I’ve had her for over 11 years now n she had gone through many incarnations to what we here. I have taken a 2 year hiatus in competitive drifting n she has been under the covers ever since.
A drive (drift) around the block was all it took to convince me that I won’t be changing a thing about her…then again the Nitrous system will have to go to accommodate the new rulings in drifting!
GAS , which is the abreviation for Gymkhana Autocross Series, started on 2013 in conjunction with the launching of the GT Radial Champiro SX 2 in Sepang. A one day event which saw 30 participants competing in this inaugural event. With the glut of other gymkhana events following its wake that year, the management decided to take a hiatus and diverted it’s effort to more private gymkhana events mainly for car clubs. However, with the frequency of Gymkhana event dwindling the following year to the point where there were not a single event in the year 2014. Sync Optima had decided to take the helm and try to revive the sport in 2015 by running three events which proved to be successful. The formula of a self funded event , amongst the tight knit of competitors proved to be the way to go in these trying times. So much so that in 2016 , it was decided to run a 5 series competition which will end on the 18th Dec 2016! The following are the posters of the past events
Please check out GAS Gymkhana facebook page
https://www.facebook.com/GymkhanaAutoXSeries/
2012 was a year that we took a hiatus on competitive drifting as we only competed in two events throughout the year.
Batu Pahat Drift Challenge 2012 where I placed 3rd
and KBS Drift Challenge Round 1 where I bagged 2nd place..
We did however competed in quiet a number of Gymkhana and Autocross event for the last year
We fared decently considering I have a lot more to learn when it came to gymkhana driving techniques and the car used during competition is not considered to be ideal as it was laggy and had gearings that is too high for this genre of competition. We had fun nevertheless
2012 also had us teaming up with Petronas Malaysia where we had the opportunity to represent them in promoting their Primax Xtra fuel in a form of a drift ride road tour in whic had us traveling to 10 different states around Malaysia.
Most notably 2012 was the year that had Jane and I brought into the GT Radial tires family. With the support of Heap Joo sdn bhd, the Malaysian Distributor. Jane and I are currently representing and competing with their extremely high performance tires!!
Though having a fairly hectic schedule, we did manage to slot in quiet a handful of SODA classes.
2013 saw me doing some work with car manufactures as an instructor.
Mini Cooper
Proton
Jaguar
Volkswagon Golf GTI 
Kia 
Porsche
We are also fortunate to be able to work with Bank Muamalat in their road tour event where we gave drift rides to their clients held in Selangor, Kelantan and Terengganu . with 3 more other states due soon
Mid this year saw us organizing the launching of the GT Radial Champiro SX2 tires in Malaysia
Dealers and participants were given first hand experience on the tires in car fitted with the GT Radial Champiro SX2
A gymkhana competition was also held on that day where an almost 100% success rate was achieved when all 11 of the sponsored SX2 competitors out of 24 drivers competed had all podiumed in their respective classes
On the circuit, the Megalap competition held on that day , saw the all the sponsored drivers either improving on their previous timings or had podium in their respective classes. This is a true testament of how well these tires performs!
2013 had Jane and I back into competitive drifting with us participating in the Federal PRO AM Drift series. I have to admit my debut into competition was not exactly spectacular due to some confusion with what the exact criteria the judges were looking for .But I had slowly progressed on the subsequent rounds..
I managed to bag a 3rd on round 2
and a first in round 3
Jane has been improving steadily with qualifying as high as 9th amongst the big names and finishing into the top 8’s in recent competitions as the RacePod drift series held in Malacca !
Well I hope this brief insight of what had happened these past 7 months justifies me not updating this blog but I do however vow to do weekly updates from now on.
Watch this space !!
With my S13 still in the panel beaters after my major screw up in Formula Drift Malaysia, Jane and I decided to take part in the inaugural ACE Drift Challenge in Jebat stadium in Malacca. ACE is a company that specializes in suspension and undercarriage components for drift cars here in Malaysia. They are quiet popular amongst the AE86 and KE70s crowd as they are known to make top notch robust absorbers that could withstand all the abuse drifting could offer 🙂
Photos taken from :
http://ellmiesupreme.blogspot.com/2010/01/ace-drift-challenge-round-1-2010.html
The course that was set by sole judge, Ah Keat, was the usual ‘R’ Shape with a single rear clipping zone and two front clipping points. What made it different was the line that he wanted us to take; Entering in third gear, we were required to take a angular line towards the rear clipping zone!! To be honest, I was a bit confused about what the judge wanted when my run where I clipped the rear zone (knocking a cone off) and nailing the two front clipping points only earned me an 9th qualifying placing . Unfortunately Jane’s runs , which I thought were good, wasn’t good enough to make it to the top 16.
TOP 16
My first tsuiso run was against Rocker Loh ,in a borrowed Cefiro. I had managed to follow closely the RB25 powered car while trialing and managed to distance myself while leading . With that I got through the best eight.
TOP 8
My next opponent was top qualifier Tan Tat Wei. My AE86 was no match to his high powered hatchi but unfortunately he made a fatal mistake of following too closely on this tight course which ended in him rear ending me during the switch over and straightening in the process. With that, I’m in the top 4!!
TOP 4
Top 4 was against me an Zulfikar. Zul was still struggling to get in grips in his newly transplanted SR20 turboed trueno. An uncharacteristic spin by Zul and strong chase run by me ,allowed me advance to the finals.
Cool sequence shots taken from www.rattlezasia.blogspot.com.
FINALS
The finals was me against Derrick Lim. At this point, with the total of six tsusio runs I had, along with the two qualifying runs I was still using the same pair of Goodyear Duraplus tires at the rear. Jane was getting a bit worried if they would last the next couple of runs but after thoroughly inspecting them, we were amazed that they were good enough to go for another dozen of runs!! Most importantly, the grip level stayed consistent throughout. I believe this gave me the advantage against Derrick as I was alot quicker than him during our runs even when I was short of more than 50 horses against his car!!
In the end of the video by eddie88 (www.zakumalaya.com) below , shows the final tandem battle of me against Derrick !
After a disastrous Formula Drift Malaysia last December, it was good to be on the podium again .
Five months had past when my S13 is finally ready. With a hefty power up grade and a newly acquired control arms and knuckles, the round 2 of the ACE Dift Challenge seem like the perfect opportunity to test out the car before Formula Drift Singapore 2010, scheduled was 2 weeks later. However, things didnt go as smoothly a planned with an untimely failed LSD and a misaligned knuckle kit that would either cause me to straighten or spin at any given moment.I had barely scraped through qualifying with an 8th placing but got knocked out early by Hong when the s13 veered off course during my lead.
Videos by Nash from Singapore
(www.youtube.com/user/driftonowhere)
Jane wasn’t spared either as she had suddenly developed misfiring issues right during qualifying!
We were glad that we were able to identify the problem and have two weeks to rectify them!
With our maid having to go for surgery. We had Johanna with us for this round of competition. I was a bit worried as the environment at Afamosa isnt what I would call ideal for a two year old . So Jane and I had took turns looking after her while one of us would go out for practice. It helped also, that Yoong and Swee Kin had brought along their daughter Sze Yun to Malacca too. Swee kin had the daunting task of looking after both of them when we both were out during practice!! Thanks Swee Kin!!
We had taken baby steps to develop the handling department of the S13 since it debut in April and we are glad to say that we are almost there. Our experience during round 2 of FX Open ( report will be done later) had exposed the car’s weakness of its intitial set up.The car handles alot better after making a few adjustments and we reckon we are able to make it even more faster.
I managed to qualify 3rd with two strong runs with Jane making into the top 32 with a 28th placing!!
Having to take care of Johanna and also not having (our photo/videographer,caretaker and friend) Kevin Boey around results in having no drifting photos of the event!! My apologies..
TOP 32
Jane had to go against Kecik of Sultan Sulaiman Team. Jane did a strong trailling run but had straighten during her turn to lead.A One More Time was called. Unfortunately Jane had straighten during both of the runs giving the win to Kecik. I believe with her new power upgrade coming up, she wouldn’t have to struggle so much during her tsusio run.
I had a ‘walk by’ as I qualified 3rd (within the top 8) and went straight into the top 16
Top 16
I had to go against another Sultan Sulaiman team member, Popeye (i swear, thats his name) . During my lead, Popeye had taken the inner line while I was clipping the rear clipping zone thus forcing him to brake and straighten when I dove into the front clipping point. During my trailing run, I followed him as closely as possible and manage to advance to the Top 8
T0p 8
In this round, I had to go against Oliy of Feinto D. Oliy and I have gone against each other before and we are both not shy about exchanging some paintwork (report of Cyberjaya competition later). However it was unfortunate that his NOS powered supercharged AE86 was low on NOS which result in me gaining a huge gap during my turn to lead and him straightening during initiation when I was trailing. I’m into the TOP 4
Top 4
This is the second time I have to go against Tan tat Wei. But this time Tan is packing even more power with a 300bhp++ Nos powered rotary AE86!! Not wanting to take any chances I opt of have a tire change. So I picked up my crew from the starting line and off we went to our pit. This is where things got a bit weird; somewhere during the time my tires were being changed, the NOS switch on my car was switched off. I was in the car the whole time and my crew reckoned that I did it. I strongly doubt it as during my experience of FD Malaysia, I made it a point to never touch it !. Somehow i suspected that my crew had accidentally knocked it off while trying to get out of the cramped caged car. Anyway, I not pissed or anything but I just found it weird. So as you might have guessed, my run with Tan was a disaster. He qualified 1st , so he was first to lead. The starting point is extremely sandy so I am forced to drive half throttle throughout the 1st gear and floor it mid into 2nd. Usually the car would response with a sudden surge of power. However this time nothing happen!! I saw Tan gained 4 cars length infront of me and I knew there was no way of catching him.Upon returning to the starting grid ,only had I realised that the switch was off. With my over zealousness of wanting to gain a gap during my turn to lead, I had entered the rear zone a bit too hot causing me to hit the rear barriers but not losing drift! However this slowed me down tremendously thus allowing Tan to stick close to me!! So that puts an end to my day in this competition
With that I was awarded a third placing and inturn making currently in 1st spot in the overall standing!! With one more round to go, I hope my luck improves for me to win the title..wish me luck 😉
It is a tradition for us to have a meet up during the many festive holidays that our multi national country celebrates. For this Hari Raya we had a gathering in Sunway for a mini Wangan session to a secret location 😉 . Bringing the panda AE86 to a meet such as this ,perfectly exemplify the term ‘ Bringing a knife to a gun fight‘ especially in the presences of 500WHP Skylines ,Type Rs and a couple of souped up Hondas!
However there was a reason for this . I was given a set of , Goodyear DuraPlus to do a review a while back. Testing it in drift application had me using up the rear but the fronts we still as good as new! I had actually bought an extra pair of DuraPlus and found that this gathering was a perfect opportunity to test these tires under these condition. Being H rated tires, the Goodyear DuraPlus’s maximum recommended speed rating is about 210Km/h which is about as fast as my AE86 could go. As this test was being conducted by the seat of my pants ,without the aid of any form of scientific measuring device ,all I could conclude was
A)Low tire noise. while this fact may not bother some performance orientated drivers , I do find that the lack of humming or noise emitting from the tires gives me more confidence traveling at speed. Furthermore, the lack of tire noise allows you to hear other things that might be a warning or tell tale signs on your car’s condition (ie: pinging)
B)Structural integrity; as expected , the tires did not developed an form of thread deformity or such after a number of high speed runs. This doesn’t come as a surprise as we had found similar results during our drift testing , which I believe is more abusive to tires!
C) Less rolling resistance. To be perfectly honest, the sensation of having less rolling resistance may just be a psychological effect from reading the product brochure 🙂 But somehow I felt the car was a lot smoother at 33 psi pressure in the tires compared to the others I have tested. So don’t flame me on this 😛 One good indication of the lack of rolling resistance is from the fuel economy performance but i think you’ll understand that in this case there’s an exception
Anyways here are the pictures of the cars that turned up that night
