27 August 2006

Sliding tofu sellers...

In an rather refreshing turn of events, I ended up at a race track last night, watching some people whose cars seemed to be facing the wrong direction whenever they entered a corner:

"Look! It's that guy from Initial D!!!"


The starting grid. It's a grid. Cars start on it. Yes, they do.


Yup, it was a drifting event. Organised by Angle D5, it's a Saturday night event held at the PLUS speedway near the USJ toll plaza. We discovered it by accident, though - it was near Warren's house and we can hear the noise at the track from there. So, we decided to have a look.

That's me


Some old Toyota hatchback with a helluva good drifter behind the wheel...


What struck me about the event was the variety in the types of cars used - there were both brand new cars as well as crummy old 1970s Japanese sedans (and most of the better drifters seem to prefer the latter). The audience was pretty diverse too, with Malays, Chinese and Indians freely mixing together, both youngsters and even entire families with baby prams and stuff...

A Skyline R33 - presumably, the owner is affluent enough to risk pranging it.


"Oi! Why got traffic jam???"


An old-ish Skyline R32. Looks completely shagged


We spent about 2 hours looking at these cars go round and round the track, laying about a few tonnes of rubber into it. It seemed fairly well-organised too - with bilingual deejays, track marshalls, ambulances on standby and pretty girls with ultra-tight tops prancing around the main entrance.

Of course, after you pay the RM5 entrance fee, you'll walk in only to find that there aren't anymore big-breasted women inside (apart from some visitors, of course). Darn.

A Nissan Skyline R32 and a Nissan 180SX - crummy old cars, but excellent for drifting!


A participant from Singapore. Can't wait to see his tow-truck bill...


And there you have it. Apparently, they've got another event on Merdeka eve, which - coincidentally - is exactly a year since I've started blogging. I think I'll be there... ^_^

5 comments:

tihtahpah said...

hahaha,.,,I love blogger takes on Malaysian vices :) thumbs up!

Chris Chong said...

But... but... it's perfectly LEGAL.

Anonymous said...

Yup this is legal. That is exactly what the sport doesn't need - a stereotypical view that street motorsports like these are "illegal".

Read between the lines - track marshalls, ambulance on standby. This is the right direction to promote a sport that your average M'sian can actually participate in (with some effort of course).

The Wanderer said...

ah sze, it's a legal event lah. and what are you doing so far out of your bridge, you troll? ;)

but max, not everybody can get into this sport easily. it is pretty expensive, what with mods, tyres, towing, entry fees and the such to consider. even if i could afford an old AE86, i'd still be broke after doing it up.

Anonymous said...

I believe drifting can be a lot cheaper than would appear, starting right at the bottom and working up from there. *Competitive* drifting is different, however if you find yourself to be a natural wheelman set on a career in motorsport, there may be possibilities for sponsorship coupled with some resourcefulness.

I can appreciate that those fantastic cars in pics and movies do require a deep wallet. We should try not to let that detract us from the whole drifting experience. After all, those cars are advertising tools, campaigning to convince people like us that we *need* to spend more on our cars.