Wow, it has been a minute since my last post, and by a minute I mean months. I definitely need to dedicate myself to keeping the blog updated as it still gets a surprising amount of views. In that spirit, I’ll kick things off with something a bit different… the Riverside Drift $50K Summer Shootout.

Held at Salem Speedway in Salem, Indiana by Riverside Drift (in conjunction with Link ECU) it may have been the biggest cash payout for a drift event in US history. Riverside invited me to be the style judge for the competition so I got a behind the scenes look at everything that goes into an event of this magnitude.

The event itself was billed as a “Pros vs Joes” shootout as Formula D drivers like Travis Reeder and Rad Dan were pitted against amateur drivers and Youtubers like Taylor Ray and Jimmy Oaks. It also brought Dave Egan and Josh from Drift Game out from Ireland. Besides judging my main interest was seeing friends like Mike Fieock and Christopher Johnson (CMJ) drive.

CMJ is part of a team based out of Indianapolis called OneLife and is who I ask all my stupid wiring questions as he’s a electrical guru and Link ECU dealer and tuner. His personal E46 is one of the few I like. It’s an interesting combination of street and pro car. It has been swapped to a JZX100 1JZGTE and runs a full PDM/Link setup and has a full interior. You can expect a full feature on this car soon.

I have to say it was pretty surreal to see Dave and Josh filming as Drift Games has been one of my favorite Youtube channels for a while. In addition to covering the event, Dave was competing as well. Ryan Meyer, who runs Riverside Drift, bought the Mustang in the picture above for him to drive. CMJ and the guys from OneLife were given 45 days to turn it into a competition ready car for Dave, which the somehow managed to pull off.

It wouldn’t be a stretch to declare Mike Fieock to be one of the best driver’s in the country not currently competing in Formula D. I say currently, because he used to drive in FD in their early days. He’s also one of the few people still flying the rotary banner. He brought out his practice car, an absolute rocket ship of an FC with a 13BRE Cosmo 2-rotor under the hood. Although he made it into the Top 16, boost-cut issues and a suspension failure ended what could have been a legit run into the finals.

I couldn’t resist the opportunity to bring my son along for the weekend. He’s now 14 years old and always has fun at drift events. This was actually his first drift event not at USAIR. I’ve made it a point to not push my interests on him with a heavy-hand. I just make sure he gets to experience them and if he decides he wants to drift, that’s great. If not, no big deal. He had a blast, and I can’t say I wasn’t excited to hear him talk about wanting a pit bike and wanting to drift afterwards…

There were plenty of “pro” cars there, but I wasn’t particularly interested in them. While I appreciate the effort and engineering involved, street cars that drift is where my interest lies. Like CMJ’s E46, youtuber Jimmy Oakes’ S13 was a great example. Low, big wheels, full interior, full-aero and a 1JZGTE under the hood. A big thumbs up from me. It turns out this was his first big competition and I think he exceeded everyone’s expectations and managed to qualify and would have made it into Top 32 if it wasn’t for a transmission failure.

Another car I was interested in seeing was Taylor Ray’s V8 Miata. He built the entire car himself including all the fabrication, wiring, etc.. It’s even dry-sumped. Chatting with him I was surprised to find out that it weighs 2,900 pounds. Much heavier than I expected. He ended up making it into Top 16, but got lined up against Travis Reeder in his Formula-D BMW. Although, Ray drove pretty flawlessly, Reeder’s car was just too fast to deal with.

One of the few pro cars I spent time checking out was Rad Dan’s JZA80. I was thoroughly impressed with not only the level engineering involved, but the attention to aesthetics. It’s not just a bunch of expensive parts throw together. It’s a work of damn art.

There was a small car show at the event and one of the nicer cars there was this ER34 sedan owned by Jake Vanderbilt. He was also competing in a 350Z.

All-in-all it was an interesting weekend. I spent a good chunk of it in the judging booth with Jeff Jones and Dave Egan, and I have to admit, it was an exciting competition and exceeded my expectations. The vibes were positive and everyone (from Pro to Joe) seemed to be having a great time.

I know this post doesn’t have a ton of detail, but I just wanted to use it to get back on the wagon. You can expect posts to come at a more regular interval in the future.