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I'm interested in what paying spectators (and some amateur drifters) thought of this event as well as some other general questions about drifting. Thank you for taking some time (this is kind of long and may take about a half-hour) to reply to this post with brief but meaningful answers to some or all of these questions.
I’m not asking who you are or for any personal information. I know that a lot of us know each other on the board here and we really know who we really are in real life. If you’d like to be anonymous in your answers, be creative – I’m sure you know what I mean.
If you wish to answer the questions – great. Please don’t insist on knowing who I am or why I’m asking. Some of the questions are very pointed and direct. Some may lead you to believe that I’m a moron. These are the questions you can choose to not answer – I know how much of a moron I am, you don’t need to remind me.
Flame elsewhere - serious replies here only - please.
Thank you.
Mark
1. Was the price of admission for D1 fair? Would you gladly pay more? If so, how much more? If not, where should the admission price be?
2. Is the space for D1 at Irwindale big enough for drifting? Are you close enough to the action? Is the course good enough to see what the best drifters can really do or do they need more space? Was California Speedway better (GT Live / D1GP in December, 2004)? If Fontana was a better place for drifting, why?
3. JGTC – Dope or whack – why? Does it have a future in the US and why or why not?
4. Would a drifting event taking place in a parking lot be ok? Or would it be lame? Realize that this parking lot would be HUGE! It could allow for different track layouts to be set up over the course of a weekend. It would be big enough for 4th gear corner entries. There might be some bleachers, but odds are, spectators would stand behind concrete barriers – about 50 feet or more away from the track. Is standing lame or are bleachers a must?
5. What if there was no PA system at an event and the only way to hear the commentators was with a Walkman or other FM receiver?
6. As an amateur drifter, would you pay $50, $100, $150, $200 or $250 to spend a morning in a drifting clinic and an afternoon on-track with both in-car and on-track coaching? Assume the instructors are HIGH level American drifters who may be fairly well-known, but not championship-winning D1 drivers. The other side of this coin is “I don’t drift – I just watch”.
7. Would you pay $4,735 to go to a 3-day drifting school in Phoenix, Las Vegas, Los Angeles or D.C.? The school would provide the cars (GOOD, well-tuned, turbo-charged, very capable, new or 1 or 2-year old cars from a major, well-known manufacturer), tires, suits, helmets, gloves, shoes, on-board data acquisition, hotel shuttle to and from the school and videotape / DVD of classroom lessons, all of your on-track sessions from on-board cameras and each debriefing session. Insurance would be available for another $100 per day and would limit your liability to $2,000 if you cause more than $2,000 worth of damage to a car; but the tracks would be such that it would be very, very difficult to hit a wall or roll a car. Damage up to $2,000 would come out of your pocket – even with the insurance. This would not include clutches or tires – the normal wear and tear on these items would be covered by your tuition, so you wouldn’t pay if you fry a clutch or prematurely go through a set of tires. You wouldn’t be charged for normal wear and tear. The fee wouldn’t include airfare or hotel but would include continental breakfast each day, lunch each day and a dinner the last day. The instructors may or may not be big names in drifting, but they would be MORE than well qualified to teach drifting – guaranteed. Over the course of the three days, you would be on more than one track.
8. Do you agree with this statement? “If drifting happens anywhere except the greater Los Angeles area, it’s worthless. I wouldn’t watch, attend or participate if this was the case. Only the top names and the best shows can be found on the Pacific coast.”
9. Was the D1 event well organized? Did the day flow smoothly? Was there enough ongoing action or other show elements to keep you occupied? What was good and what was bad about the event?
10. Which language should the PA announcers speak in during the weekend?
11. Is it a pain in the @$$ that a lot of the drivers can’t speak English or speak it very well? Or is this unimportant as in “I don’t care what the drivers have to say – I just want to see the action!” or “The translators do a good job of translating what the drivers say – which I have an interest in hearing”.
12. Do you need ‘down time’ during an event to take a break from the noise or get away the intensity or do you prefer non-stop action without letting up?
13. Which is best from a spectator’s standpoint?
a. Drifting at night
b. Drifting in the day
c. It doesn’t matter
d. Competition that starts in the day with the finals at night under the lights.
14. Are you interested in the look of the cars? The performance of the cars? The technology of the cars? The personal stories of the drivers?
15. How late should a drifting event end?
a. 5 pm
b. 7 pm
c. 9 pm
d. 10 pm
e. 11 pm
f. Midnight
16. Was the big screen at D1 effective? Could you see it? Was your view of the screen blocked? Was it too far away? Could you hear the audio part of the video over the PA system OK? Was the big screen a waste of time, money and bother? Did it ad anything to the event? Would you like to see what the Option Video cameras see on the big screen as they’re taping? Would you like to be able to see slow motion instant replays?
17. What time should a drifting event begin?
a. 6 am
b. 8 am
c. 9 am
d. 10 am
e. Noon
f. 1 pm
g. 3 pm
18. On the big screen, would you like to see an English, Japanese or Spanish speaking pit reporter doing pre and post-run interviews with the drivers as well as victory circle interviews? Maybe even a tech-tip or other pit report? Should this pit reporter be a guy or a gal and why? Is this idea lame?
19. Did D1 offer enough access? Would you like to be able to get closer to the cars? The drivers? Should it be two days or was one enough.
20. Was parking and traffic control getting into and out of the event ok?
21. Do you think that manufacturers belong in drifting? Would you prefer they wait a couple of years before sending in heavyweight, well-financed factory teams? Do you think they take the sport up a notch? Do you think they make it impossible or impractical for ‘the little’ guy to have a shot at getting to the top of drifting? Does this give you (as a drifter) something to shoot for – getting a factory ride; or does this discourage you? Do you think factory drivers are worth what they’re given?
22. Do you think that drifting should be about finesse, control, style and flair – or do you think it should be about high speed and high horsepower?
23. Do you wish that drifting were on TV? I’m talking about a mainstream, major network that everyone gets. Would you watch a regular, weekly show that covered drifting events all over the country – even though the competitors might not be the top names in drifting – or would you rather see only the top names in drifting only once or twice a year on network TV?
24. FD and G4TechTV – AWESOME or P-fkn-lease?
25. Would you subscribe to a regular release of drifting videos from Netflix, Blockbuster or some other major, well-established video / DVD rental outlet? Would you follow a season-long championship this way? These videos would be professionally produced – just like network TV, but would only be available through these rental stores. Each one would be about an hour long and would cover each of the entrants from qualifying through the finals. They would be available the Wednesday following an event. They might contain a few ads, but they wouldn’t have a lot of blatant, commercial content that was paid inserts which would tout a lame product as being a good one – you would only see ads and ‘deals’ or ‘special offers’ from only the top, proven names in speed shops, suspension upgrade manufacturers, power-adder manufacturers, wheel / tire plus-fitment parings and the like. The rental costs and terms would be just like any other video / DVD you get from these places.
26. Do you think we’ve seen enough of ‘exhibitions’ and should move on to only hold ‘competitions’? Do you think that exhibitions are still cool enough that you would spend a day or a weekend going to one – especially if it was tied into a car show / bikini contest / DJ / etc?
27. “Option Video can’t be beat – I wouldn’t waste one nickel on any other video” – True or False.
28. What do you want from an announcer – mickey fickey hip hop hype in street-ese or information in English? (Not intended to offend anyone, so don’t go there – you know what I’m asking here, so don’t play ‘victim’ and read into the question).
29. How many sanctioning bodies of drifting should there be? Is it ok for us to have several top dogs and a bunch of stragglers or would it be better for some sanctions to ‘mind there place’ and stick with being a feeder series for one or two big dogs – for several sanctions to work together to form a food chain?
30. How far would you drive or fly to go to a ‘major’ drifting event? A major event would have a tuner car show, bikini contest, vendor row, two days worth of activity, one or two ‘A’ drifters, many ‘B’ drifters and a few, good, ‘C’ drifters who likely would be eliminated in the first round in a home-built-looking ride. Would you make a weekend of it – hotel, meals out, maybe a flight and a rental car, too? What would you pay for a full-access weekend pass to such an event?
31. What do you think is the worst thing that could happen to drifting – to kill it in the US? What do you think it needs in order to survive and grow? Do you not worry about it – do you think that after a couple of years, when things even out, there will still be some grass roots drifting groups and one or two major, top series – kind of like NHRA / NDRA and IDRC / IDRA?
32. How old are you?
33. What do you do for a living (in general – I’m not asking where you work)?
34. Do you have kids?
35. How much money do you spend on drifting in a year? This could include building, tuning and drifting a car as well as the cost of going to drifting events or schools.
36. As a driver / drifter, what is the best car to drift and why (read 38 before answering)?
37. How important is it for a judge to be a big name in drifting? If three to five judges at an event score relatively close to one another and if their scores agree with what the audience sees a majority of the time, is this ok? As long as a judge understands the judging criteria and consistently judges according to this, is this ok – even if the judge has limited experience or success in drifting?
38. As a spectator, what is the best car to see on the track drifting and why?
39. What else would you like to say that hasn’t been asked?
Thank you again for your time and your thoughts.
M D
I'm interested in what paying spectators (and some amateur drifters) thought of this event as well as some other general questions about drifting. Thank you for taking some time (this is kind of long and may take about a half-hour) to reply to this post with brief but meaningful answers to some or all of these questions.
I’m not asking who you are or for any personal information. I know that a lot of us know each other on the board here and we really know who we really are in real life. If you’d like to be anonymous in your answers, be creative – I’m sure you know what I mean.
If you wish to answer the questions – great. Please don’t insist on knowing who I am or why I’m asking. Some of the questions are very pointed and direct. Some may lead you to believe that I’m a moron. These are the questions you can choose to not answer – I know how much of a moron I am, you don’t need to remind me.
Flame elsewhere - serious replies here only - please.
Thank you.
Mark
1. Was the price of admission for D1 fair? Would you gladly pay more? If so, how much more? If not, where should the admission price be?
2. Is the space for D1 at Irwindale big enough for drifting? Are you close enough to the action? Is the course good enough to see what the best drifters can really do or do they need more space? Was California Speedway better (GT Live / D1GP in December, 2004)? If Fontana was a better place for drifting, why?
3. JGTC – Dope or whack – why? Does it have a future in the US and why or why not?
4. Would a drifting event taking place in a parking lot be ok? Or would it be lame? Realize that this parking lot would be HUGE! It could allow for different track layouts to be set up over the course of a weekend. It would be big enough for 4th gear corner entries. There might be some bleachers, but odds are, spectators would stand behind concrete barriers – about 50 feet or more away from the track. Is standing lame or are bleachers a must?
5. What if there was no PA system at an event and the only way to hear the commentators was with a Walkman or other FM receiver?
6. As an amateur drifter, would you pay $50, $100, $150, $200 or $250 to spend a morning in a drifting clinic and an afternoon on-track with both in-car and on-track coaching? Assume the instructors are HIGH level American drifters who may be fairly well-known, but not championship-winning D1 drivers. The other side of this coin is “I don’t drift – I just watch”.
7. Would you pay $4,735 to go to a 3-day drifting school in Phoenix, Las Vegas, Los Angeles or D.C.? The school would provide the cars (GOOD, well-tuned, turbo-charged, very capable, new or 1 or 2-year old cars from a major, well-known manufacturer), tires, suits, helmets, gloves, shoes, on-board data acquisition, hotel shuttle to and from the school and videotape / DVD of classroom lessons, all of your on-track sessions from on-board cameras and each debriefing session. Insurance would be available for another $100 per day and would limit your liability to $2,000 if you cause more than $2,000 worth of damage to a car; but the tracks would be such that it would be very, very difficult to hit a wall or roll a car. Damage up to $2,000 would come out of your pocket – even with the insurance. This would not include clutches or tires – the normal wear and tear on these items would be covered by your tuition, so you wouldn’t pay if you fry a clutch or prematurely go through a set of tires. You wouldn’t be charged for normal wear and tear. The fee wouldn’t include airfare or hotel but would include continental breakfast each day, lunch each day and a dinner the last day. The instructors may or may not be big names in drifting, but they would be MORE than well qualified to teach drifting – guaranteed. Over the course of the three days, you would be on more than one track.
8. Do you agree with this statement? “If drifting happens anywhere except the greater Los Angeles area, it’s worthless. I wouldn’t watch, attend or participate if this was the case. Only the top names and the best shows can be found on the Pacific coast.”
9. Was the D1 event well organized? Did the day flow smoothly? Was there enough ongoing action or other show elements to keep you occupied? What was good and what was bad about the event?
10. Which language should the PA announcers speak in during the weekend?
11. Is it a pain in the @$$ that a lot of the drivers can’t speak English or speak it very well? Or is this unimportant as in “I don’t care what the drivers have to say – I just want to see the action!” or “The translators do a good job of translating what the drivers say – which I have an interest in hearing”.
12. Do you need ‘down time’ during an event to take a break from the noise or get away the intensity or do you prefer non-stop action without letting up?
13. Which is best from a spectator’s standpoint?
a. Drifting at night
b. Drifting in the day
c. It doesn’t matter
d. Competition that starts in the day with the finals at night under the lights.
14. Are you interested in the look of the cars? The performance of the cars? The technology of the cars? The personal stories of the drivers?
15. How late should a drifting event end?
a. 5 pm
b. 7 pm
c. 9 pm
d. 10 pm
e. 11 pm
f. Midnight
16. Was the big screen at D1 effective? Could you see it? Was your view of the screen blocked? Was it too far away? Could you hear the audio part of the video over the PA system OK? Was the big screen a waste of time, money and bother? Did it ad anything to the event? Would you like to see what the Option Video cameras see on the big screen as they’re taping? Would you like to be able to see slow motion instant replays?
17. What time should a drifting event begin?
a. 6 am
b. 8 am
c. 9 am
d. 10 am
e. Noon
f. 1 pm
g. 3 pm
18. On the big screen, would you like to see an English, Japanese or Spanish speaking pit reporter doing pre and post-run interviews with the drivers as well as victory circle interviews? Maybe even a tech-tip or other pit report? Should this pit reporter be a guy or a gal and why? Is this idea lame?
19. Did D1 offer enough access? Would you like to be able to get closer to the cars? The drivers? Should it be two days or was one enough.
20. Was parking and traffic control getting into and out of the event ok?
21. Do you think that manufacturers belong in drifting? Would you prefer they wait a couple of years before sending in heavyweight, well-financed factory teams? Do you think they take the sport up a notch? Do you think they make it impossible or impractical for ‘the little’ guy to have a shot at getting to the top of drifting? Does this give you (as a drifter) something to shoot for – getting a factory ride; or does this discourage you? Do you think factory drivers are worth what they’re given?
22. Do you think that drifting should be about finesse, control, style and flair – or do you think it should be about high speed and high horsepower?
23. Do you wish that drifting were on TV? I’m talking about a mainstream, major network that everyone gets. Would you watch a regular, weekly show that covered drifting events all over the country – even though the competitors might not be the top names in drifting – or would you rather see only the top names in drifting only once or twice a year on network TV?
24. FD and G4TechTV – AWESOME or P-fkn-lease?
25. Would you subscribe to a regular release of drifting videos from Netflix, Blockbuster or some other major, well-established video / DVD rental outlet? Would you follow a season-long championship this way? These videos would be professionally produced – just like network TV, but would only be available through these rental stores. Each one would be about an hour long and would cover each of the entrants from qualifying through the finals. They would be available the Wednesday following an event. They might contain a few ads, but they wouldn’t have a lot of blatant, commercial content that was paid inserts which would tout a lame product as being a good one – you would only see ads and ‘deals’ or ‘special offers’ from only the top, proven names in speed shops, suspension upgrade manufacturers, power-adder manufacturers, wheel / tire plus-fitment parings and the like. The rental costs and terms would be just like any other video / DVD you get from these places.
26. Do you think we’ve seen enough of ‘exhibitions’ and should move on to only hold ‘competitions’? Do you think that exhibitions are still cool enough that you would spend a day or a weekend going to one – especially if it was tied into a car show / bikini contest / DJ / etc?
27. “Option Video can’t be beat – I wouldn’t waste one nickel on any other video” – True or False.
28. What do you want from an announcer – mickey fickey hip hop hype in street-ese or information in English? (Not intended to offend anyone, so don’t go there – you know what I’m asking here, so don’t play ‘victim’ and read into the question).
29. How many sanctioning bodies of drifting should there be? Is it ok for us to have several top dogs and a bunch of stragglers or would it be better for some sanctions to ‘mind there place’ and stick with being a feeder series for one or two big dogs – for several sanctions to work together to form a food chain?
30. How far would you drive or fly to go to a ‘major’ drifting event? A major event would have a tuner car show, bikini contest, vendor row, two days worth of activity, one or two ‘A’ drifters, many ‘B’ drifters and a few, good, ‘C’ drifters who likely would be eliminated in the first round in a home-built-looking ride. Would you make a weekend of it – hotel, meals out, maybe a flight and a rental car, too? What would you pay for a full-access weekend pass to such an event?
31. What do you think is the worst thing that could happen to drifting – to kill it in the US? What do you think it needs in order to survive and grow? Do you not worry about it – do you think that after a couple of years, when things even out, there will still be some grass roots drifting groups and one or two major, top series – kind of like NHRA / NDRA and IDRC / IDRA?
32. How old are you?
33. What do you do for a living (in general – I’m not asking where you work)?
34. Do you have kids?
35. How much money do you spend on drifting in a year? This could include building, tuning and drifting a car as well as the cost of going to drifting events or schools.
36. As a driver / drifter, what is the best car to drift and why (read 38 before answering)?
37. How important is it for a judge to be a big name in drifting? If three to five judges at an event score relatively close to one another and if their scores agree with what the audience sees a majority of the time, is this ok? As long as a judge understands the judging criteria and consistently judges according to this, is this ok – even if the judge has limited experience or success in drifting?
38. As a spectator, what is the best car to see on the track drifting and why?
39. What else would you like to say that hasn’t been asked?
Thank you again for your time and your thoughts.
M D
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