Traveling to Drift Matsuri with Chris Forsberg

Here is our first installment of Drift Matsuri videos featuring Wrecked Magazine and Chris Forsberg. A huge thanks to NOS Energy Drink for making the whole trip possible in the first place. This first teaser video highlights our adventure getting to Ebisu Circuit from Los Angeles, California. The video also has some footage of the  pits and a few teaser drift shots gearing you up for our second video. Enjoy our endless adventures around Japan.
Watch the video: http://www.wreckedmagazine.com/watchvideo/traveling-to-drift-matsuri-with-chris-forsber

The Bro Show from Break.com got Chris Forsberg and his NOS Energy Nissan 350z involved in the latest of their shenanigans. I don’t want to give too much away with my Behind the Scenes story of the day but the dummy you see in the photo above was a person and the passenger of Chris Forsberg’s Nissan 350z had no idea the swap was made.

Chris Forsberg flew around Irwindale Speedway during the filming of the prank which involved a human clipping point.

After the prank was unveiled to all the parties involved the Break Media crew filmed some interviews with everyone. Then it was time for everybody at Irwindale to grab a ride-a-long with Chris.

The guys from the Bro Show were hooked on drifting after getting some rides with Forsberg. You could tell they were having a great time through the course of the shoot. Sadly they didn’t get to experience any tandem battles over the course of the day since Forsberg was the only driver for the prank.

After that the filming finished up at Irwindale it was time to go home and brave Los Angeles traffic. We are just waiting for Break to release the prank soon. We don’t have a release date but I will post it up on the website once they have it live.

The proposal isn’t to bad until Page 16 where you get to a D1GP Vs. Formula D comparison page. Sadly they have been sending this packet to potential sponsors and companies trying to bash Formula D and spread blatant lies about the series. The comparison chart is located below and if your having trouble reading it, you can pull up a full size image with a link just below the comparison chart. In my post below all of the

D1GP vs. Formula Drift – Full Size Image

Organizational Footprint

D1GP – “Worldwide”  This statement is a stretch but I guess we can even give them this one. They did have D1GB (D1 Great Britain) but after the 2006 D1 Vs. World event in Irwindale they ticked off the guys helping them over in that area. By the next year they split ties with D1GP and started EDC. I know Team Orange has done a few demos worldwide but all of the events have been in Japan/USA in past few years otherwise.

Formula D – “US/North America” All of this information is correct but they did leave out quite a bit of information. They threw an event in Panama (It is also the fastest growing economy and the largest per capita consumer in Central America) which covers them for Central America. For the past four years they have been throwing events in Southeast Asia adding that to the group. “US/North America/Central America/Southeast Asia”

Years in Operation

D1GP – “Japan 11 years / US 7 years” – They have not thrown events for 7 straight years in the USA. In 2008 they announced things and never threw an event on US soil. So far to date they have thrown events in 6 years since coming to the USA. 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009. This season coming up would make the 7th season for them.

Formula D – “US 6 years” For starters they have been in the USA throwing events for 7 years. 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008 , 2009, and 2010. They have thrown events for four years in Southeast Asia. Also 2 years in Panama (Central America).

Live Events

D1GP – “Japan, USA, Malaysia, UAE, China”  I cannot find a record of D1GP throwing a live event in Malaysia since 2006. To this date they have never thrown an event in the UAE or China. I have been told this winter they are throwing an event in Abu Dhabi (UAE) but no date was given to me.

Formula D – The proposal lists nothing for this section. Here is where Formula D has been doing live events “USA, Mexico, Panama, Indonesia, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia.”

Domestic or US Television

D1GP – “Speed/Fox Sports Net” The SPEED schedule for D1GP changes days and times through the broadcast. Some episodes are broadcast on Saturday and then some are moved to Sunday. The times range from 2:00pm to 6:30pm across those day changes. Link to D1GP Speed TV Post

Formula D – “Canceled” This is just blatant bullshit. This year they have a program on VERSUS like last season. The show starts airing on 8/15/2010 in the 4:00pm time slot on Sunday for 13 straight weeks with no changes. They also have a re-air of each broadcast which is at 5:30pm the Tuesday after it’s original air date. Formula Drift has never been canceled off a network and offered consistent television since 2005:

2005- G4TV
2006- G4TV
2007- ESPN2
2008- SPEED
2009- Versus
2010- Versus

Link to Formula D VERSUS Post

International Television

D1GP – “Tokyo TV, BS Fuji” No comments here due to lack of information/knowledge.

Formula D – “None” Another bold faced lie listed by D1GP. Formula Drift has posted before it’s syndication to over 300,000,000+ homes internationally that broadcast Formula D on television. They have posted that before on channel/country so if your eager to tune in, locate that sheet. It’s possible Formula D could post some of those slots here in the comments as well. In addition, Formula Drift Asia events are broadcast locally on Star Sports which is owned by ESPN. They have a reach including India, Hong Kong, China, Taiwan, Malaysia, Thailand and more spreading to 200,000,000 homes. These events air on Star Sports quite often and know people who see them frequently. For those of you who know Jason Small his father travels to China on business frequently and tells us about watching Formula D there. Just to provide solid proof, we have posted a whole episode of Star Sports coverage on our site before: Formula D Singapore on Star Sports Part 1

DVD/Blu-Ray

D1GP – “100+ Titles” This is an actual fact they listed in the proposal. D1 under the Option banner has released tons of DVDs which you can buy here.

Formula D – “2 Only Through Drift Alliance” Chalk up another lie. Want to buy Formula D DVD’s? 2005 Season DVD is here and No Limits DVD is here on our store. So now we have established that they released DVDs before. Currently you can access the Formula Drift All Access portion of the website and watch all the old television episodes from the series. New events are also now broadcast on the live stream and archived for viewing. None of these options are things D1GP does offer.

Yearly Estimated Unit Sales (for DVD)

D1GP – “3 Million” This is just not true. Assuming that a DVD costs about $1.00 to press (which is pretty correct) and they sell for an average net profit of $10.00 (low estimate) they would be bringing in $30,000,000 NET PROFIT a year just from DVD sales. The reality is then D1GP wouldn’t be having these financial issues everyone in the Japan drifting scene whispers about. Also speaking with US distributors of the DVD they just don’t move that many units, nothing even close. Less than 10,000 unit sales a year in US sales is a number I was told. So where are these other 2,900,000 DVDs being sold?

Formula D – “0″ I am sure someone buys the DVD units they have made but I guess you cannot list a number D1 Grand Prix when you lied about them making DVDs in the first place.

Video Games

D1GP – “Yes” This is correct. In 2004 they released a D1GP game for Japanese PS2. It wasn’t very good. Then in 2005 they launched D1GP 2005 for the Japanese PS2 which was awesome. It had the three judges very animated in the bottom left corner of the screen as you drifted. In 2006 they brought that same D1GP 2005 game to the United States and released it as NTSC game so it could be playable on a US Playstation 2. They also have had Ryuji Miki’s Top Secret D1GP car featured in Forza 2 and Forza 3. On Japanese arcade systems you can drift as several D1GP cars in Battle Gear 4 as well.

Formula D - “No” Well guess who got it wrong again? They have been featured in two EA Game productions with Formula Drift. The most recent in Need for Speed SHIFT you have Vaughn Gittin Jr.’s 2010 Mustang (PROOF). It is unlocked at Level 10 driver level and you can use it to compete in various drift events. Rhys Millen’s Hyundai Genesis was also featured in Forza 3 in a free Hyundai DLC pack that came out just after SEMA 2009 to all Xbox Live players (PROOF).

Online MMORPG

D1GP – “Yes” Ummm really? Since when did D1 Grand Prix release a MMORPG which stands for “Massively multiplayer online role-playing game.” Per wikipedia “It is a genre of computer role-playing games in which a very large number of players interact with one another within a virtual gaming world.” Anybody know about this one and I am just in the dark? The best I could find is “Drift City” which they called a MMORPG and didn’t look much like one by definition. It also appeared to have no affiliation with D1GP I could find. Perhaps they are working on a Dungeons and D1GP dragons for 2010?

Formula D – “No” This is correct. On the bright side you can play Fantasy Drift for the Formula Drift series here at Wrecked Magazine.

Mobile Games

D1GP – “Yes” They do have in the proposal information about an iPhone drifting game coming out. Don’t think it is on market currently.

Formula D – “No” You cannot get games from Formula Drift but they do have a LiveStream application and you can access Fantasy Drift on mobile phones.

Magazine

D1GP – “Option Magazine (Japan)” This is correct.

Formula D - “No” Formula Drift doesn’t own a magazine but you cannot deny the exposure Formula Drift gets from various media outlets in the United States. An independent study done by Meltwater News showed that Formula Drift has a 90% market share with magazine editorial coverage worldwide.

Professional Judges

D1GP – “All” I agree with this statement.

Formula D – “1 of 3″ Alright so who is the one professional judge? I mean all three drivers have competed on a professional level in Formula Drift. Pretty sure all of them participated in the old D1GP events as well. This is just an absurd statement thrown in here to discredit Formula Drift.

Driftbox Technology

D1GP – “Yes” This is a correct statement. Due to malfunctions of this system back in the 2009 USA series, they made a few drivers run multiple qualifying runs since the box didn’t log any information.

Formula D – “No” I chalked up a debate with a professional driver on this topic and he ended it before it started with “who cares?” I think that somehow put it better than I ever could.

Professional Street Legal Series

D1GP – “Yes” The way they worded the category is just pure trickery. Sure, you guys named your Pro Am series “Street Legal” and nobody else has a “Street Legal” series but it’s just a fancy word for “Am.”

Formula D – “No”  They call their series the Formula Drift Pro Am and we mostly reference it as “Am” series. They have a network in the Am series of over 10 series I know of and did some in Southeast Asia as well.

Car and Driver Entries

D1GP – “100+” I have attended several D1GP events in Japan along with the United States in the past 6 years. Never have I seen an entry list of 100+ cars. Even if they met that number, it’s a very irrelevant number. The issue here is quality over quantity any day.

Formula D – “50+” Correct.

Live Event Countries

D1GP – “Japan, U.S., Dubai, China” The big sore thumb here…. Dubai is not a country. It isn’t even the capital city of the United Arab Emirates (proper country name). Dubai is a city and also an emirate of the UAE (think of in America as a state) which they have seven of in the whole country. They didn’t even put enough thought/proof reading into this proposal to verify that fact. Also from Live Events to Live Event Countries Malaysia magically vanished.

Formula D - This section had no entry for Formula Drift. We covered this back in live events but I will bring the same list down. “USA, Mexico, Panama, Indonesia, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia.”

Number of Yearly Events

D1GP – “15-20″ This is correct fact.

Formula D – “5 to 7″ With international reach Formula Drift will throw 12 events in 2010. The American championship points series consists of 7 rounds. Never in history have they had 5 championship point rounds in one year. 2004 they had 4 (inaugural season) and in 2005 they jumped to 6 rounds. By 2006 they went to 7 rounds for America and have not changed to this day.

Average Attendance Per Event

D1GP – “10,000″ If you went to D1GP USA in 2009 you would know that number was not the case. I won’t really dispute that for Japan numbers because of a lack of direct first hand knowledge. It’s been a good minute since D1GP packed in 10,000 here in the USA.

Formula D – “6,000″ That is another joke. All three events this season have been well clear of 10,000 fans. Irwindale last year broke an attendance record and sold out.

Editor Side Note: It upsets me to see D1GP using these false pretenses and malice practices to try and win sponsorship. While I know some of you might care I think it was worth getting out in the open. Over the last few days they have had reps posting on our site talking about how they are here for the good and growth of the sport. Sure doesn’t seem like it after reading over this. The document’s authenticity was verified by me with proper contact information in the back of this packet along with talking to people who had seen the same packet in presentations/meetings with D1GP. The packet came from a very trustworthy source in the industry who I thank and owe drinks too soon.

Daijiro Yoshihara is the one of the most talented drivers in Formula Drift to date. I don’t think anyone can question that across the board while providing legitimate counter points. However since he has come to Falken Tire he just hasn’t brought that aggressive edge or that last 10% of performance to put him at 100%. Some fans blamed it on the Lexus and then that car got written off in Seattle 2009.

That has to be a monumental mark in Daijiro Yoshihara’s career that no one will forget anytime soon. After Seattle of last year he seemed shaken up and not recovered from the accident. The S13 under performed and Dai wasn’t his aggressive self to say the least closing out 2009.

With all that being said I didn’t give him much of a shot for making a championship run in the 2010 season. In fact, I don’t think many people really had Dai as a viable championship winner. On paper his four wins in the first 40 events makes him the only driver with more than two victories and no championship.

He qualified 4th in Atlanta and 12th in Long Beach putting on two solid performances. It’s not going to be an easy battle for Daijiro but he has some of the most loyal/vocal fans behind him and one of the best teams working on his S13. Did you see his performance in Atlanta? He was driving like a mad man who couldn’t be stopped and was unable to be stopped even after Darren McNamara removed the whole back side of his car. Right now he only sits 37 points behind Vaughn Gittin Jr. which is an easy gap to overcome with 5 rounds left. His key will be to stay consistent and score points at all five rounds.

In years past I don’t think anyone would dream of a Falken Tire driver taking home a championship but it looks like for 2010 the only people in his way might be his Falken Tire teammates. What do you think about Daijiro Yoshihara winning the 2010 championship? Are you glad he is back now at 100%?

You saw our pre event Pit Notes that we posted yesterday which you can find here if you want to look back at what we said before the event started. If I would of known earlier Patrick Mordaunt was in his S14 he would of ranked probably on the top of my Hot Property List. Here is a breakdown of the Top 32 battles and what I feel about the drivers and possibly the tandem battle for today’s main event. Here is a breakdown of these Top 32 tandem battles in the driver in them.

Tanner Foust Vs. Matt Waldin
This is technically a battle of North American Drifting champions since Matt Waldin has won DMCC and Tanner is a two time Formula Drift champion. I don’t think Matt Waldin’s Nissan 350z is really a match for the NASCAR V8 but greater upsets have happened in time. Fantasy wise if you have Matt Waldin then a One More Time is probably going to be your best bet to score some points. My prediction is that Tanner Foust advances.

Ryan Tuerck Vs. Dennis Mertzanis
I told the world on the Live Drift Stream that Dennis would take out Vaughn in the Top 32 at Long Beach which didn’t happen and I really don’t think he stands a chance against Ryan Tuerck. Ryan has more control against slower drivers and is a tandem machine. Maxxis Tires always seem to thrive here as history tells us as well. My prediction is that Ryan Tuerck advances.

Conrad Grunewald Vs. Forrest Wang
Even though these guys qualified so far from each other I don’t want to declare a winner in this match. Conrad was eliminated early at Long Beach and the car just doesn’t seem to tandem as well as he can qualify. Forrest Wang has great talent but his Infiniti G35 seems to be a handicap. The car doesn’t seem to work 100% and there is no telling what he will get when the event starts. This is a Fantasy Drift wild card which you don’t want to miss on the live steam or in person.

Daijiro Yoshihara Vs. “Mad Mike” Whidett
Mad Mike qualified in his first Formula Drift event but I don’t think he is any match for Daijiro Yoshihara. If you watched him drive that S13 he was looking like the Daijiro Yoshihara of old and not the one we saw drive in 2009. This leads me to believe he could go far this weekend. He has also made podium in Atlanta before. My prediction is that Daijiro Yoshihara advances.

Rhys Millen Vs. Cody Parkhouse
Rhys Millen has been on fire this year so I think Cody Parkhouse is going to have a big problem on his hand. It’s hard to keep up with Rhys on this track as well with his shallow angle style he runs here that caused much controversy when he beat Bill Sherman a few years back. My prediction is that Rhys Millen advances.

Michael Essa Vs. Stephan Verdier
I love Michael Essa’s huge insane entry as he came down the hill but I question the cars ability to tandem. The car still appears to have a lack of grip and we haven’t seen this BMW 350R compete in tandem competition yet. While Essa is on my Fantasy Team I just think Stephan Verdier has the upper hand. For crying out loud Iron Man 2 came out yesterday so we have to get Stephan some secret forces behind him. My prediction is that Stephan Verdier advances.

Vaughn Gittin Jr. Vs. Michihiro Takatori
Takatori didn’t look all that overwhelming during qualifying or practice and Vaughn Gittin Jr. just seems to be unstoppable after Streets of Long Beach. My prediction is that Vaughn Gittin Jr. advances.

Chris Forsberg Vs. Cyrus Martinez
I don’t want to discredit the rookie Cyrus Martinez here like most of you have already done but Forsberg is going to win this round. Cyrus looks great and if he drew anyone else other than a the only two time winner here I would give him a chance but I just don’t see this one happening. My prediction is that Chris Forsberg advances.

Doug Van Den Brink Vs. Sam Hubinette
Sam Hubinette just seems to have his hands full with the Dodge Challenger this weekend. Right before I wrote this he got towed back to the pits when it looked like the car just did a simple wheel drop. I am going to take a huge risk here with seeing that and predict the southeastern local Doug Van Den Brink takes home the win. A huge statement but mine as well make a bold statement in here, I feel like a ton of these predictions are a tad vanilla. My prediction is that Doug Van Den Brink advances.

Joon Maeng Vs. Dean Kearney
Neither of these guys have done fantastic lately but I am going to favor Joon Maeng in the Full Tilt Poker Mazda Rx-8. Dean Kearney is in a great S14 no question but it just seems suffer constant mechanical issues which means you cannot count on that. Joon has done well here before and could use this event to booster him for the rest of the season. My prediction is that Joon Maeng advances.

Robbie Nishida Vs. Matt Powers
This is another tough one based on car reliability issues. I would of picked Matt Powers before his accident at night practice but now he has me a little nervous in selecting him. Robbie Nishida has a fantastic machine but no seat time in it. He already put it in the pea gravel and had a wreck tow off with it this weekend as well. This is going to be a survival of the fittest more than a tandem battle I predict.

Darren McNamara Vs. Taka Aono
This is quite a matchup since Taka has had some legendary battles in his Corolla here before. Remember the tandem battles between Taka Aono and Sam Hubinette that brought in the One More Time Rule to the sport? Yea, pretty epic but I have Darren McNamara going all the way this weekend to finally win here so sorry Taka. My prediction is that Darren McNamara goes all the way.

Tyler McQuarrie Vs. Patrick Mordaunt
I picked both of these guys in my pre event notes to do really well but with Patrick showing up in his S14 I give him a slight advantage. Something about Patrick in this track that I just don’t see him being able to lose to Tyler. I know Tyler was already mad at me for saying he would lose to Darren McNamara before these were fixed but he is just caught up in a tough part of the grid. Patrick is just focused and Road Atlanta seems to be his home away from home.

Justin Pawlak Vs. Ryuji Miki
The RTR Ford Mustang seems to be giving Justin Pawlak some troubles so I am nervous to select him as a winner. Ryuji Miki historically isn’t great at qualifying and can just set the world on fire when it comes to tandem drifting. I am going for the underdog here with Ryuji Miki.

Kyle Mohan Vs. Ross Petty
Another tough choice is with these guys against each other plus the genuine unpredictable nature of Ross Petty in tandem. For some reason I feel like Kyle Mohan is focused and on fire right now so I am going to give him the advance.

Charles Ng Vs. Ken Gushi
Charles Ng has put some impressive runs down and is seemingly hungry just to get professional level seat time. He was even running at Formula Drift Singapore last month in a borrowed car to get out there in the industry more. Even with that said Ken Gushi is just under rated in the public eye for some reason these days. The Scion Racing team seems to have things figured out in 2010 so my prediction is that Ken Gushi advances.

***5/8/2010 at 12:11pm EDIT: Tyler McQuarrie and Taka Aono had the same score in qualifying along with Doug Van Den Brink and Cyrus Martinez. We just updated our qualifying list to represent Tyler McQuarrie in 20th and Taka Aono in 21st. They also did the same thing with 24th Dough Van Den Brink and Cyrus Martinez in 25th. Our list came from the live feed which was unofficial and it appears Tyler moved in front. This changes those tandem battles which we are editing now and updating before Top 32. Sorry for the confusion and delay on figuring this out.

Road Atlanta is the best round of the Formula Drift series in my humble opinion by far over the course of a year. Since Long Beach is just a toss up Atlanta always seems to give you a good idea of who will progress through the rest of the season. I complied some of my pre race notes on drivers and things to remember as the event unfolds. I will update the race with some more pit note information later as it breaks.

Facts About Road Atlanta:

Chris Forsberg seems to be just on fire when he comes to Road Atlanta. In the last three years he has won the event twice, ironically, beating the same man in the finals Darren McNamara. I don’t feel Chris has the driving force to bring his way to the finals but Darren McNamara is my pick for a first place finish. The guy just needs a victory here and has tasted second place twice in the past three years. The other year was the debut of the Saturn Sky which didn’t allow him to make anything of the event.

Patrick Mordaunt always looks epic it seems like at Road Atlanta. The photo above shows him beating Daijiro Yoshihara in an awesome One More Time tandem round. He almost took down Vaughn Gittin Jr. one year prior and just seems to have this track layout figured out. He was DQ’d last season over some tire drama so he never actually even took a loss last season at the track. The one thing that makes me nervous about him is this is his first Formula D event but he has driven a 350z in competition before.

Another interesting note is that every Road Atlanta winner is one of the seven drivers who have multiple Formula Drift victories. This means it’s highly unlikely that a first time winner will rise to the top at this round. With that said Rhys Millen is a possible candidate for a win here if he looks like he did in Long Beach. I wouldn’t discredit him until he is eliminated.

That should be enough juice for you to hold on to until qualifying starts here in a couple hours. Below is a Hot Property list of drivers we expect to put on a top notch performance.

Hot Property List:
1. Darren McNamara
2. Rhys Millen
3. Taka Aono
4. Justin Pawlak

2010 Taurus SHO Vs. Audi A6 with Tanner Foust

An interesting place for the Formula Drift champion/Supercars Exposed star to show up but we like it. He is walking us through the 2010 Ford Taurus SHO which is a twin turbo V6 package and apparently can beat the Audi A6 in a drag race. While I don’t think we will be seeing the 2010 Ford Taurus SHO on Supercars Exposed anytime it’s a pretty interesting Ford commercial featuring Tanner Foust.

Watch the video: http://www.wreckedmagazine.com/watchvideo/2010-taurus-sho-vs-audi-a6-with-tanner-foust

When this hit me on Ubertwitter a few hours ago it came as a quite a shock because I didn’t recall saying any of these things accused in the mentioned about tweets. I screen capped the comments above in case they were deleted by the user once the post went up. Normally I get my death threats, hate mail, lawsuits, cease and assist orders and ending of friendships in e-mail’s which are private and I keep those private in return. Since twitter is a public forum I decided to return in kind, publicly on the Internet. Since I was outed for not being professional and starting controversy I wanted to clear the air and break down this post we made.

Here is a link to the thread they are clearly upset about “We Are Left Scratching Our Heads on the Hankook Nissan GT-R.” The first comment which is on the bottom says “R35 will be ready for Formula D, dont start controversy, lets keep it professional.”

After reading my post 20 times and cannot find anywhere that I said they wouldn’t make it to Formula Drift. The quote I made in fact was “This make me nervous for Robbie Nishida and his performance in the 2010 season.” So for Robbie to be driving in 2010 wouldn’t his car need to be done? I have no doubts that Gruppe S will have the car done. You guys have been involved with teams for years dating back to Falken Tires and no one at Wrecked Magazine doubts your abilities. As for starting controversy I just merely re posted what you guys listed about the GT-R with some opinions attached.

As for the other post I am glad you guys have the car going and you run an amazing program. In fact, my Project 350z is running Seibon Carbon, Brian Crower Cams, and KW Suspension so I have no doubts in the GT-R. I’m aware the cage is done because I constantly am checking your guys blog but I didn’t think it was quite big enough news to run on the site. If you would like to keep our readers frequently updated you are welcome to a drivers lounge blog. I have a pretty open door policy on the website and have never told a pro/Am driver no to having one.

Now as for your engines being proven, I don’t say one thing about your engines in the whole post or imply you don’t know what your doing with them. My concern for Robbie Nishida is that seat time makes a championship performance and I don’t see him getting as much of it with the car not complete as this point. Look at last years champion when talking about seat time being proven and look at Tanner Foust (two time champion) failing to qualify at Wall Speedway.

Regardess, I hope that your tweet diatribes are done and I would love an apology. You can always just post it in our comments or tweet me back! Sorry for the long winded post but this one was kind of hard to @reply back them on twitter.

Follow Wrecked Magazine on Twitter: www.twitter.com/wreckedmagazine

The results from Horse Thief Mile yesterday were staggering for everyone involved in our virtual versus reality project. I sat on the track scared for my life as we battled it out for virtual reality and reality. Vaughn had never driven HTM at the time or driven the Shelby GT500 on a track until yesterday. I had never raced the Shelby GT500 at HTM on Need  for Speed SHIFT until we arrived at the track as well.

When Vaughn wasn’t busy melting the tires we had some really awesome battles in our respective machines. A huge thanks to the guys at Go Pro Camera who brought us 10+ HD Motorsports Hero car cameras to really capture the event with video. We are going to get putting all this footage and data together as soon as we can. Stay tuned for when we release it all in one of the upcoming issues of Wrecked Magazine,

A very sad day in the world drifting community today as D1GP Japan driver Atsushi Kuroi was killed in a motorcycle accident in Japan. From 2001 he campaigned a Nissan Silvia PS13 and a Nissan 180sx RPS13 in his history with the series. Above is a picture of his car in the pits at the 2008 Fuji Speedway event with his sponsors River Side and Toyo Tires that I took on my last visit to Japan. His greatest moment in D1 Grand Prix history was taking home a victory at Fuji Speedway in 2007 which would be the only D1 victory of his career.