Thanks to all my sponsors, and most importantly, all of you amazing fans and supporters that kept me going-you guys ROCK!
Drift Ya Later!
Toxic Drift
www.toxicdrift.com
Mopar
www.mopar.com
BF Goodrich
www.bfgoodrich.com
Tanner Faust
Good things come in twos: shoes, chopsticks, Siamese twins, testes... In the case of championships, nothing beats a repeat performance: it affirms that the winner took it on merits and isn't just some lucky bastard. Is the 350Z-driving Tanner a bastard? Find out!
Wow, what a weekend! Irwindale had a much more serious feel around the paddock than other events this season. Pranks and jokes around the pits were a bit more taboo than usual, and everyone's suits were zipped straight up to the collar at all times. On the track, things were serious, too. The qualifying scores were very low and judges succeeded in making a statement: be willing to risk everything, on every run, or pack up the trailer! Fortunately, we qualified Second, and avoided major damage to the car in doing so. But that put me up against Haruguchi for the first round, and the last time I battled him I went into the wall after some controversial braking. I knew I absolutely had to win the round to keep the pressure on Samuel for the championship points race, which we were both in contention to win.
Leading Haruguchi, I went as fast as possible, and braked very late for the inner oval. I earned the advantage. Following, I knew I could catch him, but I didn't want to be right on top of his S15 in case he had a "problem" like last time. He was very slow on the acceleration so I had no choice but to stick with him on the initiation. He gapped me around the oval but I was able to close the distance quickly. Then, he slowed too much on the infield and lost his drift. I moved on. Sam made the same costly error of losing his drift during his run against Takatori and relinquished the FD Championship. We won it! While the pressure was off for the championship, Rockstar/AEM Team Manager Stephan Papadakis reminded us to focus on the event at hand.
The next few rounds against Ryan Tuerck and Justin Pawlak both required One More Time runs and some swapped paint to get through, before the final round with JR, who was killing it all weekend. I gave him some decent runs but he pushed a bit harder and deserved the event win. Congrats to JR for retiring his Mustang in style, and Congrats to Rockstar/AEM Drift Team members Stephan, Sean and Carlos for battling through another season right to the top! We did it!
Rockstar
www.rockstar69.com
AEM
www.aempower.com
Tanner Foust
www.tannerfoust.com
Vaughn Gittin Jr.
Vaughn Gittin Jr. and his Mustang have long held the honors as the sole D1GP winner from the U.S. In Formula D, on the other hand, the top spot on the podium has been as elusive as feet to a fat man.
First of all, let me just say, "WOOOOOHOOOOO!!!!" Round 7 was an incredible event in which I literally KO'd everything keeping me from a win all season long. The Falken Tire Mustang was absolutely on-point throughout practice and Qualifying-screaming and taking everything I threw at it! And I felt more than confident heading into competition.
Tandem began with us facing Bill Sherman, who has been killing it since he came back to FD just a few events ago. Once I knocked him out, I was up against former D1 champ Ryuji Miki; I ended up beating him with a 17-12 final score. In the following round, I was up against Takatori who also fell to the 'Stang after putting up a good fight. So there I was, after a terrible season, heading to the finals against last year's champ Tanner.