Last winter, something unexpected happened at the D1GP's USA versus Japan exhibition event. Vaughn "JR" Gittin, with an extraordinary display of driving prowess against Japan's drifting elite, muscled his way to the podium with a supercharged Mustang, marking the very first win by an American in any D1GP event. With less than a month to ship cars back and forth to the Tokyo Auto Salon (and back again for the season opener), regrouping, and preparing the cars for '06 (which could be drifting's biggest year yet), you could bet the Japanese would not accept anything other than a win. This would not simply be a show for the fans, but a fight for the year's first point's designation. A second American win in a row would be considered miraculous.
It Never Rains in Southern California
For the first time ever, the forecast called for heavy rain, but D1GP had every intention of making sure the show went on as planned. By Friday's qualifying rounds, the Japanese looked confident, having drifted in weather conditions like this many times over, and our home court advantage looked slight by comparison. Switching back to theoriginal course configuration used at the Irwindale Speedway (the event was run in reverse the last time), the usual suspects all came to play with some switching sponsors or teams.
On the American side, Team Falken's roster remained largely intact from last year with the exception of Tony Angelo and Ben "Big Smoke" Schwartz. Ben, who drove the Peak Performance/Falken S14 last year, will be joining Dai Yoshihara (who was absent from this D1 to prepare for Formula D's opener) as Pacific Rim's second driver; he also turned the controls of the S14 over to Robbie Nishida, who was picked up quickly by Peak's owner, Eddie Kim. Quoc Ly made a strong debut as Jasper's newest team member with his 240 hatchback, but could not advance past qualifying, and the Kaaz cars driven by Bryan Norris and Barry Wong picked up a new sponsor in Hankook tires.
While there were a good number of American drivers who passed qualifying at the US versus Japan match, the same couldn't be said for this round. Stephan Papadakis, who ran hard and acquired a D1 license before smashing his S2000 into the barrier walls and destroying most of the chassis and the left side suspension, had it repaired in time to compete but had trouble maintaining a clean pass during qualifying. It should be noted that '06 will be Steph's first year as a full-time drifter as AEM has pushed all of its efforts into the sport for the next three years and will also be employing Tanner Foust as his teammate. Rhys Millen's Pontiac Solstice, the replacement for last year's GTO (also totaled at the last event), wasn't finished in time, but his father Rod came to represent the Americans once again and went into the Top 32 with the Grenade RX-8. Chris Forsberg was now back into the seat of his 350Z, but it was his first Z and not the topless Titan V-8-powered version that was showcased at SEMA. He was able to move into the Top 32 with Falken teammates Hiro Sumida, Ryan Hampton and JR Gittin.
But for all the changes and additions to the US side of drifting, there were just as many for the Japanese. The absences of former D1GP judge and RS*R driver Manabu Orido and HKS' Nobuteru Taniguchi were clouded by controversy and rumor. Orido was back in Japan practicing for the upcoming Super GT series and it's questionable whether he will be participating in D1 since his efforts are now being directed more towards GT racing. According to HKS, NOB will be focused more towards Time Attack and breaking records with the newly redesigned TRB-II Evo, which was re-launched at this year's Tokyo Auto Salon in a bright red color. NOB will also be concentrating heavily on racing in the Super GT series for Direxiv Motorsports (www.direxivmotorsports.com), piloting the Vemac RD320R, a 380bhp 3.5L Honda C32B engine, with co-driver Shogo Mitsuyama. Youichi Imamura, who drove A'PEXi's FD RX-7 to numerous wins, is now the driver of the Top Secret Z33, which was formerly driven by Ryuji Miki, who is now rumored to be driving a car that's to be built by HPI.
It's a Beautiful Day
As Saturday rolled around, the skies cleared and the sun showed brightly upon Los Angeles for the main event. Samuel Hubinette, who recently brought Shaun Carlson and the Nuformz crew on board for technical support, came in strong, qualifying number one in the Mopar Viper and posting his best D1 performance yet, which was due partly to his recent change of tire sponsors from Yokohama to BFGoodrich. Equipped with KDWs-mainly because BFG offers more variety in this tire than the stickier KDs-he was able to maintain the highest speeds of the 47 qualifiers around the outer bank. His new Charger was on display in the vendor area and will be finished by the first Formula D event at Long Beach.
Once the competition started, those who went aggressively into their drift and had close encounters with the wall received plenty of adoration from the fans. Many of the top drivers were grazing the wall on the inside bank in front of the judges stand. This was not the case of sloppy driving but skillful attempts to see how close the drivers could get to the wall without interrupting their line. On more than one occasion-most notably during a run by Sam Hubinette and Drift Samurai-a driver would tap the wall only to come back on the very next pass and hang it out within inches of the same spot, fanning the banners in dramatic displays of big talent and brass balls. It was kind of like our parallel parking technique, only at 50-plus miles per hour.