Drifting (motorsport)


Drifting is a driving technique where the driver purposely oversteers, with loss of traction, while maintaining control and driving the car through the entirety of a corner or a turn. The technique causes the rear slip angle to exceed the front slip angle to such an extent that often the front wheels are pointing in the opposite direction to the turn. Drifting is traditionally performed using three methods: clutch kicking, weight transfer, and employing a handbrake turn. This sense of drift is not to be confused with the four wheel drift, a classic cornering technique established in Grand Prix and sports car racing.
As a motoring discipline, drifting competitions were first popularized in Japan in the 1970s and further popularized by the 1995 manga series Initial D. Drifting competitions are held worldwide and are judged according to the speed, angle, showmanship, and line taken through a corner or set of corners.

History

Origin

Famous motorcyclist turned driver Kunimitsu Takahashi was the foremost creator of drifting techniques in the 1970s. This earned him several championships and a legion of fans who enjoyed the spectacle of smoking tires. The bias-ply racing tires of the 1960s-1980s lent themselves to driving styles with a high slip angle. As professional racers in Japan drove this way, so did street racers.
Keiichi Tsuchiya, known as the "Drift King", became particularly interested in Takahashi's drift techniques. Tsuchiya began practicing his drifting skills on the mountain roads of Japan, and quickly gained a reputation amongst the racing crowd. In 1987, several popular car magazines and tuning garages agreed to produce a video of Tsuchiya's drifting skills. The video, known as Pluspy, became a hit and inspired many of the professional drifting drivers on the circuits today. In 1988, alongside Option magazine founder and chief editor Daijiro Inada, he helped to organize one of the first events specifically for drifting called the Ikaten. He has also drifted through every turn in Tsukuba Circuit.

Popularity

One of the earliest recorded drift events outside Japan took place in 1996 at Willow Springs Raceway in Willow Springs, California, hosted by the Japanese drifting magazine and organization Option. Daijiro Inada, the NHRA Funny Car drag racer Kenji Okazaki, and Keiichi Tsuchiya gave demonstrations in a Nissan 180SX that the magazine had brought over from Japan. Entrants included Rhys Millen and Bryan Norris. Drifting has since exploded into a form of motorsport in North America, Australia, Asia and Europe. Grassroots drifting has seen a huge increase in popularity in the 21st century.
Drifting has evolved into a competitive sport where drivers compete to earn points from judges based on various factors. At the top levels of competition, the D1 Grand Prix in Japan pioneered the sport in 2001. Other events such as Drift Games Extreme in Ireland, Formula D in the United States, Drift Allstars, King of Europe, Drift Masters and the British Drift Championship in Europe, WDS in China, RDS in Russia, Formula Drift Asia in the Malaysia/Singapore/Thailand/Indonesia/Philippines, NZ Drift Series in New Zealand, the Australian Drifting Grand Prix, Spec - D Drift Series in Western Canada and the Greek Drift Championship have come along to further expand it into a legitimate motorsport worldwide. Drivers within these series are able to keep their cars sliding for extended periods of time, often linking several turns.

Drift competition

Drifting as an officially sanctioned motorsport competition was initially popularized with the D1 Grand Prix in Japan, which began in 2001 and helped establish judging standards and competition guidelines. Judging takes place on just a small part of the circuit, a few linking corners that provide good viewing, and opportunities for drifting. The rest of the circuit is irrelevant, but it pertains to controlling the temperature of the tires and setting the car up for the first judged corner. In tandem passes, the lead driver often feints their entry to the first corner to upset the chase driver ; however, in some European series, this practice is frowned upon by judges and considered foul play, resulting in deduction of points.
There are typically two sessions - a qualifying or practice session, and a final session. In qualifying sessions, referred to as "solo runs", drifters get individual passes in front of judges to try to make the final 16. This is often on the day preceding the final.
The finals are tandem passes called "chases". Drivers are paired off, and each heat comprises two passes, with each driver taking a turn to lead. The best of the eight heats go to the next four, to the next two, to the final. The passes are judged as explained above; however, there are some provisos such as:
  • Overtaking the lead car under drift conditions is frowned upon even if the chasing car doesn't interrupt the lead car's drift.
  • Overtaking the lead car under grip conditions automatically forfeits a pass.
  • Spinning forfeits a pass, unless the other driver also spins.
  • Increasing the lead under drift conditions helps to win a pass.
  • Maintaining a close gap while chasing under drift conditions helps to win a pass.
  • The level of smoke from the tires is also a factor.
Points are awarded for each pass, and usually, one driver prevails. Sometimes, the judges cannot agree, or cannot decide, or a crowd vocally disagrees with the judge's decision. In such cases, more passes may be run until a winner is produced. On occasion, mechanical failure determines the battle's outcome, either during or preceding a heat. If a car cannot enter a tandem battle, the remaining entrant will give a solo demonstration pass. In the event of apparently close or tied runs, crowds often demonstrate their desire for another run with chants of 'one more time'.
Commitment is about how much throttle the driver applies, and the confidence and dedication the driver shows when approaching track edges and barriers. The higher the rate-to-angle, the more speed and angle a driver can carry through the course. In addition, the fewer corrections they apply through the course and the closer they drive to the track edges or barriers, the higher their style score.
This can be broken down into that are used to score drifters.
  1. Speed/Fluidity – In this area drivers are judged on how fast and well they maintain momentum when entering and exiting corners on the track. This is the commitment section and often demonstrates the driver’s confidence.
  2. Angle – Drivers aim to take corners at a large angle but this can be difficult because the larger an angle is the more the car slows down. This is why a driver wants to maintain their speed through the large angle. Achieving this correctly judges will give you a higher score.
  3. Line – In almost any drifting scene or competition the driver will need to follow a "line". A line is a path that is forged by the driver throughout the course. Line suggestions will be given by judges prior the race and may have areas where clipping points and getting close to the wall are "suggested". The closer a driver gets to the wall on a drift, and the more they follow the suggested line accurately, the higher points they receive.
  4. Style – All this leads into the last core criteria and possibly the most Important. Drivers will use a variety of techniques and strategies and depending on their style it can look very different. Some drivers will have a smooth and precise approach while others will have a more aggressive and sharp approach. Style will be ultimately up to the judges opinion but most look for little to no corrections made throughout the drift, speed and momentum, and consistency and acuteness.

    Outside Japan

There is some regional variation. For example, in Australia, the chase car is judged on how accurately it emulates the drift of the lead car, as opposed to being judged on its own merit — this is only taken into consideration by the judges if the lead car is on the appropriate racing line. Other variations of the tansō/tsuisō and the tansō-only method is multi-car group judging, seen in Drift Tengoku videos where the four-car team is judged in groups.
The D1GP drift series has been prototyping and fine-tuning an electronic judging system based on custom sensors that record and transmit car data to a computer that judges the run. This system is also being tested in some European series. It is designed to remove subjectivity and/or predisposition of judges. Usually the track for such a system is broken up into several sections and the system automatically generates scores based on speed, angle and fluidity of the driver in each section, combining the scores for the final score. In certain situations judges can change or overrule a score, which happens, though rarely.
Formula Drift is the top United States Drifting series. Its judging style for competition is based on line, angle, and speed. When judging for line the driver is judged based on their ability to stay on the line set in place by the judges. Points are allocated to outside zones and inner clips, and are also allocated to touch and go areas. Angle is the drivers ability to maintain a high level of angle that will be set by the angle judge in the drivers meeting. Style is judged based on three areas of focus; initiation, fluidity, and commitment. Initiation is based on how early and smooth the driver initiates into a drift. Fluidity is how smooth the driver drives from lock to lock, high angles of drift, and just overall smoothness on the track. Commitment is judged on consistent throttle throughout, and how close the driver is willing to get to walls and clipping points.
The King of Europe Drift ProSeries has developed its own telemetry system, which uses GPS data to accurately measure speed, angle and line, thus leading to a very objective result for the qualifying sessions.