Drift Day

Motivation, sometimes, is a hard sought commodity, something that can elude even the most intelligent or wealthy of people.

I was initially quite skeptical when Mick first hit me with this idea. A drift day, organised by ourselves.... 'If you want to organise it, you can put it under the name but its all on you' was my immediate reaction. These things don't tend to always pan out.

Let me first explain my negativity. Organising events such as this are notoriously awkward, first you gather the drivers, then you confirm and book the track and then start looking for money. Anyone familiar with this system knows that any of those variables could inevitably scupper your plans.

Alas, Mick took on the challenge and a couple of days later a group was put together of potential partakers with the majority of the drivers getting their names down quickly.

The track was booked and fast forward six weeks and preparations are in full swing. Unfortunately, I am still 5-6 months out from putting my finishing touches to the 180sx (More on that soon!) so I could not partake however, we needed a photographer for the day and that responsibly was to fall to me anyway!

The week running up to the trackday was hectic, most notably from my perspective with Keith (@Diffwrecker) and Jamie's (@Justaroo) cars as they put the finishing touches together. This culminated in Keith realising his clutch needed to be changed, three days prior to the event! Some overnight parts from Flo's and we managed to change the faulty item the very next day.

The Morning Of

We hit the road early as Keith was towing his AE86 and I was towing Jamies R32 to the track.

We were on route to meet Darren (@Dc_Skidz) and his JZX81 Cresta in Clonmel when an emergency delayed our trip and we were forced to wait in a service station for an hour!

Fortunately, we still made it on time to unload the cars and attend a casual drivers briefing before the action started.

It was lunch before I started to take in what was going on around me and by that time some cool cars had arrived to hang out for a few hours

Andrews AE111, Cillians KE70 and both Patrick and Deckys 86s were just a few of the quality cars lurking in the paddock.

The format changed after lunch with two cars and four laps of the track being permitted and the driving from everybody began to improve as everybody started to find their groove.

Eddie bet the shit out his Ex-DMAX demo car all day. Unfortunately, no photos of him with full aero as he lost the majority of it on lap one!

Darren started to get the hang of things too.

Kevins SR20 powered 86 was pushed hard all day and just kept going. I love this car, it embodies all things cool

Josh told me this was his first time drifting and he seemed to get the hang of it quick. This Type-X 180sx has an Autech built SR20DE and it was cool to see it being put to the correct use

Mikeys been a buddy of mine for a couple years now and I've yet to meet someone with a cooler car & tow rig combo. Toyota 040 all round right?! He also runs this super sick blog where he documents his corolla adventures. Definitely recommend giving that a read here

Mick, whilst busy organising the day managed to get plenty of laps in too and if he ever sends me on the GoPro footage hes been talking about then I'm sure it would make for some cool videos

Notable mentions go to James (@Lango866) and Martin (@Martin_murrs_) for making the long haul in their 86s from the Galway area to drive for the day. A true testament to the confidence they have in their Corollas. Add a dash of stupidity for good measure I reckon!

You should be seeing more of James' car this year as I think I've talked him into doing some work on my S13 when the time is right!

We've had plenty of messages asking will this event run again as we kept it pretty quiet so as not to attract too much attention but I am hoping to do something similar towards the end of the year!

Stay tuned!