Keiichi Tsuchiya is a Japanese professional race car driver. He is known as the Drift King for his nontraditional use of drifting in non-drifting racing events and his role in popularizing drifting as a motorsport. In professional racing, he is a two-time 24 Hours of Le Mans class winner and the 2001 All Japan GT Championship runner-up. He is also known for touge driving.
Drifting is a driving technique where the driver intentionally oversteers, with loss of traction, while maintaining control and driving the car through the entirety of a corner. 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 done by clutch kicking, then intentionally oversteering and countersteering. 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.
Formula Drift is a United States-based motorsport drifting series. Formula Drift, Inc. was co-founded by Jim Liaw and Ryan Sage in 2003 as a sister company to Slipstream Global Marketing, the same partnership that introduced D1 Grand Prix to the United States. The new entity would solely own, operate and launch the first official drifting series in North America. Formula D is not affiliated with the FIA series of formula racing championships.
Christopher Forsberg, is a self-taught, three-time Formula Drift Champion and Formula Drift World Champion race car driver from Doylestown, Pennsylvania who currently competes in the Formula Drift series in his Nissan Z (Z34) for NOS Energy Drink. He is the owner, driver and shop manager of Forsberg Racing.
Kenshiro "Ken" Gushi is one of Japan's top competitors in the sport of drifting. Born in Okinawa, Japan but raised in San Gabriel, California, he was taught by his father Tsukasa Gushi at the age of 13 with a Toyota AE86. Ken has become the youngest competitor in both the D1 Grand Prix of Japan and the Formula Drift Championships of the U.S. when he was 16, despite not passing his driving test at the time.
Nobuteru Taniguchi is a Japanese racing driver and drifting driver who currently competes in Super GT and D1 Grand Prix. Taniguchi is commonly nicknamed "NOB" or "The Pimp" as a reference to his S15 Silvia which he is best known for.
Philip John Morrison is an English drift driver and businessman from Birmingham, England. He is one of the most successful drivers in UK drifting, having won the 2006 D1 Great Britain series and 2010 British Drift Championship and is co-owner of automotive parts company Driftworks.
Tengku Djan Ley bin Tengku Mahaleel is the head of Proton Motorsports and is also a Malaysian professional drift driver who has taken part in the D1 Grand Prix racing series and others. He has won the 12-hour Merdeka Millennium Endurance race twice, in 2005 and 2006. Tengku Djan Ley is one of the Kelantan royal lineage.
Katsuhiro Ueo is a Japanese professional drifting driver, whose currently competing in D1 Grand Prix with a Nissan Silvia S15, well known for formerly using the Toyota AE86 in the series. He is also known as, Therefore, it is.
Daigo Saito is a Japanese professional drifting driver, currently competing in the D1 Grand Prix series and Formula Drift Japan for TMAR. He formerly competed in Formula DRIFT USA and World Championship series for Achilles Radial. He was the first driver to win the two drifting majors, D1GP in 2008 and Formula D in 2012.
During its history the Toyota Supra has enjoyed considerable success in a variety of different motorsports.
Falken Tire is a brand of passenger car, light truck, and medium truck tires owned by the Japanese company Sumitomo Rubber Industries (SRI). It was launched in its native country of Japan in 1983, and was introduced to the North American market two years later and in Europe in 1988. Falken has now become a stand-alone brand that focuses on UHP products while utilizing professional motorsports to further develop and improve products for worldwide distribution.
Tetsuya Hibino is a Japanese professional drifting driver, currently competing in the D1 Grand Prix series for Shibata Racing Team.
Taka Aono is a Japanese drift driver currently competing in the American Formula D series in his Toyota Sprinter AE86 Trueno. Before his professional drifting career began, Taka was a successful autocross driver, and was instrumental in building southern California's drift scene. Taka was previously sponsored by Falken Tires, however he has since lost his sponsorship deal due to an unsuccessful season in 2008. Taka is also known to have given up a career as a chiropractor to become a drift driver.
Daijiro Yoshihara, more commonly known as Dai Yoshihara, is a professional driver with experience in Drifting, Road Racing, Time Attack, and Hill Climb.
The 2010 Formula D season was the seventh season for the Formula D series. The series began on April 10 on the streets of Long Beach and concluded on October 9 at Toyota Speedway at Irwindale after seven events.
Justin Thomas Pawlak, also known as JTP, is an American professional drifter who currently competes in the Formula D series. He earned his Formula D Professional license in 2006 and later earned his D1 license. In 2010, he was picked up Team Falken Tire and has been with them ever since. For the 2012 FD Season, he drives the 2013 Falken Tire Ford Mustang RTR. Justin continues his support of local, grassroots drifting by judging the Just Drift Top Drift series alongside fellow Formula D drivers Taka Aono and Hiro Sumida.
Ryan Tuerck is an American professional drifter from Derry, New Hampshire who currently competes in the U.S. Formula Drift series.
Robbie Nishida is a professional drifter who currently competes in several different professional series' around the world, including Formula D USA series and Formula D World series. He has been competing in the Formula D USA series since 2005. He has been competing ever since both in Japan and the USA.
James Deane is an Irish professional drift driver. He is a former 3 time Formula D champion, having won the series in 2017, 2018 and 2019 and has won multiple National and European titles.
Ireland