Drifting? Invented by tire companies, to wear out yer tires in 1/4 the time. Just as silly as the racecars with something like a bookshelf on the roof.
xs, I will see if this educates you beyond your initial ignorance. If not, you do know what it means to not be able to be educated out of ignorance, right?
[h=2]Japanese History of Drifting[/h]
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The history of drifting as we know it today goes way back to the 1960’s to the winding mountain roads of Japan. Back then a group of racers called the Rolling Zoku raced on the twisty mountain roads of Japan trying to set record times between point A and B.
As the racers improved and their lap times became faster, these racers started going over the grip limit of their tires. They found out that by going over the limit the car was still controllable. In the end it didn't seem to be faster, but it sure was a outrageous and exciting way to show off car control skills. It was then that racers in Japan first studied this driving technique.
Later on in the 1970’s there was the All Japan Touring Car Championship. The racers were heavily competing against each other, and each lap the racers increased their lap times bit by bit, testing the tires’ grip to the limit! This resulted in an awesome spectacle of car control where the racing drivers drifted their cars incredibly fast through the corners.
One of those drivers was a former motorcycle driver,
Kunimitsu Takahashi.
Takahashi's drifting technique was unmatched by anyone else. He was able to hit the corner’s apex at high speeds perfectly and caused the car to oversteer.
With with great control he mastered the drifts and reached great exit speeds...
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Combined with the fact that he was driving a car that was build for the win, the Nissan Skyline KPGC10, or “Hakosuka”, he accounted for more than 50+ straight victories on a row and captured several championship titles along the way. The spectacle of burning rubber made the crowd love Takahashi, under whom was a boy named
Keiichi Tsuchiya.
The All Japan Touring Car Championship later evolved into the racing organization called JGTC (Japan Grand Touring Championship), or Super GT, where today Takahashi is the chairman of.
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Keiichi Tsuchiya was an ordinary street racer and was a big fan of Takahashi’s drifting technique. Inspired by Takahashi’s driving skills Tsuchiya joined the Fuji Freshman Race in 1977. This is how his professional career started, but he was still a street racer. For day and night he practiced the drift techniques on the Japanese tight and twisty mountain roads (also known in Japanese as “touge”) with his 1986 Toyota Sprinter Trueno GTV.
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Japanese History Of Drifting -
While drifting was fast becoming a popular sport in Japan to the extent that several different grass roots drifting events were being held around he country, the sport found its way to Western shores, particularly in California where one of the first drifting events outside of Japan took place in 1996.
The site was the Willow Springs Raceway in Willow Springs, California where Dajido Inada, one of the founding fathers of the D1 Grand Prix, hosted the competition. At the event, future drifting stars Rhys Millen and Bryan Norris were two of the entrants. Since then, drifting has exploded in the West to become one of the most popular forms of automotive competition.
Essentially, what Inada and Tsuchiya started with the D1 Grand Prix has blossomed into many other world-class drifting events all over the world, including
Formula D in the US, the NZ Drift Series in New Zealand, the Nordic Drifting Series in Europe, and most recently, the Red Bull Drifting Championship.
[h=3]Big Today, Bigger Tomorrow[/h]
While drifting doesn’t have the grandeur of
Formula One or the spectacle of
NASCAR , it’s popularity has spurned a generation of upstart drifters practicing their latest hooning skills in every corner of the world. It’s hard to believe that the first organized drifting competition only happened a decade ago, and the sport’s appeal not just to the viewers, but to young racers, is living proof that drifting is a sport that’s yet to hit its full potential.
For all intents and purposes, it’s a sport that’s going to increase in popularity as the years go by, something that its forefathers from Japan should be mighty proud of.
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The History Of Drifting - Top Speed -
Ignorance can be educated out of existence; when one is ineducable, stupidity is all that remains.
