(car engine revs)
- Have you ever lived in the Midwest and you jump on TikTok,
or you go on vacation to, like, the west coast.
Them cool bastards.
And you look at the people
and they're wearing like cool things,
like things that you didn't know were cool,
but then you look at yourself,
and they've got styles that you,
that you thought people made fun of,
and then you're out there with some like basic shorts,
Adidas shoes, and some v-necks,
because you thought v-necks were still in,
and apparently they're not in anymore.
So you go back home, you try to dress like them.
And then you realize
that the west coast designs are both five years away
from ever making their way
into the Midwest styling, okay?
Like we're the last to look cool almost every single time.
And when I mean that-
- [Distorted Voice] I mean always.
- In the automotive industry,
there's a segment that is filled with the cool kids.
A little bit of that feeling.
I'm Alex, Alex.FI at Instagram,
and today we're gonna be talking about those cool kids,
the boys and girls that decided that,
absolutely not, I'm not going to keep my tires in one piece,
and absolutely not, I don't want to keep
my body of my car the same color,
I want it to rub up against other cars for decades.
And absolutely not, do I want to have a reliable,
low cost vehicle.
Ladies and gentlemen, let's talk about the history of one
of the flashiest, one of the loudest,
and probably the most misunderstood
automotive sports out there in the industry.
Let's dive into the history of drifting.
(instrumental hip hop music)
Hola, me llama Dora.
I think she says it nicer than that.
And if you're looking for a place to see what
wheels, tires, and suspension fit
your newly acquired car or otherwise,
potentially, even dare I say a drift car,
well then bud why don't you just go
over and hit us up over at fitmentindustries.com.
Where we have a large gallery,
like over 40,000 vehicles,
you can enter in your year, make and model,
it tells you what fits.
So you can pick up wheels, tires, and suspension
that come mounted, balanced and shipped for free
to your door, to the lower 48.
All right, sorry, Alaska and Hawaii.
Maybe you should be more connected to the country.
And in addition to that, of course, because some people
like the stretchy boys and some people
like rubber bands, we can actually
mount those things to your, to your wheels.
Instead of getting judged, and having the anxiety of going
to a tire shop and them looking at you like you're an idiot.
You don't have to do that
because we don't judge you.
Mostly because we don't see you.
But that's besides the point.
Also drop the comments where
you first heard of drifting.
Was it Fast and the Furious?
Maybe a little night YouTube adventure filled
with funk music or something like that.
The first time maybe you've put lunch trays
under your rear wheels when you were in high school
because that's what Sean and I did when we went
to North or Chippewa.
And let us know in the comments
so we can read through all of them and laugh or cry.
The history of drifting takes us across the water
to the island of Japan.
Kunimitsu Takahashi, a well-known motorcyclist,
that was one of the first Japanese racers to
win a motorcycle Grand Prix in Germany,
all the way back in 1961.
After a substantial accident on the Isle of Mann,
TT, which if you guys don't know what that is,
it looks a bit like this.
(motorcycle revs)
And it (beep) is scary, okay?
I hope it scares you as much as it scares me
turning off the lights before going
up the stairs from the basement, because I get nervous.
The monster in Evolution is what I used to think about.
But after the crash, Takahashi would change courses
and move to automobile racing.
And I would, too, considering the danger.
In 1965, instead of being on two wheels,
he began being on four in a Nissan Skyline.
And in 1965, he would immediately just start taking wins.
Not because of the Skyline,
and not really because of the money,
but because of how he bombed through corners.
A very specific technique that really originated with him.
You see back then bias place racing tires were
extremely tough to manage grip at high speeds
when the rubber was twisted through a turn.
It just didn't do well at dispersing the traction.
So instead of trying to race normally,
Takahashi would intentionally cause the car
to slide with oversteer control
before the apex of a corner,
essentially trying to straighten out the car
post turn before the turn.
Then the moment he exited that turn,
he would be holding a speed higher than
much of his competitors,
and just pretty much slam it down
in hopes that he could get the traction
on the later end of the turn.
This unique driving ability wasn't anything too new,
but Takahashi his ability to do so with such eloquence.
Okay, word of the day is eloquence and in a multitude
of different weather conditions, was made him so special.
Takahashi would never actually slow down depending
on the weather.
He just bombed through everything.
And this is where people mentioned that drifting
on street roads started before racing because that's really
not the case.
And Takahashi's impressive driving behavior
is essentially what captivated
both the professional enthusiasts
that was getting their ass beat,
and the 16 year old with the (beep) box
that spent his weekends on the mountain roads of Japan.
And to further compound that,
Takahashi would race pretty much everything.
He'd go on to race Formula One, GT Two,
he'd even race motorcycles, and more.
So when he began to, like,
apply this technique and people saw success with it,
it immediately followed suit and pretty much everywhere.
That's kind of, sort of, where the illegal bit comes in.
That's illegal.
You can't do that on street roads.
That's dangerous.
I hate when people tell me that.
Like, I know that.
Like, I'm just out here booing around
in the countryside.
If I hurt myself, it's just me.
Dangerous is our middle name, Karen, all right?
We don't even know what that word means
because we're young and bounce back like a wiggler.
It's a toy from the nineties.
If you guys were wondering, it's what you put your finger
in and it's got the gel on the outside is plastic.
It's called a wiggler.
So as Takahashi began to establish the name
of like the grandfather of professional drifting,
this essentially laid the framework
for a lot of people to also copy his craft,
especially illegal street racers.
And this is where the most popular name
probably the one that you know
and love the DK Drift King, Keiichi Tsuchiya,
began to grow his technique.
Because he did kind of sort of the same thing,
but through the mountain roads,
in a classic, in a beautiful, in a panda-looking 1996
Toyota sprinter twin yo.
What does DK stand for?
I'm a say it again.
Donkey Kong, Drift King.
Okay?
And that was it.
I mean, essentially this is how that style
and that heritage began to get passing down.
The illegal racing grew massive popularity in the seventies,
specifically in Japan,
and Tsuchiya behind the wheel of setting records,
both on the track and off the track,
the community just fell in love
with the craft of drifting.
Tsuchiya would enter into professional,
professional racing in 1977
through the Fuji freshmen race.
He would essentially dominate
and then take that very same car and still illegally race
on the midnight roads back in Japan, because it was fun.
It was so much fun that he got in trouble because of it.
Fun fact, he was actually suspended for a period
of time for legally racing on the mountain roads
and getting in trouble because of a short film
where his illegal, you know, mountain racing was promoted.
Like, it turns out people didn't like that.
Specifically the people that were helping him, you know,
support his legal racing.
Who knew?
The public stunt was a little bit like
top secret speeding tickets though.
Bad on the short-term, massive on the longterm.
This decision made headlines in the automotive industry,
which led to more people to flock
to the sport and essentially start doing
and loving the idea of smoky boy drifties, okay?
And the interest in the sport just continued to rise.
The need of having drivers come together and have an event
and do all of it in some sort of sanctioned way
started to really grow along with it.
Events like the video option, car boy, and more
began to grow, and with it,
the first official D-One Grand Prix
for drifting would be hosted in the early two thousands,
the late 1990s, officially cementing the activity
into a fully fledged automotive sport.
Now the D-One event took place in 2001,
but there are a couple of events in between that.
The D-One Grand Prix was co-founded
with the help of Tsuchiya and Daijiro Inada, okay?
And he was the founder of the Tokyo Auto Saloon,
which is an awesome modified event in Japan,
which is like SEMA except better in every way,
because all it is is about crazy,
just loud obnoxious vehicles.
The moment that this started to officially
start taking roots in Japan, though,
the interest spread to the
United States of America, all right?
A Willow Springs Raceway in California would be
one of the first places a lot of people in the USA
would start to see this activity.
While it was hosted by Daijiro Inada,
one of the founders of the Grand Prix,
it quickly evolved into its own style and community.
This is essentially where the Japanese
and the American drifting started coming together.
Young bucks like Rhys Millen and Brian Norris
were the first to enter the sport
before it was well-received as much as it is today.
And in no time, Formula D would be founded in the States,
and Z Drift series in New Zealand,
Nordic Drifting in Europe,
and even the wing growing masters,
Red Bull Drifting Championship would start to take hold
as we went into the two thousands.
It really started to spread like wildfire.
In 2003, Formula D would take the official reins, all right?
As the drifting series here in the 50 states
co-founded by Jim Liaw and Ryan Sage.
I'm sorry if I say that wrong.
As a sister company to an old company called Slipstream.
Now, Slipstream was the same company
that introduced the D-One grand Prix to the States as well,
essentially kind of tying those two pieces together,
were Slipstream was the channel between Japan
and the United States.
Formula D now owns and operates the official drifting series
in North America and is in its 18th year of competition,
which is just absolutely nuts.
Because of the varying degree of classes,
professions, and seriousness of the sport,
nearly anyone can get involved
in drifting if they truly want to.
What really matters is just if you got, like, the money
because it's very expensive sport, okay?
Whether you're just jumping into the sport
with a stock 350 Z with an LSD,
artists and elders, a Nanjing NS 25s,
or you want to ramp up,
you want to get yourself a Boss 240 SX,
also on artists to elders.
Meh.
We sponsored one,
so that's why I keep bringing it up.
You should take a look,
and I'm sure we'll put a picture here.
(car revs)
And I'm so excited to see it,
but seriously, no matter where you're at,
whether it's official judging,
or just some sort of fun circle track,
it's all possible with pretty much anything
that's rear wheel drive.
The art and craft of drifting has multiple routes.
It has different ways of actually conducting the drifting,
whether it's a clutch kick or Kansei drifting.
You can have a shit box or you can have
a hundred thousand dollar monster.
It really doesn't matter.
At least if you're really trying to jump into it.
What matters is going in,
learning everything you can,
making some mistakes, crashing every once in a while,
meeting people, and having fun.
We definitely recommend some cheap tires too.
But what do you think about drifting?
Is it something that should stay around for a while,
or is it just one of those hot boy things?
Let us know below, and if you're looking for
aftermarket wheels, tires, or suspension
for your drift car or your daily,
be sure to hit us up over at fitmentindustries.com.
If you'd like us to touch
on anything more in the drifting world,
or another segment of the automotive scene at all,
let us know below.
I'm Alex from Fitment Industries, and we will see you later.
Peace.
Ow, my knee.
Soccer.
(funky music)