The start of something (hopefully) beautiful - driftexchange.com

So, I have been kicking this idea around in my head for quite some time. Here are the reasons behind this project.

1) I normally go to an automotive forum to browse the classifieds... I'm sure a lot of you do the same. I wanted a place to go where I didn't have to sift through a ton of BS to get to the good stuff.

2) Not all of us drift the same type of car.There are tons of car forums out there that have to do with a specific make, but none of those allow users of different makes find parts easily. I want this to be a one stop shop for users to find parts for their drift cars easily and quickly.

Get a new car but a different make? No need to join another forum once you register here, just pop into the different makes sub forum!

3) Eventually, with enough member and vendor support, my goal is to begin sponsoring amateur drifters, giving them the assistance they need to attend pro-am level events.

So, please, check it out http://www.driftexchange.com

I also got bored and decided to make (read re-skin) this pixelcar s13, to match my current livery. I like!!

VegasDrift Round 2 - Road trip, Vegas Edition

Red hot action vid!!!!!

Photo by Santi Romero

Thanks!!!!!!

First off, a huge thank you goes out Jim Guthrie and Brian Dewitt from Car Crafters and Guthrie Racing for making this weekend a possibility for me, without the support from the team (including borrowing a truck and trailer) I wouldn't be able to do any of these events, so thank you from the bottom of my heart!

Another shout goes to Erin over at Pulstar plugs for hooking it up with a set of copper 2 stage colder test plugs (which performed flawlessly by the way) :)

Last but not least, a gigantic thanks to Ed and Santiago for trekking out to vegas with me and helping out. Couldn't have done it without you guys :)

The Trip

Now, on to the weekend put on by Nick Dizon and all the crew at VegasDrift!

We left albuquerque almost 3 hours later than planned and didn't arrive at the hotel until 1:30am, so we did what any right minded person would do. We went out, drank and got crazy until 5am, only then deciding that sleep might be a good idea for the day ahead.

Peeling ourselves out of bed at 11am the next day wasn't much fun having gone to bed just a few hours ealier, but we were all excited for the days slidey wagon competition. We headed out to a gas station to fill up on 100 octane (<3 you for that Vegas), and blasted down the hiway to Las Vegas Motor Speedway. We grabbed a quick bite to eat and set up camp in the pits.

Random filler snap from Kyle Pope, at some point during my qualifying run.

The Event

It was pretty hot, but not anywhere near as bad as I thought it would be. Thanks to eds tireless efforts with the water sprayer the car never got over 215 degrees (Thats a first).

The course was super fun, combining high speeds with a transition to very low speed, then back out to high speed again. This made for some much needed easier to learn tandem practice with tons of epic drivers.  There was 4 hours (minus time spent waiting for the carnage to be cleared up) of open practice to get a feel for the course. Quick rundown of the course:

3rd gear entry, outside near the wall, aiming for the tires surrounding one of the light poles, then heading out towards the wall for the first outer clip. If you were wide enough, you would transition right before the next front clip, slowing the car down almost to a stop to complete a full 360 degree donut around another light pole, staying as inside as possible. It was back on the throttle after that to another outside clip on the wall, to another outside clip on the wall, then out to finish.

And a vid for reference:

Sadly the course had its way with more than a few drivers, and sent some cars home (I somehow managed not to hit any walls this time Brian). I think there were 3 bad wrecks and a few more fender benders over the course of practice.

Qualifying time

I laid down a pretty crappy first run, and i'll leave it at that (my camera didn't record anything past practice, so sadly I dont have any vids of the good stuff). 2nd run and I had a decent line, nothing super aggressive, decently close to the walls. I hit the clips and stayed inside on the donut section. A run that would get me qualified 11th out of the 32 registered drivers. Super stoked to make the show!!!!

I lol'd when Nick announced my name. I think a total of 4 people clapped, and Mix yelled hooray!

Top 16

I was pitted up against Alex Villebrille in the top 16. Super rad guy, and awesome driver. (photo by Kyle Pope)

I followed first and have to admit, did a horrible job of doing so. For the first time that I can remember, I yanked my ebrake without pushing the clutch in, stalling the car out, then dumping the clutch to get it started again. Needless to say, it was not my best driving, but it was awesome practice. Alex had a super clean run so I really needed to step things up.

For my lead run I had a decent run (nothing amazing like I was looking for), went wide on the donut, and was off line for the rest of the course. Sadly Alex had spun out entering into the donut section, then upon exiting the course, blew his motor :(

I got the win due to the spin, and moved on to my first ever great 8!!

Great 8
For my great 8 battle, I was paired up with another amazing driver by the name of Mauricio Ornelas. This guy seriously rips hard, and is super consistant, so it was an honor to get to drive with him. Coincidentally, he and I had an amazing run in practice resulting in this epic photo by Kyle Pope:

I was set to follow for my first run, and straightened a few times and got all around beat up lol. My lead run was decent until i decided it would be a good idea to swing wide enough around the donut to get passed on the inside cleanly by Mauricio, sealing my fate and ending my run for the podium. Congrats to him for battling his way to 3rd place!

I took my place back in the pits, stoked to have been able to drive with such rad people and watched the rest of the guys absolutely destroy the course. Congrats again to the top 4!
1st – Mike Burns (Retaks “Insane Entry” Award)
2nd – Brandon Patterson
3rd – Mauricio Ornelas
4th – George Marstanovic (#1 qualifier run)

All in all another epic event, met some great new people and got to drive with some of the best drivers in the southwest.

Local practice event, sunday 5/29/11 racingsouthwest.com style.

45mph winds

Sand

14 cars

1 enclosed trailer

More wind

Fun event for sure, despite having lost all my arm hair. 

pics

Driftfotos.com home image, and painted wheels!

So, for those that don't know, Larry Chen (driftfotos.com) takes some of the best damn pictures you've ever seen. Plus, he's a rad guy in general. He changes the homepage image up when he features a new event, and I was lucky enough to be that shot :). Super stoked on that.

Check it!

So that was pretty rad. 

I also painted my wheels because time attack coloring makes me vomit. 5 easy steps to hot nasty wheel coloring.

1. Scuff.

2. Clean (No picture because thats boring)

3. Primer

4. Apply generous coats of Montana Gold Blaze Yellow spraypaint (flat color). Don't bother masking because tires are garbage.

Step 5. Apply UV clear coat (only legit part of this whole job)

And bam! Bright ass yellow wheels.

Just Drift TOPDRIFT Rd. 2 Horse Thief Mile, Willow Springs - 10th overall

Where to begin... This weekend was incredible. Beyond words, outstandingly amazing. Thank you Charlie, the Justdrift crew and the judges for one hell of a weekend, and once again, i'll throw out the largest possible thank you to Jim, Brian and James from Car Crafters and Guthrie Racing for making traveling to drift events a reality, without their help, I would be stuck doing the same old thing on the same old track. Ok i'll stop now :)

Day 1 - Practice

7am, Saturday morning. Arrive at Willow springs, and haphazardly make our way to Horse Thief Mile (Seemed noone from the track knew how to get there) and after backing the rig up almost a quarter mile to get to the correct turn off, we made it to the paddock.

The Paddock

Unload the cars amidst the 40+ others, have a quick drivers meeting where this track is explained to be rather difficult. Charlie asks who hasn't been here before, Jim and I raise our hands... Jim and I are both in group A (first run group of the day) lol. Begin all day runs of 1/2 hour each.

We helmet up and meander on to the track, heading up for the first warm up lap.

Initial thoughts:

• Holy smokes this track is steep.
• Holy smokes this track is narrow.
• Holy smokes this track feels like a roller coaster.
• Holy smokes this track is amazing.
• Holy smokes this track really does separate the men from the boys.
  

After doing it completely wrong for all of the first practice session (including a few off road excursions), I notice the car is cutting out bad during acceleration (more on that later), and end up just dealing with it being 150+ HP low again lol.

Right after initiation

2nd practice session, I finally start to figure out how to run this track, and make one complete linked run at the end of my session. It wasn't pretty and my line was horrible, but damn it felt good. Fast forward 4 more run groups, and after talking with Ryan Bell (fellow top drift driver), I iron out some kinks and am feeling nice and consistent with my entry, line and speed.

For those that have never driven this track, here is a written visual from my perspective. 

Come around the turn at the bottom of the hill, accelerate uphill full throttle in 2nd gear, all the way to the top (both hill and gear). Initiate hard using weight transfer and e-brake, bringing the car as close to full lock as possible. Immediately get back into throttle, hitting a very late apex clip point around the first hairpin. Drive a rather awkward line, as far as you can get down the hill on the straight, bringing the rear tires to the very outside edge of the asphalt (but not off). If you don't get far enough down the hill here, your run is already over. Find the clipping point further down the hill on the outside of the straight, lift slightly and transition hard, then right back on the throttle for just a moment. Too much throttle here, and you go off the track at the bottom of the hill, too little, and you end up in the dirt on the inside of the bottom hairpin or not making it and straightening out. For me, most of my runs would include e-braking pretty hard to drag myself outside to hit the clips on the next hairpin. Back on full throttle, hit the inner clip, then as far outside, fast transition, then outside again, to hit the last inner clipping point, finishing the run. 

Day 2 - Qualifying

2 quick practices to get back up to speed and make sure everything is still dialed. Drivers meeting to go over the line, clipping points and other things. Car is way down on power now, worse than the day before. Brian, checks out the spark plugs right as group A is qualifying (now going by numbers, thank goodness im 45), and finds the ceramic on 3 plugs is broken off. We make a quick run to Auto Zone, and pick up new plugs, throw them in, and i run up to balcony and it feels amazing again. 

My qualifying runs are upon me. I lay down a decent first run, nothing too aggressive, just to get one in the books, then do almost the exact run again. For the third I let it hang out, aggressive entry, used the whole track, hardly had to e brake the downhill, stoked on that run. 

Qualifying run - Getting outside!

Drivers meeting. 50 dudes, all waiting to hear the news on who would make top 16. Feeling pretty nervous at this point, Jim sadly spun all 3 runs due to horrible rear tires, and the crew was back at the trailer. 

They start reading off names. 16th,15th,14th, 13th,12th,11th,10th, still no Dan Brockett, getting pretty worried at this point,9th,8th - my name gets called. So stoked. So beyond stoked. Wishing my Mixie was here to celebrate with me ;)

Made it :) I decided to look the wrong way for this pic lol. 

Day 2 - Tandem

I line up for tandem John Jimison, have a shitty lead run, and a shittier following run. We get one more timed. I have an amazing lead run, and straighten out first thing when following... I have so much to learn about tandem its not even funny lol. 

This is a slight indicator of the grade of the track... Pretty steep.

Spooled it.

The decided to suck, and straighten out.

I have talked your ears off, on to the pics!

Results after 2 rounds!

Round 2 final results, top 16 in bold!!!

Car #	Driver Name	Points	Round 2 Rank
2	David Briggs	100	1
1	Neiko Gunther	95	2
15	Dave Westfall	90	3
11	Orlando Gamez	86	4
3	Ryan Clemens	82	5
4	Carlos Cano	78	6
6	John Jimison	74	7
16	Enrique Mendoza jr	70	8
7	Adam Bakaya	66	9
14	Dan Brockett	62	10
10	Alex Villabrille	58	11
5	Chris Licup	54	12
13	Adam Levi	50	13
20	Brandon Patterson	46	14
21	Randy Ramos	42	15
17	Mikey Whitey	38	16
12	Ryan Bell	34	17
28	Andy Hatley	30	18
30	Mauricio Orneales	26	19
32	Bruce Krees	22	20
8	Jason Kim	18	21
9	Mikki Frial	18	22
18	Jesse Vargas	18	23
23	Tyler K Xiong	18	24
24	John Bathel	18	25
25	Daniel Kuo	18	26
26	Philippe Abatol	18	27
40	Jason Bostrom	18	28
41	Jacky Sin	18	29
42	Joe Mitchel	18	30
43	Van Williams	18	31
19	Jim Guthrie	0	32
22	Ramon Hernandez	0	33
27	George Kilada	0	34
29	Tony Cisneros	0	35
31	Masashi Montonga	0	36
33	Matt Dale	0	37
34	Josh Chang	0	38
35	Mikko Eustaquiao	0	39
36	Spencer Reiker	0	40
37	Misa Ingles	0	41
38	Yoshie Shayuma	0	42
39	Eric Hill	0	43

A few more pics from vegas, including my wrecked fender :(

Vegas Drift Rd. 1 - 16th place

What a crazy weekend. Had a great time overall, learned a lot more and am ready for the next round. Here are my thoughts. I am going to be pretty hard on myself, as I expect a lot more of me. The saving grace of this weekend was having the love of my life finally get to come out to an event with me :) Just having her there made a world of difference.

So...

First things first I hit a wall pretty hard after about 5 practice laps (car was feeling amazing by the way), everything was going great, then I went way off line way to fast and smashed the wall rear end first, then hit the front right tire at almost full lock. I crushed the rear bumper / fender / trunk / taillight,  broke the PBM toe rod in half and bent the front strut where the knuckle meets the coil-over.

Keep in mind that this is my first major wreck in 4 years of driving the car at events, so I was pretty bummed my weekend was over. I limped the car back to the pits to see Brian waiting there with a giant hammer and block of wood.

Post wreck pic

The dude worked a miracle, popped the fender out, bent the strut back into shape, "realigned" the car and off i went... Until the rear wheel rubbed with the slightest input... Back again to see the rear toe rod was broken in half. I had no spares, and went looking through the pits for one. Luckily a very kind Vegas local had just swapped his out for new ones and let me have it.

We slapped it on and off I went with my wall made alignment. The car didn't want to transition, among other things ( to be expected) and right when I was getting the hang of it and laying down runs, it died and wouldn't turn over... Once again I thought the weekend was over. I get a text from Brian telling me to get a ride back with Ben and jump in Jims car and get practice in. I cannot thank Jim enough for letting me use his car, it meant more than most people could understand. He also gave up driving in qualifying to let me have a shot.

So I did.

I got 2 practice runs in before qualifying started... Holy smokes 700hp is a lot. I laid down a conservative run to get one in the books. I never went past 3/4 throttle as it had so much power all around.
2nd run I nailed it. Super aggressive entry, hit the clips, then decided to let it eat and floored it right at the end.

I spun out. Those 700 ponies came on like a freight train. Luckily the previous run was enough to make the show, and I qualified 14th in the top 16.

This was also my first time making top 16 at a large drift event. It felt great!!! Since I qualified towards the back of the pack, I was up against the number 2 qualifier, Josh Guild (rad driver by the way).

Needless to say, I lack the tandem experience needed (come on NM lets do this) to advance, and got knocked out first round. I got out driven in every way, especially since I had the HP advantage. Well done Josh :)

As stated I learned a ton once again and will be back it it this weekend for top drift round 2.

Test... And blow through 6 tires in 10 minutes.

Took the car out the Sandia Motor speedway today to get a feel for it, as I havnt been behind the wheel of it since oct. of last year.

Felt really good to be back in the seat, had some issues with holding power in 3rd gear, but the angle was amazing when the power was there. 

Few pics that Will Fox from racingsouthwest.com snapped of the days fun. Thanks a million Will, the shots look epic!