They are of different worlds, of different generations, of different social strata. One was common, the other high-fallutin’; one was delightfully simple, the other deviously complicated. The AE86 lived its life briefly and brightly, Japan’s tightly-structured four-years-per-generation rule all but ensuring that the Corolla GT-S would be replaced before it got hoary and old; the Honda S2000, home of the F20C engine now seen between the Toyota’s strut towers, lived for an entire decade and seems to have barely been missed since it went away.

It’s amazing to think how far the Lexus GS has come in a relatively short amount of time. When it was first introduced in 1993, the car was, unbeknownst to most, what you could consider special, as the GS 300’s lineage comes from one of Toyota’s greatest platforms, the Supra, and subsequently, was also derived from one of its Lexus brethren, the SC 400, sharing many things like suspension design and drivetrain. Of course, some of you know it more as an Aristo in JDM lingo, and for those of you really in the know, the way a 2JZ engine fits in the bay is more than just “really cool shit”—it’s sublime and perfect. Even the second gen GS became a popular car fit for engine conversions (more so in the US), drifting and bippu, maybe more so in Japan as drivers like Manabu Orido commissioned an Aristo himself for competition.

This has basically become a routine for us here at Super Street: every year, a month or so after the annual SEMA show occurs, we make our way down to Ontario, CA to visit our good friend Bisi Ezerioha. It’s always nice to catch up with Bisi and his interesting sense of humor, but the main reason why we head out there is to get a better look at his latest, and possibly greatest, new project. We’ve come to expect a lot from Bisi over the years because he never disappoints. If anything, he’s always surprised us and exceeded our expectations. Bisi started out as the naturally-aspirated single-cam Honda king, and then captured the attention of the entire import automotive community by building a 700-plus horsepower, turbocharged Civic Wagon. One company that took a vested interest in Bisimoto’s many accomplishments was Honda of America. They knew he had the uncanny ability to build what seemed impossible and provided him with the opportunity last year to tinker with the then-newly released hybrid Honda CR-Z. Unless you’ve been living under that proverbial rock, you’ve probably already heard of his fully-operational hybrid, turbocharged, 533hp CR-Z. If by chance you haven’t, please kindly pull up a Google search and educate yourself. The Bisimoto CR-Z garnered such critical acclaim and positive reception, that Honda once again contacted Bisi for the 2011 SEMA project. This time around, they had another unique undertaking in the form of the newly-unveiled 2012 Honda Civic Si.

Even if you’re not a walking encyclopedia about cars, you should know a few things about the Impreza WRX STI. First off, it’s Subaru’s flagship high performance car and it came exclusively with an all-wheel drive layout. In addition, the car is well-decorated in motorsport with success in the World Rally Championship. But for the next few minutes, let’s throw all that shit out the window because this particular STI beats to a different drum. It’s been specifically designed for drifting, sporting a rear-wheel drive conversion. It’s also powered by an RB25DET from the Nissan Skyline! If you’re a Subie purist, please turn the page now—but if we caught your attention, you won’t be disappointed.

It’s the first day of SEMA and we’re standing in the Lexus tent as hundreds of journalists check out the reveal of the Five Axis GS F Sport. There isn’t much that needs to be said about the car that you can’t get from the photos. The car is a thing of beauty and moments later we were proven right. We see a group of models walk in with their eyes glued to the car. Among them was our recent cover model Eva Skye, who must have took twenty pictures of the car. After ignoring us for few minutes we call out her name and she yells back, “this is so sexy,” as she waves, turns around and looks right back at the car.

There’s a lot I could say about a Datsun 510. I could refer to this car as a “dime”, then segue into a long-winded aside about how we got ripped off by never getting the Bluebird, or tell you about Peter Brock’s (BRE) championship winning 510s that changed America’s perception of Datsun as a brand. But, to be quite honest, you’ve probably heard it all before.

Some of you are going to hate it; some of you are going to love it. We can’t please everyone but with its popularity, we can’t deny it’s becoming a major part of our scene. What are we talking about? Stance! In the October ’11 issue we dedicated our entire magazine to the craze. Sure the crazy low and wide stance kills the handling of a car and makes it a pain in the ass to drive everyday, but it simply looks badass. So to keep the kids happy, we’ll be dishing out this new two-page quickie feature every month showcasing some of the hottest stanced rides in the nation. Kicking off the new segment, we have JT Teng’s Civic, fresh from the Wekfest show (elsewhere in this issue).

If you’re going to do something out of the ordinary, you’d better do it properly. This is precisely the kind of mindset that Trial had when they embarked on their most extreme MR-S based project yet. Located in the outskirts of Osaka City, a five-minute walk from neighboring garage Auto Select, Trial is without a doubt, one of the biggest tuning shops we have come across in Japan. They offer top notch tuning services for pretty much any car you care to show up in, and while they specialize mostly in GT-Rs, Evos and Supras, they always have a very healthy interest in Toyota’s Celica and MR2, developing plenty of aftermarket parts for the two platforms. Even after Toyota discontinued the ZZW30 MR-S, Makihara-san, owner of Trial, still wanted to build one of these little mid-ship coupes. All he needed was time and a lot of carbon-fiber, but you can no doubt tell that those two key elements were just what this project needed.

There’s a reason this EK hatch is in our magazine and it’s not because of a lime green rollcage. Justin Semon has spent the last year building his Civic to run with the wolves. Not squandering money on rare or flashy parts, he’s developed an all-around car tailored for the track. And while many Honda owners only take their rides to get-togethers, Mr. Semon isn’t wasting his time being a hard parker. Last year, he tracked his car at Road Atlanta and plans to do more of the same in ’12.

I believe RAUH-Welt Begriff, or RWB for short, is a company that probably doesn’t need any introduction. You may remember two of their creations we featured back in our August issue. Over the last few years RWB has elevated from a small body shop in Chiba that nobody had ever heard of to one of the most liked tuners on the Internet. The key to owner Akira Nakai’s success is the broad appeal of his aggressively styled Porsches.

You already know this car very well. S13 240SX chassis, the kind of car you want succeeding at a drift event. That TRA KYOTO/GT Rodeo aero, oh so good. Easily recognizable Falken livery. And that driver—yes, that cool Japanese guy with even cooler hair. So damn smooth and what I call pure genius behind the wheel. This is not so much a story about a car that was taken to a Formula D victory, but more about the guy who is responsible for doing the job. After all, without a great driver, the car is nothing more than a piece of lifeless machinery. Its life comes from within him, through his fingertips, fast acting feet and precision coordination. Winning a championship is a goal that has been in effect since the day he stepped off a plane back in 2003 as a hired gun for a then emerging drift scene. He never once stopped trying although he was knocked down a couple times in the process. And, so it goes without saying: 2011 was finally Dai Yoshihara’s year.

There’s no question the owner of this ’03 Mitsubishi Evo is the boss. With all the realest parts imported from Japan to Puerto Rico, plus a 650whp bulletproof motor, it doesn’t surprise us he wants to remain anonymous. To honor his request, we’ve kept his identity hidden; however, to get the photos of this monster we talked to Speed Technology PR, the shop responsible for the monster.

If you have a closed-mind, this Scion probably isn’t your cup of tea. But for those who can appreciate different styles and think outside the box, you’ll enjoy what Michael Ma has accomplished. His ’04 Scion xB sports a little bit of everything (JDM parts, supercharged, stance, retro colors) making it one of the most interesting show cars we came across last year.

Rocky Auto is a name that has been cemented into the world of Japanese classics. A wondrous place where things are done to the beat of a different drum, where there are no limitations or restrictions—a safe haven where ideas can flow to help turn out original vintage rides at any given moment. As Watanabe-san, the man behind it all says, “What’s the point of building something that has already been done before?” He certainly has a point, which is why we are here once again, this time with a car that was built to wow crowds at this year’s Tokyo Auto Salon, which is now up for sale for the modest sum of ¥13,545,000, or $176,745.

Since ’09, we’ve been gaining more and more respect for Hyundai. The Korean automaker introduced a sleek rear-wheel drive coupe called the Genesis—maybe you’ve heard of it. For $22k, you could get behind the wheel of a new sports car equipped with a 210hp 2.0-liter turbo, or upgrade to a 306hp 3.8-liter V6 for a few extra bucks. If you haven’t seen one on the streets, you’ve probably caught a glimpse of the 500+hp Genesis driven by Rhys Millen in Formula D. Hyundai is making some bold moves to create a new identity in North America and its ‘12 Veloster is just another example of good things to come.

It’s crazy how shorthand travels for cars that aren’t actually sold in this country. The Nissan Skyline is a case in point: most old school fans will know what a hakosuka is (hako, for box; suka, for the Japanese pronunciation of the first half of the Skyline name), and some may even know the Japan Skyline (1977-81, named for its “I Love Japan” advertising theme) and the Newman Skyline (1981-85, so named because Paul Newman raced a version in international competition).

You’re looking at what might be the fastest FWD car in Southern California. “Might” because it makes the power and wins the races . . . but no one knows exactly by how much, or what its full potential may be. And no, not because it “just got finished,” “isn’t tuned on the nitrous,” or any other excuse some might give for not putting their track-prepped cars where their mouths are. This thing’s been calling names and stomping them into the ground since 2007, running—and mostly winning—over 80 all-out, head-up races during that time. Trouble is, none of them have been on an actual race track.

Finding a flawless, daily-driven 25 year-old project car is like finding oil in your backyard—rare as fugg. But after perusing the Motion Auto Show earlier this year, we were proven wrong. Ryan Deguzman had just finished this breathtaking ’87 Mazda RX-7 with all the right parts and styling cues. And he wasn’t any pansy either. The 33 year-old drove this FC to work everyday with 350whp of rotary power at his disposal.

Time attack is a curious game. On paper it is one of the least exciting forms of motorsport; after all, watching cars go around a track for short stints to improve upon their own times isn’t exactly groundbreaking entertainment. But, despite this, the way it continues to grow, there’s obviously an interest there that keeps it going, and that’s really the cars themselves. In Japan, time attack has always been about the tuning; enthusiasts follow their favorite demo cars religiously, and in most cases, it’s a chance for most shops to push the envelope of engine and chassis tuning. To go balls-out extreme, if you will, an Esprit’s NSX is a perfect example of balls-out “crazy”. A car that once started as a bone-stock Type-S is now a lot closer to resembling the type of racer that takes home Super GT championships.

Normally when the conversation makes it’s way to the future plans discussion for any given project car, you generally hear about what kind of finishing touches are on the horizon or what the next set of wheels are on order. When that particular question came up on Bruce Kress’ Mazda RX-7, he told me that this street car was going to become a kamikaze drift car. It was an answer that left me questioning my own judgment; did I hear him right? “I want to take this car into a few walls,” he says, matter of factly. Is he insane? He might very well be. But to understand this lunacy, you need to go back-to-basics and understand his theory on building cars.

Forget the hard parkers and track junkies, this ’08 Mitsubishi Evo is for the people. It’s not stored in a garage but daily-driven, whether commuting to the office, picking up the kids from school, going on long road trips… You name it. And it does it all with some serious style and big-turbo power.

Have you seen this *image before? This is “The Great Wave Off Kanagawa”, the first of a series of ukiyo-e woodcut prints created by Hokusai in the late 1820s or early 1830s. It’s a single piece of symbolic shorthand that embodies the term “old school Japanese” for millions around the world—and you can’t get a lot more old school than two centuries ago. But the image itself can be readily adapted to explain the car whose hood it adorns—and perhaps the owner himself.

What I am about to say might shock you. With any luck, it might even piss you off. But clear your mind for a second; let that mind be free. No, the iQ isn’t here to “change the game” or spark a revolution in the tuning scene; it will, however, change the way you might think about cruising around town. Especially if that “town” happens to be a very big city, say Los Angeles—or any big metropolis, really—and you’re constantly reminded of what a nightmare it is to find suitable parking when you’re gallivanting around it. Our in-house Facebook expert even told us that with a little bit of research marketing conducted on our sister title’s fan page, that most comments eluded to comments such as “hate to be seen in that death trap”, “sucks huge pipe” (use your imagination with that one) and “how do you have sex in this?” Well, I can tell you with certainty that having sex in an iQ won’t be a problem (The front passenger seat has more room for it to slide forward so you can have more room in the back. What, you think I’m that cool to have done it in one? Not that cool. Yet.) So, believe me when I say: the Scion iQ does not suck.

As the brains behind the Australian performance car video series, Motive DVD and the director of the Australian Drifting Grand Prix and forthcoming Track Battle time attack series, 30 year-old Sydneysider Andrew Hawkins’ life is far removed from days spent in the Australian Air Force. If there’s anything he took away from his early career in the airborne military however, it’s a mindset to engineer things the right way, and of course, to make them go as fast as possible. They’re good traits to have when you’re piecing together a low-flying machine destined to wage war with the world’s time attack elite.

You could call this win a much-needed bit of redemption for Sportcar Motion. Being the champion of our first FF Battle, they were highly-favored to win FF Battle 2 with a new competition car, a “subtle”, more street-able replacement to their famed Integra—this EK9 Civic Type R. Stripped down and rebuilt, it’s actually more simplistic than one might think. What you see is what you get; it’s heart and soul being a 234hp K20Z1 with high-quality bolt-ons and internals. At FF Battle 2, while this particular setup was proper, the car’s suspension was not an ideal setup for street tires, which hurt their overall lap time. Once remedied, the car turned a 1:59, good enough for first place, but it was in a non-official session and instead, the car finished fourth with a time of 2:04.321 being the fastest lap time counted.