- Wait, he just displays this for everybody to look at?
Wait, what is that?
Is that a cave?
- [Larry] Okay.
Is this, is this?
- [Dino] Is this for real, man?
- [Larry] Is this heaven?
(intense music)
- What the heck?
- [Larry] I'm Larry Chen.
I've been shooting car culture all
of the world for the past 18 years.
From the best builds to the fastest races,
I've seen it all.
In this series, I'm highlighting the gearheads
that inspire me in our generation.
(dreamy music)
- [Larry] Professional drifting in the United States was
changed forever when Daigo Saito entered in 2012.
That year will forever have an imprint on
Formula DRIFT history, as it was the year he not only
came, but absolutely dominated.
As arguably the most famous competitor drifter from Japan,
Daigo has competed all of the world.
With Formula DRIFT just being one of the many series
he's had a chance to play around with.
In this episode, I traveled all the way to Japan.
Following Daigo, with my friend Robbie Nishida,
as we talk about Daigo's life, his shop and
and his love for Americana.
We're in Japan.
We're actually at Fat Five Racing.
Which is Daigo Saito's shop.
We miss Daigo.
A lot.
We also miss you, Robbie.
We're finally here, after all this time.
And I'm excited because we like shooting drift cars
and things like that.
- I gotta tell you one thing.
I mean, I've seen this place progress over the years, right?
This is like probably the world's biggest COVID project.
I'm pretty sure you've seen a lot of stuff,
like bits and pieces.
But right now, it's almost at its final form, maybe?
If he was Frieza, he's still at like, maybe level two.
- [Larry] Just to give you an idea,
I've been here before.
When he was building a R35.
The warehouse was completely empty,
except for maybe like five cars.
And it was brand new.
This lot was completely empty.
There wasn't any of these containers, any of these garages.
But now it's evolved into this crazy drift shop.
There's just so much stuff going on.
- [Robbie] Yeah.
He's must have built like close to a hundred
cars here already.
It could be from, you know, cars that are sent out to Europe
for demos.
Or, you know, whatever cars that he had to build to
take to the US.
Or to, you know, Russia.
To like Amman, whatever.
All over the place.
So, and especially in Japan.
Then his teammates, his customers.
You can tell when he's like working super hard,
cause his hair's like all blown out.
- [Larry] I thought that was his style.
- It is.
It is because that's what he looks like
most of the time cause he is always working on cars.
So he usually comes out, he's like all covered with
like fiberglass dust or you know, metal whatever.
- [Larry] When I first saw the SC come to the
States for the first time in Formula DRIFT,
you just changed professional drifting.
- [Robbie] A lot of people don't know this too.
He's been wanting to compete in the US prior to 2012.
And he's been to the States with me a few times just to go.
Cause he wanted to see the car build.
He wanted to see the level.
And we were talking about this before.
He knew that he wanted to come and
he didn't want to just do okay.
He wanted to make sure that he came and like left something.
So he honest, you know, he did a good job on that.
But prior to that, he did go to the States
and he looked at all the cars.
And he just, you know, came up with something
where it was like, oh, if I build this,
this should be good enough to be able to, you know
get on top of it.
So he's got weird ideas all the time.
But I honestly think that he's probably,
he studies, he, you know.
Like now he knows what everybody's saying in English,
cause he studies English.
He just doesn't speak.
He doesn't speak English or Japanese.
Put it this way. (Daigo laughing)
- Right.
He studies really hard.
And I know there's certain ways of seeing things
and a lot of things, you know, happen by, you know
being lucky and whatnot.
But he's a really hard worker.
Cause like I said, I've never seen him in clean clothes
because he's always in there working on a car.
- [Larry] I know this car is special.
And that this was supposed to be a Formula DRIFT car.
- [Robbie] Obviously him and Minowa,
which is next door.
They both shipped their cars out because
they're supposed to compete right before COVID hit.
And as the cars were on the boat, went over there,
COVID started.
Brewed and they ended up not being able
to travel anyways.
So these cars left, went to the States,
sat there for a year and just came back.
- [Larry] This place is just so crazy.
There's just so much history.
All the trophies.
All the body panels from all the cars.
And also the cars themselves.
They're just, there's just all over the place.
So what are we looking at here?
- [Robbie] So From here on,
let's say it's all the TMAR cars.
TMAR is Trail Motor Apex Racing.
The new team that they came up with,
Daigo was able to link up with some of the TMR guys
who were interested in, you know,
being sponsors and supporting the sport.
And they also support other young youth in various sports,
so.
- [Larry] This is Daigo's FD Japan car.
- [Robbie] Yeah.
Like this car too.
He made two cars in three months.
And then he got podium on his first round.
- [Larry] Whoa!
What's going on here?
- [Daigo] Supra.
- [Larry] NASCAR TRE Supra.
Geez.
- [Robbie] He actually wants to do what Turk did.
Cause I was like, yeah this is
going against Turk's car.
But he's like, no, he wants to do that car.
- [Larry] This is like the Yokohama Advan storage area,
huh?
Look at this.
- [Robbie] So he's partnered with Yokohama.
Obviously.
And then he competes an FD Japan and also in D1.
So he does both series in Japan.
They support him and they actually had him build some
of these cars.
These cars he already had built.
And this one was basically,
they built it just for Yokohama, just for
demos.
- [Larry] Do you know how many cars you have?
- No, he don't know.
- Daigo collects drift cars.
Like full on drift cars, like I collect Hot Wheels.
This thing is crazy.
I've never seen this before.
Why did he build this?
- [Robbie] Just for fun.
- [Larry] I wish I could build something like this for fun.
This reminds me of his SC Formula DRIFT car, dude.
Also, I like seeing all these Formula DRIFT trophies over
here.
- [Robbie] I know.
You know, when I see that it's like, it's crazy.
Cause as a competitor, I only have two.
I have a lot of heart and I like cars, right?
But every time I come here, you just kind of lose.
You're just kind of like, man.
Like you can't top this.
Crazy things, young kids out there.
He had a dream.
Before all this, before the shop,
before his championship.
There's a small garage at his house.
And he was building cars there.
And you know, just like everybody else did.
And he kept doing it and he was just super motivated.
And he had a goal.
Before he came to FD US.
He's like, oh he wants to win the FD US Championship.
And on top of that, he was like,
I wanna build my shop.
I wanna make sure there's like a glass case where
I could sit there and look at my, you know, creations.
He actually had that in mind 15, 20 years ago,
when we were like, oh.
Like, yeah right, you know.
You never think that people are gonna come this far.
So I think that's pretty crazy.
Where he really did what he wanted to do.
And I think it was one of those goals that he had.
And I guess it is possible.
So we gotta start working harder.
- [Larry] Yeah.
(speaking Japanese)
- See, he's laughing.
He's like, yeah, right.
(dreamy music)
- [Larry] Alright.
I don't even know what to say about this.
I'm so blown away.
- [Robbie] See that's how I feel.
Every time I come by, I look at my normal house
and my normal cars.
And I just drink beer and cry myself to sleep.
(Larry laughing)
- [Larry] While the shop is crazy.
And it's, oh my God, this is insane.
How does this exist in Japan?
This is crazy.
- [Robbie] Yeah.
That's why like we were talking about earlier.
He's Japanese, he lives in Japan.
But you know, liking the V8s.
And like you said, the house kind of looks kind of foreign.
It's that mindset.
It's he's not a normal Japanese dude.
He's different.
- [Larry] I mean, I knew he was different right away.
As soon as I saw him drive.
What are we looking at here?
So are these all his personal cars?
- [Robbie] They're all his.
So, I just asked him earlier what his favorite was.
Was this one, the 458.
This was his first Ferrari.
- [Larry] That's the ultimate flex.
When you say it was my first Ferrari.
- It's so true.
So that Mark II is his old thousand kilo,
thousand horsepower car.
So the famous jump one at Ebisu is gone.
(announcers cheering)
- That was burnt in a fire.
At a shop or something.
And this is the one that he built after that.
This was back then, okay in regulations in D1.
So he built it to the extreme.
And what happened was,
after he did all this then obviously they try to
change the rules to, oh you can't do this, you can't do.
I was like, do you feel anything when you come here?
And he was like, no, I walk by it every day.
So he doesn't.
He goes in, goes upstairs.
(Daigo speaking Japanese)
- Yeah.
He said, this is all from drift money.
- [Larry] Yeah.
- So I remember when he built his first car, the SC.
He had everything the way it was.
That's why it didn't fail.
And it drove the whole season well.
And he won the championship.
Then after that, when you start to add more people.
And not saying that because of the people or anything.
It's just that when you change your ideas
and try to do new things,
that's when you start to, you see failure.
So that's probably why the few years after that
he didn't do super good either.
But he's kind of back at it again now.
And I think that's why he wants to go back
to the States again, to redeem himself.
- [Larry] Yes.
I'd like to see that too.
So, Dino.
- Yeah?
- I didn't realize you could be such a baller
from being a drifter.
- Yeah, neither did I.
Definitely in the wrong business.
- [Larry] He's obviously doing it his own way.
- [Dino] Yeah.
But nobody else in Japan has done it like this.
- [Larry] Nobody in the world has done it.
Well, okay.
I take that back.
Vaughn has something similar.
I feel like the scale,
I would say is similar.
Vaughn's with Ford Go.
And then Daigo is, you know, with Toyota.
They're both Monster drivers.
Oh, is this it?
Skid pad?
What the heck?
Wait, he just displays this for everybody to look at.
What is this?
Is this, is this?
- Is this for real, man?
- Is this heaven.
Daigo, I wasn't ready for this.
Robbie, what is this?
- Disneyland?
When he first bought this place,
he wanted something obviously just big and flat.
But then he couldn't find anything in the area.
And this was the only place that they were able to get.
And he was like, okay, well I can use it as a part of it.
That's why he painted this whole, you know
kind of the racetrack feel.
And he likes nature and animals.
A lot.
- [Larry] Right.
He's a big turtle guy.
- [Robbie] He doesn't look like it, but yeah.
- [Larry] Okay, I want to know why.
Why do you, why did you build this place?
(Daigo speaking Japanese)
- He said he wanted his own track.
- [Larry] Yeah, but what about the cave?
(speaking Japanese and laughing)
- Oh, it's a swimming pool.
Geez.
- Normal people do this.
Like let's say, oh, I open the store.
You know, I sell things here.
I do this.
And you know, you got the theme, right.
A restaurant or whatever, right.
This is just straight out, straight up hobby.
(intense rock music)
- [Larry] So, Robbie.
When we were at his house and you were saying
this is my first Ferrari.
I didn't realize it was like.
- [Robbie] Like this?
- [Larry] Like this.
(Daigo speaking Japanese)
- [Larry] Geez.
Wait a minute.
How did this Lamborghini sneak in here?
Okay, so he doesn't know how many cars he has.
But he knows the amount of Lamborghinis.
And you said about, so he doesn't actually know.
(Robbie and Daigo speaking Japanese)
- [Robbie] He said maybe, about.
- [Larry] This is what I think is amazing.
It's not just, I have a Ferrari.
Or I have a Lamborghini.
They're all hooked up in this way.
Like they all have like, have wheels.
And it's all slammed.
And you know, some of them have fenders.
And like he was saying, like the Diablo too.
It's not that he didn't want to do anything to it.
He thought that this form looked kind of good.
That's why he kind of wanted to keep it like that.
The reason why I like this is because there's no reason
for it to exist, other than to exist.
Look at this.
Got an old Ford truck here.
Pretty cool little workshop here.
For somebody who doesn't talk.
And he's super quiet.
He's just like subtle.
Everything that he creates,
everything that he builds,
his driving.
It really just says it all.
And I'm already blown away just from the shop side.
And the fact that we got to see his house.
And then Daigo's dreamland over here.
- [Robbie] I don't know.
It makes me feel good when I come here.
It's kind of cool to see that
it's not impossible to do things.
It's not for everybody.
And not everybody's gonna accomplish what they want to.
But then it's kind of nice to see that, you know
everybody has progressed in their own ways.
I mean, same as you, you know.
He is like, you started from just shooting.
And now you're Larry, the camera guy, you know?
So, I don't know.
Everybody's been through a lot.
I've probably known him since he
didn't even have a D1 license yet.
And then he was just a guy who went
to the track and we would see him.
He's always been quiet like this.
But you know that guy, that one guy
who betters everything.
And when you're like, oh, you know, I did this.
And it's like, all of a sudden it's something else.
Or it's like, oh, I bought this.
And it's like, always somewhere else.
It's that guy.
- It makes me happy because, drifting is still
a relatively new sport in the grand scheme of things, right?
You know, you look at like so many other types
of traditional racing that's been around for so many years.
Drifting is still new, very young.
And the fact that you can make a very comfortable living
from sliding around cars.
Burning tires.
- [Robbie] Yeah.
So I've never seen somebody who've only done drifting
and made it this far.
I don't think there's anybody else
in Japan that made it this far.
Maybe they did.
Maybe it's just not, we just don't know.
But you know.
- Thank you so much for showing us this place.
I'm just.
Yeah, really.
Thank you so much.
- Thank you.
- [Larry] Yeah.
I appreciate it so much.
And it's very inspiring.
- [Robbie] You think so?
- [Larry] Yeah.
- [Robbie] I come here and I just think like,
oh, I've seen it all.
I don't have to be doing anything anymore.
(celestial music)
- Thank you guys for watching my new Hagerty show.
I really wanted to feature automotive trendsetters
in our generation.
Without Pennzoil, this series wouldn't be possible.
They are enthusiast like us.
They believe in car culture.
And they want to keep it alive.
Pennzoil supports a lot of racing, drifting
and hill climb and everything in between.
They also support a lot of our friends.
On top of that, we run Pennzoil in all of our project cars.
I hope you like this content
because we have a lot coming your way.