Last week, I was invited by Phillip to come along to Buttonwillow to attend a Team Drift Competition by Fatlace held on Sunday. With no plans made I said to myself, "sure, why the hell not. At least it'll keep me away from drinking alcohol Sat night." Boy was I glad I went. I was able to meet a Pro Drifter, Calvin Wan, and was even able to do a ride along. Holy Cows, what a ride, and super cool, down to earth dude. I really had no clue what the day had in stored but in the end, I was pretty darn happy: First drift event and first drift ride along experience with a Pro Drifter. WOW!
What made it all crazy was, I haven't been at a race event in years. Yet alone, a pure drift event in which I've never attended. My experience in Calvin's FD Ride may have awaken the Sleeping Racing Dragon in me. For those of you who don't know, I use to own a '72 Corolla, known in the race world as the Mango. It had 44 Dual side draft Mikuni's (then down graded to 40's for efficiency)and the engine was rebuit with a Japanese motor modified with a dual over head cam - 3TG. Half dome pistons for better compression and the block ported by hand. The paint was original with no rust - color: Mango. Its shoes: Panasport 13 x 8 wtih Sumitomo tires. DAMN! I miss that car. As soon as I find an old photo of it, I'll post it.
Anyways, the event was awesome. Good turn out. Good people. The racing scene has changed a lot. People seem a bit more friendlier. Maybe because its such a smaller niche in comparison to the Drag Races back in 1994-2000. The scene was a bit more calm- similar to the auto crossing scene: real mellow. So I guess the next question is, am I gonna go get a car and fix it up? The answer is, "not now." I don't have a garage of my own to monkey around and my priorities are else where. Mainly to pay my bills and to continue to travel as much as I can.
