SCCA Holds Drifting Championship "Formula D"
 

Looks like SCCA is endorsing drifting now. Forumla D will be the first North Americanprofessional drifting championship.

http://www.scca.com/news/press03_146.html

"The 2004 series will be documented on ‘Formula Drift TV' by Want Media, a leading youth marketing and media production company."

It feels like this event is really going to be commercialized and exploited to hell. Does SCCA give a rat's ass about the drifting sport or are they hoping on the bandwagon?

Cool! I hope I can partake in SCCA drifting on a local level ;)

I would love to compete on a national level. Look for me there in 2005.

god, i think most of the guys which actually do get sideways think this is gonna turn drift from grassroots where anyone can compete and get good to where you need f*cking sponsers up the ass and at least $50-100k just to compete.

count me in ill be there in 2005 too ranzo.

Yes the SCCA does share more then a monetary interest in the sport of drifting. We wouldn't make it our baby if it didn't hold so much appeal, and no sanctioning racing events is not as lucrative as you think.

Cheers,

Jason
SCCA Pro Racing Field Staff Memeber
SCCA Speed World Challenge

Why is there a zealous marketing campain is my question?

This doesn't sound like a SOLO II. "NASCAR" comes to mind first. Aww well, I hope I am wrong and it turns out to be a really cool local/regional event.

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There needs to be a "drifting" in this picture, but it gets the message across:

http://taylor-racing.com/chris/forum...e_fuck_out.jpg

Isn't one of the top guys at SCCA formerly a head NASCAR guy? Read that last yr in the SCCA mag...

Did anyone read the article in Sprotscar on the drift championship they sponsored in Irwindale Speedway? Sounds like they truly are interested in this. Why? Because it brings more members into the church of speed. More future club racers, and SCCA members.

taken from hyperrex's site "The next day, we attended the press conference by Slipstream Entertainment. They announced a new drifting series called Formula D. The twist is, they are working under the aegis of the SCCA! The SCCA will provide tech support in the form of rules and vehicle certification. The eventual goal of Formula D is to place the winners of Formula D in the next US D1 Grand Prix. What bothers me is that they claim that this is truly an opportunity for amateurs because they aren't letting anyone professional D1 drivers enter. They also claim that their judging system will eliminate politics and bias from the contest. However, they are planning a points competition, yet they are having only 4 events next year - and those 4 events are across the country! So by default, only people with lots of money and time enough to transport their car from coast to coast is going to have any reasonable shot at winning the points championship. Read bewteen the lines: only corporate sponsored drivers realistically have a shot. Way to go Slipstream."

This is all fine by me. I will transport my car wherever I can compete. There are lots of local events and so on here in Japan.......hell you can drift everyday of the year if you want. I have been in 15-20 competitions at "local" events and its boring because there is no what I call motivation......the prizes are small and so on. It is still fun and I would not stop doing it but I want to get sponsorships and make drift as large as nascar and other motorsports. Just because the SCCA wants to make a national tour or level of the competition dosen't stop the local chapters from holding events if that is what they want to do.

What I see is that drift has been going on locally and underground for years now and a lot of people want to make it something real and you cannot do that by just racing in a parking lot somewhere. The Pro D1 tour in Japan travels the country......some tracks take a day or two of travel to get to. This requires money, planning and stamina but it can be done without corporate sponsorship. To me that is the difference between someone who REALLY wants to do it and people who are just playing or is a hobby. How hard will you work to obtain your goals. As a second thought from what I have seen in the states Sponsors are paying for drivers with low abilities and I think this stems from all the hype surrounding drift at this current time. As time goes on more and more good drivers will emerge and some of the people driving now will be dropped......in my opinion of course. The whole point of what I am saying is that if you want to drift then you will and If you think you are good then you will want to show that to as many people as you can. If the SCCA goes nation wide with events then that is a good thing. I would be dissapointed if they only did it on a local level.

I'd like to organize drifting events within my own driving club.

I have done that in the past and I also co-sponsor with friends. I ususally try to get Americans from the base to enter. It is damn near impossible to get the Posers out of the parking lots to go race.

I don't know how it is in America on that side of the house but it is a pain in Japan because there is usually only one month out of the year to sign up and even then it is hard to get the dates that you want. So basically you sign up for the use of the track and pay a holding fee. If nobody shows up to your race then you are left owing a lot of money it can be a very scary situation. I want to charge money for spectators like D1 has begun to do since last year.

I think that is the reason Slipstream and the SCCA are hyping this up because if it flops then everyone will say it sucks and blah blah blah..... If it goes well then it can grow into something real. So they are investing lots of time and energy with advertising and presentation that appeals to the people who will come out and watch as well as participate.

Ranzo, I was thinking of organizing a drift event during an open track event. I'd have lapping groups for the grip drivers, and drifting groups for the power slide drivers. I'm not qualified to judge drifting techniques, and so my events would be non-competitive. It's just that with the drift groups, everyone in that run group is aware their fellow drivers are all sliding their cars purposefully, so they'd need to leave plenty of room between cars for drivers whose slides turn into "off-track excursions" :)

we have www.dgtrials.com over here. i know the guys that run. we use the parking lot at etown. i attempted to drift the 450hp monster.......the only time i did it i have no video of it LOL

its alot of fun as long as you don't smack into something. i still have ALOT to learn but its a very fun sport :)

Does that parking lot have parking light towers? I'd be afraid of smacking one of those. It's seems drifting in an open air field on a chalked-line course would be safest?

Don't be stupid and get near to it.

It doesn't make them stupid. Most autocrosses are closer than 25ft. to large stationary objects. If you really fuck up, like spinning out you can go farther than 25 ft. You take that risk at these types of events. Some places have a great wide open arena or stadium (Cohen in El Paso or Greyhound in Post Falls) parking lot, others use a small high school or CC parking lot (Missoula). You take what you can get and some places are more risky than others.

Don't be an ass.

Well let me explain the way it is done here in Japan.

They run different classes from Beginner to expert. Normally there are 4-5 classes of drift. There are usually one to two classes of "Grip" where you get a timer and lap times are recorded. As a general rule the Grip class is full of people who want to drift but are afraid so they drive fast and shoot for lap times and try sliding on certain corners. The rest of the classes are there so to keep lower level people who spin alot out of the way of better drivers. Normally you are allowed to pick what class you run in based on your own evaluation of yourself..... A lot of shops will not let you run in the upper classes if they don't know you or you cannot produce lap times and so on.....then again some shops don't care....LOL

A typical day would start with the Grip people out there first then start with the low level Drifters and work your way up. Every class runs normally 10-15 minutes and then called in so the next class can run. This will be repeated 5 to six times, depending on the number of cars, until the day is over. Generally there is a total of 1to 1 1/2 hours of driving time all day. Some people like HKS and others will allow you to drive for 1hour uninterupted but then you are done for the day.

None of this is normally judged it is just Free Runs for practice. Sometimes people like Koguchi and others are there and they hold a mini doricon and it will be judged and sometimes small prizes are given. Lap times are posted on a board for everyones evaluation though.

You could manage it in different ways depending on the number of cars and amount of time you have at given circuit. If in a parking lot I would not want more than one car at a time out there unless you have a great space between sides or area of driving.

Ranzo, yes your idea above is exactly what I had in mind for "enhancing" one of open track events. I think for safety's sake I will have fewer numbers of drift drivers in their run group relative to the grip drivers. This is to leave plenty of room for the drift drivers to spinout and off track if they lose control of their drifts.

speaking of which next wednesday is the last event of the year and i have a conquest tsi coming to drift :D

Meaning you'll be drifting a Conquest TSI? Cool!

i will be drifting this
http://www.vosko.net/photos/conquest...e/DSCF0005.JPG

should be fun !

Quite a collection of cars there.