Dai Yoshihara
Everyone loves that new car smell. Well, everyone except for maybe Dai. His new-for-the-season IS350 has had some steering issues due to a custom rack, and the world's second best drifter has found himself knocked out before the Top 16 in the first two rounds. The crew diligently at work, was the downtime before Jersey enough time to fix the problem?
To be honest, Wall Speedway is not my favorite track; it's not high-speed and is very bumpy. But I won here in 2007, so I know the track well and had a decent amount of confidence.
After Atlanta, Team Falken put all their effort into making the Discount Tire IS350 work better. Because there were only four weeks between Round 2 and 3, and both events were on the East Coast, there wasn't very much time to make changes to the car. However, we were still able to make some major improvements-we modified the steering rack and changed the whole steering column. That made steering smoother and more responsive, which was the problem I was having.
It rained all day Friday, so we couldn't drive at all. During the practice session Saturday morning, the rain stopped, but the surface was still wet. I was doing well and felt pretty comfortable. I was going to run some tandem practice since I haven't had any with the new setup. To be safe, everyone asked to make some space because the surface was still wet and they didn't want to cause any accidents. Because of this, I didn't have any good practice runs, which was a concern.
I ended up qualifying Eighth and in the Top 32 round I was up against Taka Aono. I haven't been matched with Taka-san in a long time-he's been very consistent this year and would not be easy to beat. I was leading first and I had a pretty good solid run. When I was following, I was doing well in the beginning . . . but I spun out at the third corner. WTF?! I couldn't control the speed and the line to match with Taka-san. I almost cried at that moment.
Man, I got knocked out in the Top 32 round . . . again! I'm very disappointed at my spin. But with more adjustments to the car and no more mistakes from me: no more spin! Team Falken, however, completed its first top-three sweep! It was amazing! I'm very happy for them and it was very well deserved. I super wish that I was one of them. As the IS and I keep improving, watch for the next round!
Discount Tire
www.discounttire.com
Falken Tire
www.falkentire.com
KW Suspension
www.kw-suspension.com
Rhys Millen
A discrepancy with the technical steward kept the reigning Red Bull World and 2005 Formula D champ from advancing further than the Top 16 in Atlanta. With the issues in his Genesis Coupe resolved, how far will Rhys be able to take his new Hyundai?
Every time I drive the Genesis Coupe, the smile on my face gets bigger and bigger. The funny thing is the smile on the competitions' becomes smaller and smaller. After an intense Qualifying session, Team RMR received the second highest score-after a tied First Place between Ken Gushi and Tyler McQuarrie-placing us Third. Big props to Toyo Tires for placing First and Third after Qualifying! Qualifying was proof that the Genesis Coupe had the natural balance, handling and power to compete with the crazy 600-700 hp beasts on the field.
The weekend was a balancing act of chasing the setup, as a rained-out day reduced track time and forced qualifying and race day to be compiled into one. The team had to be patient and wait for the track to come around and change to the set-up the crew thought would be right for each pass.
Competition was crazy and after several runs, the team was awarded Ninth place for the weekend. A disappointing engine misfire developed and I was forced to pull off track. After examining our data, the engine was perfect-the only hint of a question we saw was an over-boost situation, which was causing the AEM EMS to pull back timing to save the engine. Vegas is the next stop, and then it's straight onto Colorado for the Pikes Peak Hill Climb. Based on how well the Genesis Coupe is running, I see another World-Record-breaking run in our sights.
Red Bull
www.redbullusa.com
Hyundai
www.hyundaiusa.com
Rhys Millen
www.rhysmillen.com
By Carter Jung
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