COVERAGE> Falken Tires Sweep Formula D Florida!
For the first time Formula DRIFT history, the war was brought to the battlegrounds in Florida at the Palm Beach International Raceway (PBIR). Locals got to witness a "Battle of the Mustangs" as Justin "JTP" Pawlak took another victory this year in his Falken Tires Ford Mustang against last year's champion, Vaughn Gittin, Jr. and his Monster Energy/Falken Tires Ford Mustang. Darren McNamara (who qualified 2nd) and his Falken Tire Saturn Sky ended up in 3rd place after defeating number one qualifier Chris Forsberg and his NOS Energy Drink Nissan 370Z. Florida was very very good to Falken Tires! In fact, Florida was very good - period. Read more...
CENTER STAGE> JZX81 Toyota Cresta from Calgary
The lesser-told stories of Formula Drift involve the homegrown teams and drivers who work their way up the rankings at grassroots and ProAm events to get the opportunity to pour out their own blood, sweat (and money) to face the best professional drifters in America. They represent the spirit of the sport.
In the spirit of representing the spirit of the sport (say that three times fast!), rookie Formula D driver Alex Lee came all the way down from Calgary, Alberta, Canada to debut his Driftmania Canadian Championship (DMCC) West winning 1990 Toyota Cresta at Long Beach! And he certainly did it with a bang! Read more...
In the spirit of representing the spirit of the sport (say that three times fast!), rookie Formula D driver Alex Lee came all the way down from Calgary, Alberta, Canada to debut his Driftmania Canadian Championship (DMCC) West winning 1990 Toyota Cresta at Long Beach! And he certainly did it with a bang! Read more...
COVERAGE> The Formula D Atlanta Experience Pt. 2
Keeping our coverage of Round 2 of Formula Drift at Road Atlanta coming, we bring you more photos of the Pro Am rounds as well as the main event. Road Atlanta is a unique venue in that it is a world class road course that sees everything from the likes of Le Mans prototype cars to your neighbor who enjoys exercising his right foot every now and again. The Formula Drift weekend is no different - you get a mix of high-dollar, corporate-backed monster machines competing door to door with a backyard creation that you saw built from the ground up on your local forum. Read more...
COVERAGE> The Formula D Atlanta Experience Pt.1
For the MotorMavens Crew, Round Two of the 2011 Formula Drift Championship at Road Atlanta represented a lot of hard work, and about 6 or 7 total hours of sleep for the entire weekend. Since our Associate Editor Jonathan "J-Mac" McWhorter lives in the Atlanta area, he volunteered to be the team leader for the weekend, and coordinated everything for the out-of-state crew members that would be flying in for the event.
Some people may not realize this, but Road Atlanta is a very special place for the MotorMavens Crew. Anyone who knows MotorMavens co-founder Andy Sapp can tell you that he has a very fond place in his heart for Road Atlanta. Even though Andy coined the now famous phrase Keep Drifting Fun, he has been drifting competitively at Formula D events in Atlanta ever since 2004 - the very first event in the Formula Drift series. Ever.
Read more...
Some people may not realize this, but Road Atlanta is a very special place for the MotorMavens Crew. Anyone who knows MotorMavens co-founder Andy Sapp can tell you that he has a very fond place in his heart for Road Atlanta. Even though Andy coined the now famous phrase Keep Drifting Fun, he has been drifting competitively at Formula D events in Atlanta ever since 2004 - the very first event in the Formula Drift series. Ever.
Read more...
COVERAGE> Live From Formula D Atlanta Day 2
I'm back in the media tower at Road Atlanta and clicking away at my keyboard while open practice adds clouds to the cloudless sky over the track. I swear, it was clear and blue before the drifting started, now we've got puffy white clouds everywhere. Coincidence? Probably. Our sharpshooters Yoshi Shindo and Oliver Petalver are still on track right now and I'm going to give you a mix of what they've gotten so far today as well as some more shots from yesterday's practice. Read more...
GALLERY> Scenes from the Long Beach Grand Prix
This past weekend, the Toyota Grand Prix took over the streets of Long Beach, CA. This annual three-day festival of speed consisted of the Izod IndyCar Series, the American Le Mans Series, Firestone Indy Lights, Toyota Pro Celebrity Race, SCCA Pro World Challenge Championship, and a team tandem competition from Formula Drift. We don't normally cover open wheel racing on Motor Mavens, but since we were all in Long Beach two weeks ago for Round 1 of the Formula Drift series, we thought it would be pretty interesting to experience the annual Long Beach Grand Prix to show a little bit of contrast on the site.
Britain's Mike Conway (above) emerged as the winner of the IZOD IndyCar race. Last year, Conway fractured a vertebrae and broke his leg during the Indianapolis 500. An injury like that would spell the end of a racing career for some people, but Conway was able to overcome that incredible setback and take his first IndyCar win at Long Beach. What a way to make a comeback! Read more...
COVERAGE> Formula D Long Beach Experience Pt.2
Okay... you've waited long enough! I've been sick the past few days so it's been rough, but I've finally managed to go through thousands of photos that we shot at Formula Drift's 2011 season opener on the Streets of Long Beach. I know everyone wants to see the photos, so without further delay, let's begin! Through the lenses of the MotorMavens sharpshooters, this is the Formula Drift Long Beach experience, Part Two! Read more...
COVERAGE> Formula D Long Beach Experience Pt.1
Right now, I'm updating the website live from the Formula D Long Beach media center (aka: the parking garage on Linden Ave), and all the drivers are practicing, so the sounds of screeching tires and thundering V8 motors are loudly echoing off the concrete walls all around me.
If you live in Southern California, you need to drop everything you're doing and head down to Long Beach RIGHT NOW. The line at the gate is already huge, and everyone is amped up from all the excitement (or it could be from all the energy drink sponsors giving out free drinks at the track). This is what Formula Drift is all about! Let's go through some of the photos that the MotorMavens Crew has collected from Long Beach thus far! Read more...
If you live in Southern California, you need to drop everything you're doing and head down to Long Beach RIGHT NOW. The line at the gate is already huge, and everyone is amped up from all the excitement (or it could be from all the energy drink sponsors giving out free drinks at the track). This is what Formula Drift is all about! Let's go through some of the photos that the MotorMavens Crew has collected from Long Beach thus far! Read more...
COVERAGE> Grassroots Drifting at XDC Irwindale
Round 1 of the 2011 Xtreme Drift Circuit (XDC) season was held at the ever-popular Toyota Speedway at Irwindale, CA aka the "House of Drift." In addition to the drift competition, there was the REMIX Car Show, Cycle Path Bike Show, and the always popular model lounge. Drivers from all over made the journey to duke it out with a number of exciting "One More Time" battles during the last rounds of competition. Read more...
CENTER STAGE> Audi A8 That Belly Scrapes
It’s been quite a while since the last time we featured a ride from the guys over at Rotiform… Well, you’re in luck! I was able to get the full scoop on Jason Whipple's 2000 Audi A8 and, while it's an over-sized, VIP-style automobile, it nonetheless exudes the luxury and class of the $100,000 price tag of its time. A certain song comes to mind when looking at this ride - it almost emanates a certain Oh You Fancy, Huh? attitude…
I was able to steal Jason away on an uneventful Saturday morning to do the shoot, which took place in Southern California. On the way to our location, MotorMavens Crew photographer Oliver Petalver opted to take full advantage of the scenery by hanging from the window to take some dope rolling shots. They turned out pretty awesome, don’t you think?
Funny thing, though - while photo pro Oliver was hanging out the window of our chase car, Jason aired the car out to get that menacing, low effect... and Jason’s face immediately went from smiling for the camera to a certain heightened awareness of the road surface. The A8 was literally scraping on every little dip, pothole, reflector, manhole cover - I mean EVERYTHING. It was quite a sight to behold because the car was sparking, rubbing and making wonderful sounds as it scraped along the Pacific Coast Highway while onlookers gawked and stared. Members of the "functional" crowd may insert your favorite "hella" joke here. Read more...
I was able to steal Jason away on an uneventful Saturday morning to do the shoot, which took place in Southern California. On the way to our location, MotorMavens Crew photographer Oliver Petalver opted to take full advantage of the scenery by hanging from the window to take some dope rolling shots. They turned out pretty awesome, don’t you think?
Funny thing, though - while photo pro Oliver was hanging out the window of our chase car, Jason aired the car out to get that menacing, low effect... and Jason’s face immediately went from smiling for the camera to a certain heightened awareness of the road surface. The A8 was literally scraping on every little dip, pothole, reflector, manhole cover - I mean EVERYTHING. It was quite a sight to behold because the car was sparking, rubbing and making wonderful sounds as it scraped along the Pacific Coast Highway while onlookers gawked and stared. Members of the "functional" crowd may insert your favorite "hella" joke here. Read more...
GALLERY> Ken Block Gymkhana Grid Invitational
Here are some more much overdue photos from Ken Block’s Gymkhana Grid Invitational. At first, “gymkhana” may sound like a martial arts discipline (to those unfamiliar with the automotive version) but it's actually a starting line and a finish line joined together by all sorts of interesting obstacles such as cones, tires, and barrels which, when arranged just so, require a driver to perform all sorts of interesting maneuvers such as reversals, 180 and 360 degree spins, and figure 8s - all while racing against the clock. The reason I stressed that this is the automotive version is because, you may be interested to know, there is an equestrian version as well. As you can imagine, there's a lot less smoke - unless they figured out how to get a horse to do a burnout when I wasn't looking. Read more...
PERSPECTIVE> Formula Drift Irwindale 2010 Finale
This past weekend, the Formula Drift Season Finale at Irwindale Speedway went by quicker than I could ever have planned. Whether it was the severe lack of sleep, being on the move at all times, nonstop action, or the three hour time difference, I wouldn’t have changed a thing. It all started at 5am EST in Atlanta when I woke up to head to the airport in hopes that I could catch a flight to LA.
Flying standby, which may be cheap, is very risky and can be stressful when flights that were empty the night before, are full in the morning. Luckily, only the first flight out of Atlanta that morning was full and I could hop on the second flight to John Wayne at Santa Ana. If time had not been an issue, I could have arrived much later and taken an easier flight, but since I had to be there by 1:30pm PST to make it to the (all-caps) MANDATORY media meeting, I was starting to stress when I noticed the flights starting to fill up. I’m no stranger to the pre-Formula D stress syndrome though. I almost didn’t make it to this point after all.
Media passes are a hot commodity, and the MotorMavens Crew rolls pretty deep, so actually getting a pass to cover the event for the site was an episode in itself. Even though we're an official Formula D Media Partner, and we have a legitimate high traffic automotive site, Formula D's PR agency didn't want to approve all our media pass requests. I didn't really understand the thinking behind that, but I suppose we did have a lot of photo and video shooters asking for passes!
This being the last round of the year for Formula D, and me traveling all the way out to Irwindale CA from Atlanta GA, I had to do it big. I always like to say ‘go big or go home.’ It’s corny but it’s a great way of seeing things - try it and see where it gets you. Read more...
Flying standby, which may be cheap, is very risky and can be stressful when flights that were empty the night before, are full in the morning. Luckily, only the first flight out of Atlanta that morning was full and I could hop on the second flight to John Wayne at Santa Ana. If time had not been an issue, I could have arrived much later and taken an easier flight, but since I had to be there by 1:30pm PST to make it to the (all-caps) MANDATORY media meeting, I was starting to stress when I noticed the flights starting to fill up. I’m no stranger to the pre-Formula D stress syndrome though. I almost didn’t make it to this point after all.
Media passes are a hot commodity, and the MotorMavens Crew rolls pretty deep, so actually getting a pass to cover the event for the site was an episode in itself. Even though we're an official Formula D Media Partner, and we have a legitimate high traffic automotive site, Formula D's PR agency didn't want to approve all our media pass requests. I didn't really understand the thinking behind that, but I suppose we did have a lot of photo and video shooters asking for passes!
This being the last round of the year for Formula D, and me traveling all the way out to Irwindale CA from Atlanta GA, I had to do it big. I always like to say ‘go big or go home.’ It’s corny but it’s a great way of seeing things - try it and see where it gets you. Read more...
