Another Toyota 86 is heading to the 2012 D1 Grand Prix season according to the Speedhunters Facebook page. This one will be driven by Manabu Orido but no Subaru engine inside this one! The Toyota 86 chassis is taking a Lexus IS-F V8 engine and should officially be the first V8 swap in a Toyota 86/Scion FR-S platform. It is a shame that D1 will have three of these in competition while we only will see one in Formula Drift for 2012.

We have been covering the Scion FR-S over and over again over the past few months but it really is the best new release of a drift ready chassis. Ken Gushi when he was in Japan made his own personal video of drifting around in the Scion FR-S. You cannot really hear the audio of him talking very well with his personal camera he mounted on the car. Ken does note that he was asked to not beat on the car very hard so he did take it a little easy. Check below for the 5 minute in car view of Ken Gushi drifting the Scion FR-S (with ease) around this track in Japan. Follow the link below to check out the video.

The two Toyota 86 (Scion FR-S in America) heading to the D1 Grand Prix series next year have already been seen doing tandem at the 2012 Tokyo Auto Salon. The car is gaining more and more hype by the minute and it might even convert into car sales. I just love this old school HKS look that NOB will be driving in 2012. The Hibino car also marks the return of Falken Tire to the D1GP series. Check the link below to watch the videos of these two Toyota 86 cars doing tandem!

If you think these slow speed tandem videos look awesome then get ready for D1GP which kicks off in April. If your stuck stateside for all of 2012 then you can always check out Ken Gushi in his Greddy Scion FR-S for all seven events of the 2012 Formula Drift season.

Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/61300566@N05/

One of Patrick Mordaunt’s crew members John Jimison posted this up on Facebook this morning and we cannot manage to find this car anywhere else. From the best we can tell the car is for Nobuteru Taniguchi and the return of his awesome HKS style that we grew to love back in the days of D1GP. It looks like he will be joining Hibino in the 2012 D1GP season who was shown driving his Toyota 86 earlier this week.

Another car parked at the 2012 Tokyo Auto Salon this weekend is Mad Mike’s newest creation Drift-N-Ice which is a Redbull Energy Drink x Speedhunters FD Mazda Rx-7. Made Mike released this news on his website this morning and sadly he hasn’t been able to turn a wheel in the car yet! Here is what he has to say about the build and opportunity:

 “For me this is a dream come true, to be given this opportunity to compete in Japan and team alongside Kawato San again is an honor. We paired in 2010 for the Red Bull project ‘Drift-N-Ice’ using Kawato’s 13b turbo powered FD RX7 for the job and I was impressed with the performance and workmanship. For the past few months now we’ve been exchanging emails with the team at Magic Co, they’ve built an amazing car for me and I can’t wait to get some seat time.”

While recently Tokyo Auto Salon has been somewhat of a snooze fest for drifting news in the Japanese world it looks like the 2012 show might have some hope. Already announced is Tesuya Hibino (legendary Toyota Corolla driver) will be driving a Toyota 86 this season in the D1 Grand Prix series. The video above shows him flinging it around in this lot. Hopefully some other big drifting news will come out from the Tokyo Auto Salon this year!

Source: http://speedhunters.com/

The D1 Grand Prix series has posted a new schedule for the 2012 drifting season. After reviewing this schedule they have two direct conflicts with Formula Drift in the United States with Round 3 at Autopolis which conflicts with the US event Evergreen Speedway. Round 4 of the D1GP season finds them at Ebisu Circuit while Formula D is at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. This means Daigo Saito splitting time to run both series is highly unlikely. Here is how the 7 round D1GP schedule stacks up for 2012 with a notable absence of Fuji Speedway:

Round 1 – April 14/15 Tokyo, Japan at Odaiba Circuit
Round 2- May 26/27 Suzuka Circuit
Round 3 – July 21/22 Autopolis
Round 4 – August 25 Ebisu Circuit
Round 5 – August 26 Ebisu Circuit
Round 6 – September 22/23 Chubu International Airport
Round 7 – November 3/4 TBD

M7 is making its first big step into Formula Drift next year with a sponsorship of Odi Bakchis. In Japan they support some huge drifters in D1GP with Imamura, Suenaga, and Orido. After talking to Odi he will be running M7 motor oil, M7 gear oil, M7 brake fluid, M7 Spark Plugs, M7 gauges, and a M7 Touch R.A.C.E ODB communicator. On top of all that he is even running a M7/Nobuteru Taniguchi Edition Bride racing seat for the 2012 season. All of this is mixed with the fact that M7 is hitting the US market through Promotion Distribution so you can get your hands on all of these parts for 2012.

Formula Drift in 2012 will add another D1GP champion to the mix with Daigo Saito. He has been rumored for years to come join the fun in Formula Drift and now it is finally happening! The guys at Bridges Racing who campaigned Robbie Nishida with a yellow S15 in years past are taking the big step with Daigo Saito in 2012.

Daigo Saito will be an addition to the Bridges Racing team in 2012 making the Japanese drivers teammates in 2012. This has to the biggest news of the off-season to date! Daigo Saito almost won the 2011 D1GP Championship and has now added to a long list of international champions who have made the jump into Formula Drift. This has to put an even bigger hurt on the D1GP series in Japan but we will look more into that in a later post. Who is excited to see Daigo Saito stateside in 2012?

The guys at Super Street Magazine are out in Japan with the new Scion FR-S. They are currently at Sodegaura Forest Raceway with Ken Gushi and other media getting to drive the Toyota 86 (our Scion FR-S). Ken Gushi told the guys at Super Street that the car is  ”it’s lightweight, smooth and is perfect for drifting.” Personally we cannot wait to see Ken Gushi in the 2012 Scion FR-S which we hear will be built by the Japanese tuning powerhouse Greddy. It is great to see that Ken is getting some seat time already in the car.

It should hit dealerships in the USA early spring 2012. While Scion is being tight lipped about details on the car we have heard Subaru telling people that the car will get 30mpg. We can only assume that the Scion with the same engine and package will get something close to this.