The most winning driver in Formula Drift Sam Hubinette took the top qualifying spot this weekend at Irwindale Speedway which is something we haven’t seen from him in sometime. A huge congrats to his performance after a rough start to the 2011 season! Here is how the Top 32 stacked up with Rookie of the Year leader Odi Bakchis missing out with a 33rd place finish.

1.Sam Hubinette – 92.7 points
2. Justin Pawlak – 90.4 points
3. Tyler McQuarrie – 88.4 points
4. Ryan Tuerck – 86.1 points
5. Rhys Millen – 85.9 points
6. Dai Yoshihara – 83.5 points
7. Walker Wilkerson – 83.3 points
8. Robbie Nishida – 83.2 points
9. Conrad Grunewald – 82.3 points
10. Matt Powers – 79.4 points
11. Ken Gushi – 79.0 points
12. Vaughn Gittin Jr. – 77.7 points
13. Fredric Aasbo – 77.3 points
14. Dean Kearney – 77.1 points
15. Luke Lonberger – 77 points
16. Chris Forsberg – 76.9 points
17. Matt Field – 76.5 points
18. Toshiki Yoshioka – 73.1 points
19. Ryan Kado – 72.8 points
20. Kyle Mohan – 72.8 points
21. Michael Essa – 71.2 points
22. Taka Aono – 70.8 points
23. Ross Petty – 68.9 points
24. E. Armandio “Dio” – 68.6 points
25. Dennis Mertzanis – 68.3 points
26. Darren McNamara – 67.9 points
27. Jeff Abbott – 67.8 points
28. Pat Cyr – 66.3 points
29. Kenneth Moen – 66.2 points
30. Cyrus Martinez – 63.3 points
31. Charles Ng – 62.5 points
32. Patrick Mordaunt – 61 points

Check out the tentative drivers list here for Formula Drift Round 7. No big shockers in the drivers list (hopefully some last minute shocking entries show up) but read it up and down. The finals are going to be up in the air and we cannot wait until the main event:

1. Fredric Aasbo
2. Jeff Abbott
3. Emmanuel Amandio
4. Odi Bakchis
5. Tony Brakohiapa
6. Patrick Cyr
7. Michael Essa
8. Mike Feiock
9. Matt Field
10. Chris Forsberg
11. Vaughn Gittin Jr.
12. Otto Graven
13. Conrad Grunewald
14. Ken Gushi
15. Jim Guthrie
16. Sam Hubinettte
17. Jeff Jones
18. Ryan kado
19. Dean Kearney
20. Nikolay Konstantinov
21. Alex Lee
22. Luke Lonberger
23. Joon Maeng
24. Cyrus Martinez
25. Darren McNamara
26. Tyler McQuarrie
27. Dennis Mertzanis
28. Rhys Millen
29. Kenneth Moen
30. Kyle Mohan
31. Patrick Mordaunt
32. Charles Ng
33. Robbie Nishida
34. Justin Pawlak
35. Ross Petty
36. Alex Pfeiffer
37. Kyle Pollard
38. Saranon Pornpatanarak
39. Matt Powers
40. John Russakoff
41. Ryan Tuerck
42. Matt Waldin
43. Walker Wilkerson
44. Daijiro Yoshihara
45. Toshiki Yoshioka

The grid at Mondello was full of Formula Drift stars, but it was James Deane that came out on top in his S13, ousting Darren McNamara and the Need for Speed AE86 in the final round at Mondello.

Dai Yoshihara and Dean Kearney also made the trip out. Dai managed to defeat Dean Kearney in top 16, but was knocked out by Darren McNamara in the top 8.

Deane took out Fredric Aasbo in his Supra in the top 8, Phil Morrison in Final 4, and was battling Darren McNamara for the top spot when DMac suffered mechanical issues, giving James Deane the win. James Deane suffered mechanical issues himself losing 2nd and 4th gears, but was able to overcome and take top honors with half a transmission!

Dean Kearney is taking the keys this weekend from Dani Murphy’s S14 and returning to the series he won in the past. He will be coming back with plenty of other stars from Formula Drift so let’s see how he stacks up at home versus the Formula D stars in his hometown.

Source: http://www.prodriftseries.com/2011/09/08/dean-karnage-kearney-enters-prodrift-finale/

Sam Hubinette was recently spotted drifting the flame-shooting chopped up Maybach in Kanye West’s “Otis” video, and it would appear that he has returned again with his own vehicles for the new Berner music video featuring Chris Brown and Wiz Khalifa.

The video for “Yoko” features Sam Hubinette’s Dodge Challenger, as well as the Dean Kearney’s V-LED Dodge Viper drifting around Irwindale Speedway. There’s even a cameo appearance by Mike Ryan and his Freightliner drift truck which we saw drifting during halftime at Formula Drift Round 6 in Las Vegas.

Check out the video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CgKwR8IuI6Y

Here are the Top 32 pairings for todays big event. Right now if your eye is on the championship you will care about Tyler McQuarrie Justin Pawlak and Dai Yoshihara photographed above. They are on the same side of the bracket and scheduled to meet in the Final Four if they can win their respective tandem battles for the weekend. Sadly Tyler McQuarrie and Justin Pawlak are on opposite sides of the ladder so they would not meet until the finals for a battle that would be huge after the controversy of the weekend.

Matt Powers Vs. Jeff Jones
Matt Field Vs. Fredric Aasbo
Conrad Grunewald Vs. Matt Walden
Ken Gushi vs. Tyler McQuarrie
Chris Forsberg Vs. Alex Lee
Ryan Tureck Vs. Charles Ng
Vaughn Gittin Jr. Vs. Cyrus Martinez
Darren McNamara Vs. Kyle Pollard
Rhys Millen Vs. Sam Hubinette
Dean Kearney Vs. Patrick Mordaunt
Kyle Mohan Vs. Dennis Mertzanis
Michael Essa Vs. Armando “Dio”
Robbie Nishida Vs. Justin Pawlak
Otto Graven Vs. Odi Bakchis
Daijiro Yoshihara Vs. Ross Petty
Ryan Kado Vs. Toshiki Yoshioka

UPDATE at 6:41pm: Formula D changed the Top 32 due to points not given to Ryan Tuerck. No update of rankings as of Top 32 has been posted or provided as of the event going on live in progress. We apologize for the errors in this post.

Evergreen Speedway is the most exciting round of the year by far over and over again. This year eliminated Justin Pawlak in the Top 32 and allowed Dai Yoshihara to take back his championship reigns. The top 25 is going to be shaken up through Las Vegas and Irwindale Speedway this year we have a feeling resulting in the best season of Formula D history. Here is how they came out of Evergreen Speedway:

1. Daijiro Yoshihara (412 points)
2. Justin Pawlak (397 points)
3. Chris Forsberg (369 points)
4. Darren McNamara (345.50 points)
5. Matt Powers (328.50 points)
6. Tyler McQuarrie (317 points)
7. Ryan Tuerck (308 points)
8. Conrad Grunewald (300 points)
9. Vaughn Gittin Jr. (291 points)
10. Kyle Mohan (266 points)
11. Fredric Aasbo (250 points)
12. Toshiki Yoshioka (238.25 points)
13. Rhys Millen (207 points)
14. Ken Gushi (188.75 points)
15. Odi Bakchis (185.50 points)
16. Walker Wilkerson (185 points)
17. Ross Petty (184.25 points)
18. Joon Maeng (165.50 points)
19. Matt Field (159.75 points)
20. Matt Waldin (159 points)
21. Otto Graven (158.75 points)
22. Dennis Mertzanis (157.50 points)
23. Charles Ng (152.25 points)
24. John Russakoff (146.50 points)
25. Dean Kearney (128.75 points)

Formula Drift Evergreen Speedway qualifying ended today with Tyler McQuarrie taking the top spot. The rest of the qualifying order is below:

1 Tyler McQuarrie – 94.5
2 Justin Pawlak – 93.5
3 Rhys. Millen – 89.6
4 Daijiro Yoshihara – 86.9
5 Odi Bakchis – 86
6 Conrad. Grunewald – 85.1
7 Joon. Maeng – 83.7
8 Fredric. Aasbo – 82.1
9 Dean. Kearney – 81.3
10 Ryan. Tuerck – 80.3
11 Michael. Essa – 76.4
12 Vaughn. Gittin – 75.7
13 Matt. Powers – 75.1
14 Walker Wilkerson – 74.7
15 Chris. Forsberg -74.5
16 Alex. Lee – 72.8
17 Alax. Pfeiffer – 71.4
18 Otto. Graven – 71.2
19 Darin. McNamara – 71
20 Charles. Ng – 66.8
21 Matt Field – 66.5
22 Kyle Mohan – 65.1
23 Toshiki Yoshioka – 64.6
24 Roland Gallagher – 62.8
25 Ross Petty – 61
26 Ken. Gushi – 60.6
27 Cyrus Martinez – 60.5
28 Robbie Nishida – 57
29 Jeff Jones – 56.1
30 Ryan Kado – 55.2
31 Dennis Mertzanis – 52.3
32 Luke Longberger – 52.2

This is a preview page from the August issue of Option2 magazine which is featuring a Formula Drift spread and the 2010 season recap episode inside the DVD. This is the series we were hinting at in our rumor post yesterday and only a few people guessed it would be Formula Drift.

This is a screen grab of the actual layout talking about Round 1 at Long Beach and Round 2 at Road Atlanta. What does everyone think about Option2 pages being filled with some American drift coverage in the magazine along with the DVD inserts? Who in Japan is looking forward to getting DVD coverage from the newsstands featuring American drift content? This is a huge announcement from Formula Drift starting up a bigger invasion of Asia. Is a Formula Drift Asia event in Japan next on the docket? We sure hope so!