Today a magazine has been reporting that Tyler McQuarrie has a deal signed for 2012 and we have confirmed that is not the case at this current time. To catch you up back in the beginning of October he was left go from Falken Tire at the end of the 2011 season. Then we found out he was in New Jersey visiting Gardella Racing which he has continued to be linked with during this off-season. I have confirmed the two teams are still in talks so the deal is not dead but Tyler McQuarrie’s manager confirmed that nothing has been signed either. That about sums up the report but just wanted to confirm that other media outlets are reporting incorrect information this morning. Good luck to Tyler landing a deal for this new season!

Tyler McQuarrie took home an outstanding fourth first place finish at 25 Hours of Thunderhill. The CJ Wilson Racing team ran by MLB All-Star CJ Wilson took this Mazda Miata above to victory. Right now he doesn’t have a Formula Drift contract signed with a team in 2012. He has announced he will be back with Insight Racing in 2012 racing a BMW as well. We have been told that a few teams are in talks with locking him down for the 2012 Formula Drift season so I think he will be around next year for more action!

Tyler McQuarrie took this FX Motorsports Development Acura NSX and dominated Buttonwillow. Tyler McQuarrie managed to take home first place at Super Lap Battle with the NSX and in the process set a new track record of 1:40.980. The record was broken on Performance Friction Brakes and KW Suspension which are both our website sponsors so congrats to them as well! Tyler McQuarrie proved once again he is the man when it comes to anything on wheels. We cannot wait until he locks into a team for 2012!

In case you don’t follow the former Falken Tire driver Tyler McQuarrie on Facebook he threw up some mentions about being in New Jersey. Following his firing and telling Bill Wood he had some offers form other teams (and Ryan Tuerck being looked at by RMR) our eyes perked up at these posts. Well it turns out that after a few phone calls I made that Tyler McQuarrie did pay a visit to Gardella Racing on the trip. Not sure that was the only purpose of his trip but it sure seems to be that way. He did quite a bit of hanging out with Gary Gardella and around Gardella Racing HQ in New Jersey in general. What would everyone think about Tyler McQuarrie driving the Gardella Racing Chevrolet Camaro in Formula Drift for 2012?

Tyler McQuarrie is gone from a team he has been with since 2009 due to some team cutbacks. Here is a great interview conducted by our buddy and Formula 1 arch nemesis Bill Wood with some cliff notes and a link at the bottom of the page to the interview:

Things Tyler McQuarrie Said:
Going into practice I saw JTP blew up his motor in his Mustang but I didn’t think much of it at that time. I went out for practice and they said over the radio that J Brad needs to talk with you in the pits. I was in line for practice and when they said that it instantly connected and I was like “no way they are going to do this.” I came back to the pits and J Brad was like we need to pull you out of your car.

The issue was that Justin was second in points and 10 points out of the lead. I get that Falken puts a lot of money into this program and it is to win a championship. I understand that part. I didn’t agree with taking someone else that was in the championship hunt to do that. Then your in the position of taking two drivers with two unfamiliar cars. They brought in a Nissan S15 (RHD) for me to drive that hadn’t been run in two years and had not been prepped at all.

I out qualified Justin Pawlak in that car (huge grin) and I was pretty happy with that. He barely qualified and I got 25th but I guess he got some points so I guess at the end of the day it kind of protected his issue as much as possible. At the same time it ended my season.’

Watch the Full Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TiyOJuwJPOo

After the 2011 season Formula Drift has 52 events in the books. The series now has 17 overall event winners meaning just about every 3 events (twice a season) a driver will receive his first win in the sport. Now after 2011 nine drivers are multiple events winners in the series. This year added two of those nine drivers with Justin Pawlak winning both his events this season and Tyler McQuarrie earning his second at Irwindale Speedway this season joining the club.

1. Sam Hubinette (9 Wins)
1. 2004 Road Atlanta
2. 2004 Houston
3. 2004 Infineon Raceway (Sonoma)
4. 2005 Road Atlanta
5. 2005 Chicago
6. 2006 Streets of Long Beach
7. 2006 Chicago
8. 2006 Wall Speedway
9. 2007 Summit Point

2. Tanner Foust (7 Wins)
1. 2006 Road Atlanta
2. 2007 Irwindale Speedway
3. 2008 Streets of Long Beach
4. 2008 Englishtown
5. 2008 Infineon Raceway (Sonoma)
6. 2009 Las Vegas
7. 2010 Evergreen Speedway
8. 2010 Irwindale Speedway

3. Chris Forsberg (6 Wins)
1. 2005 Irwnidale
2. 2007 Road Atlanta
3. 2007 Infineon Raceway (Sonoma)
4. 2008 Streets of Long Beach
5. 2009 Road Atlanta
6. 2009 Evergreen Speedway

3. Rhys Millen (6 Wins)
1. 2004 Irwindale Speedway
2. 2005 Wall Speedway
3. 2006 Infineon Raceway (Sonoma)
4. 2008 Road Atlanta
5. 2008 Evergreen Speedway
6. 2011 Las Vegas

3. Dai Yoshihara (6 Wins)
1. 2006 Irwindale Speedway
2. 2007 Evergreen Speedway
3. 2007 Wall Speedway
4. 2010 Road Atlanta
5. 2011 Road Atlanta
6. 2011 Evergreen Speedway

6. Vaughn Gittin Jr. (3 Wins)
1. 2008 Irwindale Speedway
2. 2010 Streets of Long Beach
3. 2010 Infineon Raceway (Sonoma)

7. Ryan Tuerck (2 Wins)
1. 2009 Streets of Long Beach
2. 2009 Irwindale Speedway

7. Tyler McQuarrie (2 Wins)
1. 2010 Las Vegas
2. 2011 Irwindale Speedway

7. Justin Pawlak (2 Wins)
1. 2011 Streets of Long Beach
2. 2011 Palm Beach International Raceway

10. Ken Gushi (1 Win)
1. 2005 Houston

10. Calvin Wan (1 Win)
1. 2005 Infineon Raceway (Sonoma

10. Yukinobu Okubo (1 Win)
1. 2006 Evergreen Speedway

10. Mitsuru Haraguchi (1 Win)
1. 2007 Streets of Long Beach

10. Toshiki Yoshioka (1 Win)
1. 2008 Las Vegas

10. Darren McNamara (1 Win)
1. 2009 Wall Speedway

10. Stephan Verdier (1 Win)
1. 2009 Infineon Raceway (Sonoma)

10. Conrad Grunewald (1 Win)
1. 2011 Wall Speedway

1st. Tyler McQuarrie
2nd. Rhys Millen
3rd. Chris Forsberg

A great day at the track for Final Fight really set the tone for the main event. Joey Redmond shot the quick gallery documenting some great driving from qualifying today. The paddock was buzzing with stories today and Sam Hubinette put on a champion performance in qualifying today. Stay tuned as Justin Kaehler is taking the reigns tomorrow in the photography department.
Check out the Gallery: http://www.wreckedmagazine.com/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=268

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

Another driver not stepping back into Justin Pawlak’s his Nissan 350z at the end of the season will be Tyler. This shouldn’t come as a shock after he was already removed from his car in Las Vegas by the Falken Team Manager when he sat 6th in the championship. We are glad to see Tyler not putting up with that amount of disrespect and heading elsewhere in 2012. We have a feeling he can find another program that will respect his talents and give him a great shot at some vengeance for next season. We can only hope now that this car gets destroyed and set on fire this weekend at the hands of Tyler! This is a confirmed ACTION (no rumormill here) so teams looking for a driver please swoop him up.