If you’re not familiar with the term, a soukoukai ( 走行会) is a practice meeting. Shops and teams will host these practicing meetings throughout the year, and invite their customers or friends. A circuit is rented for the day so drivers have plenty of track time, and sometimes they end in a small competition.

Unless things have changed, it typically runs 100,000 ~ 150,000 yen to rent out a smaller circuit for the day. If I recall correctly, Bihoku Highland Circuit ran 150,000 yen for B-Course. Smaller shops and teams usually recoup the rental fee with a registration fee for drivers. I’d say 10,000 yen was the average cost.

This one was hosted by a team called Shadow Skill at Bihoku in 2007. I don’t really know much about the team. They definitely weren’t a big name and there were far fewer drivers participating in this practice meeting than you typically see. There were some cool cars in attendance though!

An AE86 revival needs to happen. I miss seeing, and hearing, these cars at events. The first time I experienced drifting was in 1996 at a touge called Matsuo in Yamaguchi-prefecture. It was raining and two Hachi’s were screaming their way up and down the tight course late into the night.

Quite a nice JZX90 Cresta from Deafen Racing, another team I’d never heard of. JZX90 Crestas were never very popular. Everyone preferred the Mark-II out of the three JZX90 models.

This AE86 Trueno from Slick out of Hiroshima has to be one of the cleanest I’ve ever seen. I absolutely love Buddy Club P1s on these cars.

I didn’t realize just how much work had been put into it until I looked inside. The whole chassis had been stripped and painted. The interior panels were mint. The power windows and locks worked as well. I didn’t get a shot of it, but there was a high-comp 4AGE under the hood.

Sitting right next to the AE86 was this impossibly cool KE70 4-door. Also from Hiroshima, it had an NA-WORKS sticker on the front lip…

I assume NA-WORKS did the 20 valve swap and 4-throttle setup. Of course it sounded amazing.

A pretty typical 180SX. I did notice it was running an S14 motor. Is that a G-Corporation wing?

S15 with Vertex aero and S14 with factory aero and big tire stretch. S15s start becoming legal for import into the US 2024. That’s only 4 years away folks. Get ready for some price inflation.

This HCR32 has seen plenty of track time. The RB20 is such an underrated motor. I’ve seen people beat the living shit out of them and they just kept on going. Gotta keep them under 350hp though!

I have so many pictures of Crazy Night Takeshi’s C35, but he NEVER has the front or rear bumpers on. I mean NEEEEEEEEVVVVVVVVEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRRR.

Takeshi is a V-Factory driver so of course, the engine bay has to look good. I dug how the bay paint has a ton of flake, but the exterior doesn’t.

Kawakami (owner of NK Company) had his nutso S14 Silvia on hand. Yes, those are LCD monitors mounted in the engine room. He drove this thing like a mad man in D1SL and MSC. Click here for a feature I did a while back.

DM Racing Laurel on Buddy Club P1s and R33 wheels. Seriously, if you want some cheap, cool wheels look for P1s on Yahoo Auctions.

The Slick AE86 from the front. This was taken near the front of the staging line where everyone waits before making their way out onto B-Course.

More cars staging to go out on the track. You can see part of the NA-WORKS Levin on the left. I wish I would have taken more pictures of it at this event.

Another shot of the orange RYO sponsored Silvia. It isn’t hard to make an S14 look good.

Crazy Night Fukuda’s S14. Hands-down one of my favorite drift cars of all time. It’s the perfect street drifter. Click here for a full feature.

I’ll wrap this post up with a common site from Bihoku, a totalled car being taken off track by a carrier. He was leading Fukuda into the first corner and went off track and rolled up the wall.