteassets/policy/hpm/hpm-100.68/hpm-100.68-ch-3_sanitized.pdf)

As for the officer’s honk, we can’t know exactly what they intended. Given the queue behind you, a request to move over seems plausible; it wasn’t necessarily a request to speed up.

Seeing other drivers speed without being stopped doesn’t establish a higher legal limit. Ordinary speeding enforcement generally means a ticket, so “I haven’t seen anyone arrested” isn’t a useful measure of whether it’s permitted.

Your move into the right lane was sensible. Keep your lawful, safe speed, signal, check your blind spot, and move over when there’s room—you don’t have to accelerate to satisfy a tailgater. [DMV guidance on tailgaters](https://qr.dmv.ca.gov/portal/handbook/california-driver-handbook/safe-driving/)