I have personally been around drifting since 2009 and I’ve been happy to know Geoff Stoneback for most of those years. Geoff resides in Philadelphia, PA and has been shredding up and down the east coast as well as the midwest in various events. When I heard he was making a run in FD this year I was super stoked for him and couldn’t wait to see where he would go. After Long Beach I was able to sit down and talk to him about his experiences at his first ever Formula Drift event as a driver. Hit the jump for the interview! Continue reading
Category Archives: Clipping Point
Clipping Point: Interview’s with todays top drifting stars, industry insiders & upcoming grassroots drifters.
2012 Clipping Point: Formula Drift Rookie – Zoltan Hajdu
We got the opportunity to sit down with Zoltan Hajdu, Formula Drift rookie, at the final event of the season. He was kind enough to give us a few minutes of his time so we can discuss who he is and where he came from and where he intends to go…
Clipping Points: 2012 Just Drift Top Drift Champion Luke Pakula
Today we are very happy to bring you and little Q&A session with 2012 Just Drift Top Drift Champion Luke Pakula.
Everything Drift: When did you first get into drifting and how did you find out about it? And what was your first Drift car?
Luke: I have been around a car scene since I was 15 (early 2000). So naturally I came across drifting once it first started catching people’s attention in the early 2004 on the streets of Chicago, where I grew up. In 2006 I moved out to California for a temporary get away. Shortly after the move I went to check out a local drift event, run by an organization called Just Drift.
Not even 2 weeks later after the event I went out and bought my first RWD car. 1989 Nissan 240sx hatchback, it was a bucket with only one intention in mind, drifting!
Throwback Thursday – 2007 Clipping Point: Hiro Sumida
Everything Drift.com: What FIRST got you interested in drifting before you became a driver?
Hiro Sumida: I have been an avid fan of rallying, especially the World Rally Championship (WRC). And I have been watching every single WRC rounds since 1993. That’s where my original interest in drifting came from. A little bit after that, I found the drifting article featuring Drift King Tsuchiya and Max Orido in their AE86 and that’s when I really wanted to try drifting myself. Still, my future dream is to compete at Rally de Corse.
Hiro Sumida: I have been an avid fan of rallying, especially the World Rally Championship (WRC). And I have been watching every single WRC rounds since 1993. That’s where my original interest in drifting came from. A little bit after that, I found the drifting article featuring Drift King Tsuchiya and Max Orido in their AE86 and that’s when I really wanted to try drifting myself. Still, my future dream is to compete at Rally de Corse.
Throwback Thursday – 2005 Clipping Point: Ken Gushi
Name: Kenshiro Gushi
Home: San Gabriel, CA
Team: Team Toyo/Ford Racing/Gushi Auto
Nationality: Japanese
Date Of Birth: September 19 1986
Marital Status: Single
Vehicle: 2005 Ford Mustang GT
Tell us about yourself…
I’m Ken Gushi, I’m 18, and a professional drifter for Toyo Tires, Ford, and Gushi Auto. I was born in Japan. I can’t remember whether English or Japanese was a first language, I suck at both. I use more English on a daily basis, but we only use Japanese in the house.
EverythingDrift.com: How did you get into drifting?
Ken Gushi: Before I started drifting, knew what it was. “thought it was just a couple kids in japan sliding their cars around” – at that time, I was 8 or 9ish – I was always into skylines, supras, wangan racing, 800 HP cars. Drifting was boring, sliding your car around a turn, anyone can do that.
Then when I was 12 or 13, saw initial D for the first time, also had seen a lot of real drifting on option video. My friend was like “you should watch this, it’s pretty cool.” He told me that it was about a corolla that beats everyone.There’s a black GTR in ID, and right when I started watching Initial D, we saw the corolla beat the skyline, and we were thinking “WHAT? That’s not real. There’s no corolla that can beat a skyline.” So that’s when I started to realize what drifting was, maybe it wasn’t as easy as I thought. I got started at this dry lake. My friend took us to this one dry lake in El Mirage, it’s about halfway to Vegas (from LA) near Barstow. He rode motorcycles, so he knew about a lot of offroad trails. We took my dad’s 86 Corolla out there, the same corolla that was in the anime series, and he was showing me how to drift around the bushes. I didn’t know he knew how to drift, but apparently he knew how to drift in Japan right before we moved out here. So he taught me how to do basic car control, sliding around the bush. We setup a couple of cones and made a little track, to see who could drift around it the best. A couple of his employees started getting into it, so they all bought employees. At one point there’s a picture of my dad’s shop that’s all corollas. Our customers, all the employees, there wasn’t a single car in the shop that wasn’t a corolla.
Dean “Karnage” Kearney Post Formula Drift Finals & Into 2012
As Dean “Karnage” Kearney ends his 2011 Formula Drift season on an up note. He was kind enough to give us some time to tell us about how he and Team SHR ended the season as well as some insight on 2012, SEMA and moving to the states…
EverythingDrift: How was it to make it into the Top 16 after the struggles of the season with the Viper having several issues, causing a lower ranking and making yourself and the team struggle?
Dean “Karnage” Kearney: “Irwindale was my second Top16 of the season. My first came at V-LEDS home event in Evergreen Speedway at round 4, the event that I eventually breathed a sign of relief and was also a major turning point for me, the team and all involved. Basically without getting into too much detail about the reasons behind the troubles and dwelling on them, my aim was to focus on the cure and get better results after 3 difficult events. The judging criteria in FD has changed so much over the years and with cars becoming faster and technologically super advanced I guess the old Viper was stuck in a FD time warp and needed some changes to get some more performance from the car and also more performance from me. Basic things such as traction to carry more drift speed was required but like everything, to every action there is an equal opposite reaction. This new found traction and speed suddenly made the car trickier to steer and transition through drift so we needed more angle and quicker lock-2-lock steering rack. Not an easy task, especially mid season to be re-engineering steering, anti roll bar and spindle design to “hopefully” gain an advantage on its current setup without any prior testing or knowledge from someone else to clarify the changes will actually work, a lottery in other words! Luckily after an all nights work in Seattle we basically junked the roll bar and re-engineered the spindles in such a way to have zero Ackermann angle which in turn alleviated the other steering rack issues as the hubs now turned more degrees with less steering input = quick rack. It was a gamble and it paid off this time. The steering improvements along with the teams hard work and dedication to making the car perform 100% at the remaining round such as Vegas where I was disgusted with myself for falling out in Top32 I really wanted to say thanks to everyone with a Top16 or better at Irwindale. On another day Top8 or more was capable but no shame in losing to Tyler on a day where he ended up winning the event….il get you one day Tyler!!” J