What a slammin' slammin' slaaaammmmin' event!
I have to say... that out of all the drift events I've competed/participated in... the RS*R Drift Festival was by far, the best! I can't exactly put my finger one specific reason why it was so rad. Maybe it was going to Chicago on a whim... maybe it was rolling soloStylee... maybe it was the weather... or the cars... the pros... the ups... the downs... OH - the track layout!!!
There were two tracks, and two driver classes: a smaller track/larger track (both configured the same... just scaled differently); amatuer/pro classes. The small track was fun... but I was fighting understeer too hard to keep the combos coming. I had about 8/15 solid runs on the smaller track... usually when I would shift into 2nd hard through the FOERST corner. Tony Shulz rode with me a couple laps and gave me some great pointers that would go on to help me a great deal during competition.
The big track, on the other hand... was effing rad to the max. The FOERST corner was a huge sweeping left hander with crazy run-off space. It was easily a 60+ mph drift zone. The pros were coming much much faster through there. After the sweeper, you shift into a chicane headed to the right, and then back to the left towards the finish.
I performed at 10/10ths during competition. We had two judged runs, back-to-back. Orido was one of the judges... I beleive one of the other RS*R drivers was as well. I nailed both my runs. There was one point, after the sweeping left-hander... as you enter the chicane that I had to let my car straighten out a bit (thanks, open differential!) before I hit the following right hander. But it didn't matter... I hit my lines right on, and made top 16.
During the top 16 runs... about half the feild spun out. I was the last to run, and one of the DriftAssociation guys came up and told me that since so many people spun... if I kept it cool with no spins - I'd do well. So, that's what I did.
They were supposed to narrow the top 16 to best 8, then down to four, & onto the finals. BUT, at the last second, they decided to go with best five & onto finals. Considering that half the feild spun, I'm 90% sure I was one of the 3 that dropped from best 8 when they cut to five. But... who knows. Shxxxt, I was so happy to be there, and ripping shxxxt up, that I really didn't care. People didn't beleive me that I was running an open-diff. It was awesome. This was what I traveled all that way to do... to fxxxcking rip it, and represent the Atlanta kru.
Orido in the RS*R Supra was probably some of the best driving I've seen with my own eyes. His style is amazing. I tried to watch what he was doing and learn from it, but was constantly distracted by it's beauty that I couldn't help but gawk in a dumfounded state, thinking... how the hell is he doing that? At one point, he came flying towards the staging area at what looked like 70mph, and tapped a metal barrier with the rear of the car... sending it flying about 20 feet back. He just kept sliding across the face of the track in front of the crowd, sending everyone into a mass frenzy. It was amazing to say the least. Words seem to fail in comparison. We had one XXL "Drifting is not a crime" tee-shirt left... and he had to have it.
All the RS*R cars were hypnotizing to watch. Something about four precision-built machines with the same paint scheme performing at the limit... at once - it was awesome. Alex was rocking out in the RS*R s2000... the winner of the Drift Festival: Japan was there in the RS*R S14. I can't remember for the life of me who was driving the RS*R 350z... but he was ripping it too.
There were plenty of close close calls with the wall from the pro-drivers. Benson Hsu had a couple close ones, along with Ken Gushi. Tony Shulz was having some clutch problems, and ended up borrowing one of the amatuers' N/A KA powered s14's to compete. Something happened to the Hell Camino at the end of the day... but I never found out exactly what it was.
Ken Gushi tapped the wall during the pro exibitions on the driver side, and bent his rim & did some suspension damage. The car wasn't driveable. Later, Sammy tapped the same wall in the same place on his passenger side (in the Tiger Racing s13). He pulled the car into the pits, and ran over to Ken & told him to take whatever suspension parts he would need off his car... and that's what they did. They popped Sammy's car in the air, and went to work repairing Ken's. The crowd was loving it like an emergency repair at a WRC event. They got Ken's car up and running... and Ken ended up taking home FOERST place in the pro class. It was an amazing chain of events. The FOERST thing he did was thank Tiger Racing... whom without, he would have never even been able to compete... let alone, win. Sportsmanship at it's finest.
I have more video that I know what to do with from the event. I took pictures of the cars in the pits'n'such... but all the action is 720x480 NTSC... so I'll try and get it all up soon. I met a lot of cool people up there... hopefully some of them will make their way to the site. I was given strict instructions to tell all the Atlanta people that all the Chicago people said "What's up?!?".
Anyway... now that I've written an entire novel about my weekend... I'll wrap things up.
To say that I was thinking about alla you guys the entire time would be a huge understatement. Everywhere I looked there was something that shouted out driftMechaniks. Hahaha... I even saw an s14 built how Cody wants to build his. FC's, Subies... hot Asian women... it was was all there!
Next year... I say screw whatever's going on... we're all going to Chicago for round 2 (err... round 3 technically)!
I'm back from RS*R: Chicago!!!
Moderators: andysapp, charlie, CodyW, darkducati
but real cool stuff though dude. sux that you got dicked out though. you shoulda made the crazy 8 round.
-
captobvious
- Imitation Crab Meat
- Posts: 325
- Joined: Wed Jul 14, 2004 9:41 am
- Location: Alvin, Texas
- Contact:
-
icantdrift
- Salsa Rodeo
- Posts: 5987
- Joined: Fri Sep 03, 2004 1:03 pm
.
.-
down_shift
- Muscle Milk
- Posts: 11892
- Joined: Sat May 29, 2004 1:38 am
- Location: Beverly Hills
Glad you had fun. Now you are even more backlogged, you need three clones.
::::: understeer is definitely a crime - Colin McRae
Yeah, man... he rawks!!! It was crazy... he pulled his car into the paddock... started to jack the car in the air... then ran straight over to Ken to donate parts. Talk about a big heart. They should have given him some kind of award. It was truly awesome! Mad respect.icantdrift wrote:sammy (tiger) is the man, hands down. even though i can't understand half of what he says he's always the nicest guy in the world
I found a couple pictures online from the event. These aren't my photos. I don't remember where I found them exactly, since I found them in a post-surgery daze... but I think it was chicagovelocity.com & clubfr.net. If these are your photos... give me a shout & I'll definitely give proper photo credit. - Enjoy!
-
darkducati
- Purple Drank
- Posts: 2496
- Joined: Sat Apr 24, 2004 10:13 pm
- Location: Setting the world on fire, one upshift at a time.
Thanks, Chris!
I can't wait to get my car built to spec. Granted... it would be nice to do a complete teardown/rebuild... but since she's still my daily drifter... I'll have to settle with what I can.
I found some more pictures... these are some that Migs took (he joined the forum shortly after the event... he ripped it in Chicago, and came home with a 5th place finish in his Hachi!!!)
I can't wait to get my car built to spec. Granted... it would be nice to do a complete teardown/rebuild... but since she's still my daily drifter... I'll have to settle with what I can.
I found some more pictures... these are some that Migs took (he joined the forum shortly after the event... he ripped it in Chicago, and came home with a 5th place finish in his Hachi!!!)
