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There is no event on this earth that can compare to the pure insanity that happens at a Drift Matsuri, the countless crashes and cars rolling around on their roofs, the people you meet and friends you make all come together to make one event you will never forget.

Loading the cars on to Hoshino’s truck, his personal touge car and my borrowed naturally aspirated S14.

Community, what does this word mean?

Community : a group of interacting organisms sharing an environment. In human communities, intent, belief, resources, preferences, needs, risks, and a number of other conditions may be present and common.

Lets take intent, not one person that comes to Matsuri is here to prove him or herself their sole intent is for fun with friends and the drift community. Now lets take resources, use what is around you, your vehicle or your friends vehicle, your tools, sharing your tools, exchanging tires or parts for those in need, together as a community we use each others resources and the ones around us to make this weekend possible. And finally lets take risks, within the first half an hour I seen two cars flip on their roofs, I found myself running out each time with a crowd of drifters as we roll the cars back on their roofs and make sure all the people inside are not injured, as a community we help each other. You find yourself mixing with people you don’t know, drifting side by side with others, helping anyone that’s in need anyway you can because your part of same community that make this event so special.

 The start of the 3 our journy to Fukushima where Ebisu Circuit is located.

Another cheap naturally aspirated S14.

The drift matsuri allows you to enjoy and see what drifting really is. Never have you realized how much drifting is based on a communities movement and working together as a single unit. It also allow you to mix with many of Japans most famous drift personalities that are all here to just relax and have a good time. It gives you a chance to meet your hero’s in a sociable non stress environment where they are willing to talk with you and just kick back. At night everyone gets together around a huge bon fire where huge amounts of fresh meat are cooked on big rotisseries another chance to make more friends and talk about the crazy days happenings. But after that its time for bed, time for drinking, or in our case it was time to hit the track again until the sunrised.

Life may be hard, the daily grind may bring you down but these 3 events over 6 days each year will reassure you of why you love drifting. Weather it be in your personal car or a cheap go-man ($500 US) naturally aspirated thrasher car this event promises to deliver memories and friends that will last a life time. People ask me why it is I throw countless amounts of cash at this sport and my car, I just mention the same things I have talked about here with you and they soon realize drifting isn’t just about cars but about the community and the passion we all share.

Drifting is community.
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Video and more photos below.

Quick stop off at garage K-style to talk with the boys from Team Orange.

The entrance to Ebisu Circuit / Safari Park.

All the cars unloaded and ready to start.

First 30 minutes of arriving at Ebisu and this 180sx flipped on its roof at north course. We rolled it back over checked everyone was ok and then they carried on drifting all weekend!

Those tire tracks seem to lead into the wall, hmmm…..

That because this fine example of a 180sx just had a little mishap, the wall won.

Myself on the left and my best mate Aaron as we stand star struck with Kazama.

A short video of me drifting the NA S14 on north course, the crowd was loving it with my NA S14 nose to tail with the turbo cars.

This AE86 also had a run in with the wall, featured in my video below but when it was a little straighter.
No problem a couple hours later this thing was back out drifting with the help of his friends.

Koro from Team Geki waiting at the entrance to one of the most infamous courses in Japan.

Another one bites the dust!

This JZX90 was sitting at a local highway stop point on the way home, nice and clean but was having engine troubles.

The Ebisu Matsuri Video, hope you enjoy
Featured in this video is Daigo Saito, world number 1 drifter in his blue JZX90 thrasher car powered by  a T67 pushing out over 500HP along with a whole lot more action.

To view in HD quality please follow this link below.
http://www.vimeo.com/4029026

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Past couple of months I have seen quite a few cars roll in and roll out oh Hoshino’s workshop, here are 2 of the boys car from Team Geki (Geki Kassou Dan). They were running close tandems at Nikko when another car spun infront of Koro’s S14.5 and well his car along with Pant’s car could not pull up in time and contact was made, quite a bad crash damage wise.

Excuse the mobile phone pictures, sorry!

Koro’s S14.5 after the Nikko crash with fellow team mate Pants.

Koro’s s14.5 before the crash.

Pant’s S14 after the Nikko crash.

 What else can I say but drift happens.

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Broken S14 at Kiryu touge.

The main aspect of the touge which I enjoy is the fact that everyone is out there for one purpose and that’s fun. There are no real attuides or classes just everyone drifting together and having a good time. If by some stroke of bad luck you do crash your car no problem, everyone will come running in to help, offering advice, tools and phone numbers to contact local tow trucks if you cant manage to limp your ride home.

A cats eye managed to wreck a rear suspension arm and wheel, they are serious business. The s14 seen here sitting on a space saver until parts arrived an hour later. After the S14 was fixed she was ready for some 4th gear touge.

Touge is where many people come to learn how to drift, a very dangerous way to start learning which often ends up in bent panels and tears. Akagi is infamous for the huge amount of learner drivers that race up and down the mountains every weekend. Because of the high volume of beginner drifters / grip racers this means far more crashes, more police activity and more cats eyes. This lower speed touge is busy every weekend with out fail but the price you pay is being surrounded by extremely slow and dangerous drivers spinning off course and into your path 70% of the time. On rare occasions you will find some higher level drifters running the mountains, but like I said that’s on rare occasions.

Hoshinos old 180sx pictured below as he leads the car in into the darkness. I have never witnessed larger braking entries on the touge then with this man behind the wheel, he simply laughs and talks like the touge requires no attention, his driving is amazing!

Head about 1 hour in the other direction and you will find yourself in the mountainous area of Kiryu. The main touge around Kiryu is where you come to drive after you have had several track days or you know the limits of your driving skill and your car. This higher speed touge will see speeds of up to 150kph and more and you will find yourself working through the gears from 4th gear all the way down to 2nd gear. Most of the drivers that come here know the course like the back of their hand and will be seen doing 4th and 3rd gear entries with their front and back wheels locked up heading into the main corner, a far cry from the 2nd gear handbrake entries that Akagi mountain offers. Many local D1 drivers can be found here drifting with friends away from the high stress D1 scene.

The touge fast or slow demands a lot of respect, any error of judgment or laziness will cost you a large amount of money. Some higher level drivers I know find the touge of no interest due to the higher risks or the much lower driving speeds then on offer by their local circuits. I suppose once your use to drifting at the top of 4th gear at around 190 clicks the lower speed touge does not really cut the mustard. But many people still come to the touge to socialize and have fun and it will still this way for many years to come, you wont find drifting anywhere else that’s cheaper then a tank of gas and some spare tires.

Akagi claims some Aussie victims, pictured below myself and some of my mates from Australia on a 3 month sponge of your mates drift holiday. A little too fast going down hill ended up with some damage, tried it again and repeated the same damge but on the right hand side haha, the touge is all laughs when your in a cheap junker S14.

Below is the touge video, nothing special just a quick slice and dice with the old equipment i had available to me at the time. This year i will be heading out more with a better video camera in hand to hopefully get some higher quality footage for everyone.

The first half of this video is in-car footage at Akagi with our mate whos a D1 driver also in Team Geki driving his wifes very stock S14 running .7 bar boost with just coilovers, diff and an exhaust. It really needed more power for the up hill, the blue 180sx had close to the double the power over the S14. The rest of the video is around Kiryu area with some Team Geki guys and other randoms.

At around 1:05 of the video you will notice an overtake attempt and a very close guard rail encounter!

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