Join host Charity Hodges and the Nopi Tunervision crew as they cover the Batlground Drift Demos at the 2006 Nopi Nationals Motorsports Supershow! See Daniel Willie, Tracy Shayhorn, Erin Sanford, and Andy Sapp ignite drifting mayhem for the 100,000 screaming fans at Atlanta Motor Speedway in Hampton, Georgia.
(photo c/o Antonio Alvendia’s blog)
We had an excellent week out at the SEMA Show in Las Vegas! Joey Redmond and I were out to promote the Slide America project.
I was also teamed up with Batlground to talk with companies about some amazing marketing opportunities we have in the works for the 2007 season. We met a lot of new people, and ran into a lot of old friends. All in all, a very successful week!
In preparation for SEMA, we released the Slide America Teaser today! Be warned, it is definitely a teaser! Joey Redmond and I will have full press-kits with the teaser available on DVD at SEMA next week, so keep an eye out for us!
Simply an amazing weekend. The 2006 Nopi Nationals drift demos were an enormous hit! With over 100,000 people in attendance, this was by far the largest show we have done to date. Words can’t really describe how amazing things went.
HUGE HUGE thanks to Kieran from Gran Turismo East for such amazing support over the weekend! The BFGoodrich G-Force Sport tires performed absolutely flawlessly. I couldn’t have driven past the limit without them, or their support!
.
.
.
.
.
Preliminary shooting of Slide America is officially complete. The past 30 days traveling the nation was BEYOND INSANE. Over 16,000 miles exposing the very core of North American drifting. I feel so lucky to have experienced American drifting the way we did. Everyone was so receptive to what we were trying to accomplish. It was simply amazing. Now that we’re back, I have over 120 hours of footage to log and capture… then the editing process begins. Wish me luck.
Atco Raceway was subject to another crazy Batlground drift demo at the 6th round of the Nopi/NDRA Xbox Cup Racing Series! The police wouldn’t let the crowd anywhere near the drifting, and also stepped in to restrict our show with HEAVY limitation. We weren’t allowed to really do burnouts, get near walls, and were prohibited from doing rodeos. In fact… we were barely allowed to tandem. It was weird, considering it was private property, and everything was heavily insured. I felt like we weren’t able to put on the kind of show that I know we can. Despite the interference, I suppose it was still a good demo… I just know it could have been better.
.
.
We landed some great coverage on Speed TV’s Nopi Tunervision. The coverage highlights some of the madness from our drift demos over the course of the weekend.
Joey Redmond and I set forth today on our 19 city/30 day tour of America for preliminary shooting of Slide America. The project’s focus is to document drifting in America on a grassroots level. This project will expose the very core of American drifting.
For more information check out the website:
www.slideamerica.us
or on MySpace:
myspace.com/slideamerica
The third round of Drift Fury was insane! Atlanta’s Illest took two podium finishes, with Jonathan “Marty” Martin finishing in first! The points race for the series is INCREDIBLY close, with a two-point spread between Marty and myself for the championship!
.
.
Speed TV’s Nopi Tunervision host Charity Hodges interviews me at NDRA Valdosta about my li’l e46.
Competition was fierce at Turner Field for round 2 of Drift Fury! When the dust settled, I was left standing atop the podium! It was a DriftMechaniks 1-2-3, as we swept the podium! Erin Sanford took 2nd place, Jonathan Martin took 3rd, and Sammy from Tiger Racing took 4th!
.
.
A short video off the Drift Fury website:
The drift demo at the 5th round of the Nopi/NDRA Xbox Cup Racing Series was insane! The E46 sustained some damage to the passenger-side rear quarter panel. I guess sometimes the walls kiss back! Luckily, the damage is only cosmetic, and should be fixed in no time! The fans up in Rockingham were really great. I met some awesome people over the course of the weekend. We did more shooting for Speed TV, so I can’t wait to see how that turns out!
Special thanks to Ashley Hawks for the great photos!
Demos > Competition.
Gateway International Raceway, just outside of St. Louis was subject to two days of unabridged MAYHEM, as we unleashed an onslaught of drifting insanity for the 4th round of the Nopi/NDRA Xbox Cup Racing Series.
This was our second NDRA drift demo. The first demo we did in Valdosta for round 2, was a blast… but we were still figuring things out as we went. This demo in St. Louis came together like VOLTRON. Things developed into more of a “show”, and the crowd went nuts. There were SO many people there. I don’t know where they all came from… but as soon as it was demo time, people were running to get a spot on the wall. The 6pm demo on Saturday was INSANE. There wasn’t an open space to stand around the entire demo area. People were sitting on people’s shoulders to get a glimpse. It was simply amazing. Beyond amazing, it was inspiring. The crowd was so into it, and we fed off that energy to create a show that might be difficult to top.
I learned where the opposing corner of the car was to my position in the driver seat during the demos. I knew the proximity of where contact would occur… but that’s one of those things you can’t truly learn until contact is made. Feeding off the energy of the crowd, I was able to “kiss” the wall at speed, and not sacrifice my line, speed, or angle. It was nuts. I started out with small low-speed… brake-stand style taps… and by the end of the weekend, was grazing the wall at speed. I managed to take a cone out that was a cigarette pack away from the wall’s edge. It was anarchy. Pure anarchy.
Drifting was a new thing to a lot of people at the event. Countless people said “I didn’t even know what drifting was until today… you made a fan out me – this is awesome!”. I few people said “I thought drifting was stupid until today… you guys changed my mind”. Hearing things like that means the world to me. You can’t put a pricetag on things like that. It validates that all the blood, sweat, and tears we put into all of this actually means something. It means EVERYTHING to me… but when it means something to other people as a result… it makes you feel like things are moving in the right direction. I would rather see drifting make it’s mark on the world, than see myself make a mark on drifting.
A short clip, shot by Tri Tri-Rudolph, from my qualifying run where I flipped the clipping point.
