Team Orange Refuse to Tandem at D1GP Chicago and More!?
Posted by Wrecked Magazine on 02 Aug 2009 at 03:33 am | Tagged as: D1GP USA, Rumors/Gossip, Team Orange
According to some reports from fans, drivers, and people closely linked to teams have filled me in on what seems to be a mess of epic proportions. The event really fell apart when the Tanaka Vs. Wang battle took place. Apparently Forrest Wang defeated Tanaka and the Japanese drivers went insane. They demanded a OMT and were not issued it. Kumakubo was scheduled to battle Forrest Wang in the top 4 and refused to run a tandem battle with him.I understand being upset about a bad call but what poor sportsman ship that is from the Team Orange camp which is a huge disappointment to not only us at Wrecked Magazine but the thousands of fans who paid money to watch them drift.
Apparently a fan I spoke with says the crowd got wind of the activities and started “booing” and chanting “bullshit.” Then it appeared that Nomuken was going to refuse to run as well passing Forrest Wang into a victory. Eventually Nomuken came out and tandemed with Forrest Wang which drew a OMT. Then Nomuken cleanly earned a victory for the night. One thing neglected was a third place run however and somehow Harri Hokkanen was just issued third place without any formal runs.
Mind you this is a story we pieced together from several people’s experience that we trust who were either fans or people we have known and worked with for some time. We will keep you updated on this story as more information comes out from the D1GP USA party and the others involved. As for now it looks like we just have a ton of unanswered questions on our table.
UPDATE: Now being told I down played the drama with the finals between Nomuken and Wang. Fans waited around 20 minutes they say for the tandem battle to occur. Wang was staged and ready and Nomuken was not coming to the line and it took around 20 minutes for this to happen.
They better not pull this shit in NJ..
20 minutes for Kumakubo to show up is an understatement.
I thought this was a professional series? We must of waited for 30-40 minutes or it at least felt like it in the stands waiting for them to provide the show we paid for. Forrest Wang is awesome though, he is a J killer.
Dear D1GP, I know you will read this so please do what is right and refund all the fans money who wasted their time/effort to come out and see a shit show.
Glad this was linked up on our local forum, I agree! Where is my money D1?
Not sure if you know the reputation of the guys running D1GP. Do not think you guys will get anything!
Previous WRECKED thread, Read the replies!
Not sure if you know the reputation of the guys running D1GP. Do not think you guys will get anything!
Previous WRECKED thread, Read the replies!
http://www.wreckedmagazine.com/blog/2009/02/06/d1gp-usa-announces-judges-and-scoring-information/
If an umpire calls an outside pitch a strike you don’t retire the team to the locker room. Bad calls happen, Team Orange should have done the professional thing and manned up to give the fans what they came to see.
A little more went down with Forrest and Nomuken, they ran first bit of tandem with Nomuken leading. From my standpoint Nomuken had a tiny advantage. Then when Wang led Nomuken didn’t go. Keep in mind there are no pace cones just a flagger. Then apparently Forrest got yelled at ffor leaving too early. Then we waited another 30 minutes while Nomuken pleaded to Keiichi.
Then to be quite honest forrest had a close run with Nomuken, not sure how he won that final tandem.
Bbut huge thanks to Rob for being straight up with judging, congrats to Forrest.
I was there team didnt even get to showcase thier personal tandem battle with eachother. D1 is a major dissapoint from 2007. Too much downtime. D1 is about the real drifters. Needed more japan drifting showcased. Worst one ive been to. Announcer also couldnt amp the crowd and fail to talk about the drivers and vehicles properly. I hope d1 finds a better format before they come to ny/nj. Were not as nice as the chicago fans.
Team Orange, nomuken and ueno are your best drivers. They need to be focused on. They are why this event happens. Without them d1 would fall.
Someone left their trophy in the trash can
Car show trophy?
Edgar, lol was it next to all the shirts that got ripped off?
First off congrats to Nomura finishing first. I’m a huge fan of him, his team, and the ER34 Skyline. Nomuken for 2009 Japan D1GP Champion!!
More importantly the lack of sportsmanship is apalling. I just don’t understand this. First it was the driftbox crap in Anaheim. I was there; the judging sucked, the announcer sucks. Black Knight you are completely right about that. Now this… Bad call arguement crap. I understand that the Japanese want to make a real impression, but this is about who is best. If there is a bad call it can be disputed, but not for that long. That means as an opponent you have to pull out all the stops and drift better. I mean really. D1GP USA needs to return to it’s glory days of 2006. Back when everything was awesome. I was happy to see D1, but also harshly dissapointed.
More support for Forrest Wang, he is pure awesome. Just imagine what he could do with more support and more cash.
One more thought… Forrest beat Tanaka in Anaheim. Maybe Team Orange is still pissed off from that.
Sounds like this dog and pony show has not improved since Anaheim, albeit for different reasons. Seems the Japanese drivers never got the memo that they were expected to compete with anyone but each other. Granted, it’s not as though D1 is fielding top talent throughout, but if some young gun is taking it to the Japanese, you’d think they’d step up and put on a show. D1(US) has a long way to go before it’s worthy of the D1 moniker.
my friend took nomuken’s trophy out of the trash can after the blitz guys threw it away! thanks for being poor sports dick heads, even though you guys didn’t drift at least we got your trophy.
Good interview from Forrest by the Vegas Drift guys:
http://www.vegasdrift.com/exclusive-interview-with-forrest-wang-on-d1-chicago/
“VD: So what happened with the final 4?
FW: Well Kumokubo came up to me and gave me a hug, he was smiling and said “I don’t know what is going on” “it’s nothing against you, but I’m not going to be able to compete with you.” I got a bye run and took on Nomuken in the final round.”
At least Kumokubo said something and didn’t just stand him up at the line. What a mess!
P.S. If anyone has any video of Mike Pollard driving this event, please email opposition.chris@gmail.com. Thanks!
this is America the greatest country in the world.
in conclusion, our drivers ARE better.
FUCK THOSE POOR SPORTSMAN DRIVERS THEY MAKE THE REST OF THE JAPANESE DRIVERS LOOK BAD. TEAM ORANGE HAS NO HONOR>
That’s very unprofessional for Team orange and those other japan drivers to act this way!! I smell a little hatterade racist going on here, maybe those J-drivers thought they were so superior to find out a good ol Americans were right up there with them. FREAKING DISHONORABLE POOR SPORTSMANSHIP!
Japanese racism in D1 drift is out of control. The Japanese show no honor in their actions here.
Smashing japan drivers! damn.
well forrest is reppin’ hawaii big time.
We should bring more drivers up there from down here in hawaii.
Keep it up forrest!
explication of Kumokubo = http://kumakubo.seesaa.net/
Dishonorable. Kumokubo is a coward and there actions were very rude flipping off the crowd like that, and acting that way in competition is a bad example for the youngsters.
[...] les gars vous
[...] les gars vous
Yea bro, I just watched the videos on the site. Team Orange should just head back to Japan
[...] the finals from a fan at D1GP Chicago. It’s not the best quality video we have ever seen but you can see these runs that have everyone in Team Orange so worked up about. The tandem runs start at the top 8 and run all the way to the finals with Nomuken facing Forrest [...]
Can I have the trophy?