TurboGrinch´s blog

first roll out of the new car :)

2011-06-26T12:18:00.000-07:00

Sport Auto Drift Challenge is THE biggest german drift event every year. Luckily i just got my car ready in time to compete there.

the car was running awesome, felt a lot better than the old one, even though i was running less grippy tires in the front and more tire pressure in the rear than usual. The only technical Problem i had was a boost pipe coming off - nothing big for an entirely new build car :)

I managed to place myself in 10th position out of 75 drivers, wich was more than statisfying to me after a 11-month-break.

The TOP16 were held on another part of the track and i missed the practice due to the blown boost hose. I had to run agains Tim Tatje a pretty good driver from the Netherlands. It was a tight battle, nobody did a mistake, but he got the win for being more aggressive than me. He was!

a big thanks to Seifert-Performance for all the help and support - its so much fun, when you build a car and it just works!

here are some random laps in different cam positions:

see you soon!

the new colour is on

2011-05-16T02:51:00.000-07:00

and its hard not to post pics because it looks HOT! :)

I´m pretty happy with the new design and can focus on the last steps in progress: suspension setup und road legalisation.

see you soon.

I hope i still know how to drift, hockenheim - the first proper roll out of the new car will be 11 month since i crashed my old car :-O

www.MartinReinsch.com is back :)

2011-05-01T11:31:00.000-07:00

my old URL is back and im trying update this place here more often from now on ;)

tomorrow im going to choose a new colour as my old decition is already on too many cars over here :)

cant wait to see it when its ready.

final touches with the bodywork

2011-04-23T09:53:00.000-07:00

in the last few weeks i did a lot of bodywork - its more work than i expected to be honest. But slowly it´s coming to an end.

the rocket bunny wing fits perfect. I was not shure about it, but now im loving it :)

a ne C/F hood and some new windows should be here within the next 2 weeks, and then im getting the car ready for its new colour in may. Its not gonna be the colour i have choosen first, because there are already too many cars in this colour around so im gonna go for something different.

project frankfurt ;)

2011-03-08T12:42:00.000-08:00

it became quiet about the build of my new drift car since i came back from the states. The reason is simple, i moved to Frankfurt to start a new job.

The decition was done pretty spontanious and took a while to get it all sorted. Most of the work is done already and now i can start working on the new drift car again - but only on the weekends ;)

Frankfurt is awesome, too bad i can´t take all my cars with me right now.

i miss ´murrica

2011-01-13T13:22:00.000-08:00

i hope you guys also had a good start in 2011!
Currently im pretty busy moving to frankfurt into a new flat right in the middle of the city *stoked*

My drift car is still sitting and waiting for light weight parts wich i have ordered 4 month ago :/

meanwhile i cant stop watching Alex´ supercool video of last years Driftoberfest @ Nashville super speedway. miss you guys ;)

TND Driftoberfest from Alexander Grant on Vimeo.

merry X-mas and a happy new year

2010-12-23T12:09:00.000-08:00

2010 was a crazy year, and im kinda happy that it´s over soon.

A special thanks to Bernd @ Seifert Performance for the awesome support this year. And of course a big thanks to my family and my friends.

I wish all you guys a very happy christmas and a mega new year - 2011 rock on!

- Martin

what a FUN weekend @ the Int. Motor Show Luxembourg

2010-12-15T11:49:00.000-08:00

Yves Faber, the 2010 IDS Champ invited Patrick "Patze" Ritzmann to the international motor show in Luxembourg.

I went with Patze and had a fun weekend, with some of the dutch drivers, i have´nt seen for a while and with no one less than Vaughn Gittin Jr. and his fiance Abigail.

The Show was totally different to the Car Shows in germany. Way more race car related and less fancy tuning cars. The Drift Show was very entertaining and the party on saturday night was simply mindblowing. Thanks to Yves for his hospitality and the invitation.

I definitely will be back ;)

the fun crew

new colour is sorted :)

2010-11-08T04:23:00.001-08:00

but how to get it on the car?
wrap it in foil or get it painted?

if you have any ideas or tips please let me know.

the more southern part :)

2010-10-26T02:44:00.000-07:00

on our 1000 miles trip we both got a bit sick of the air condition in our mercury grand marquis ls. so we decited to take a brake in a small hotel near charlotte after we drove thru the sehnandoah skyline drive.

the next day we arrived at Andy Sapp´s house. Still a bit exhausted but the weather in Atlanta was awesome - around 25°C.

Andy took us to Nashville Super Speedway for the Driftoberfest and the see some more of the crazy Team Rowdy guys.

I felt really bad at nashville, we had no sleep because we were driving thru the night and just arrived 1 hour before the gates opened. Still having a massiv flu i decited not to drive Andys car in this condition i was in.

thanks again to all the guys of Team Rowdy and especially to Andy and Lieze for their hospitality and for make us having an awesome time in Atlanta!

trip to our friends in the States

2010-10-16T22:30:00.000-07:00

Axel a very good german Drifter and me decited to hit the east coast for some drift action.

On my birthday we took a plane to NYC. The next day we joined the D-UP! event wich was held by one of our friends at the awesome Monticello Motor Club. What a nice track, and what an awesome event.

some nice cars, some of them went sideways too ;)

drivers briefing

After this brilliant event we hit the City and startet our route to Altanta, Georgia.

Thanks to Andrew for his hospitality, we really enjoyed it.

judging at IDS Hockenheim

2010-10-05T12:12:00.000-07:00

The heads of the IDS (international drift series) asked me to judge their Pro and Street class round at Hockenheim Oct. 2nd and 3rd.

With me was Harry Müller, a well known instructor. We designed a small but nice track in the paddocks of the Hockenheimring. The track was not that fast, but due to a very bumpy surface pretty technical.

I had good fun judging the event, even tho some drivers went crazy because of our decitions. But missunderstanding happens, when you miss the drivers briefing or half of it.

Like usual we had some discussions afterwards, but most of the drivers were happy with their score. Drifting is a judged sport, if you dont get what the judges asked for in the briefing, its hard to get a good result.

All in all the feedback was very good, and i was asked to do this again. And to the drivers who still think they get better results by complaining: stop complaining, and start drifting!

touch down

2010-09-22T07:21:00.001-07:00

now im waiting for some more parts but the biggest part is done. just some coolers, body parts are missing.

one is not enough :)

2010-09-16T03:43:00.001-07:00

the progress

2010-09-02T02:02:00.000-07:00

way more than 300 hours of work and the car is still not on its own feet.

yesterday i put in the engine, gearbox and the front axle.

the next steps will be to get the rear axle in, finish the wiring loom and then i want to start with the interioir (roll cage) dashboard ...

my poor old car look kinda raped. It will move into my garage this weekend.

chassis preperation

2010-08-15T08:20:00.000-07:00

i have been working on the new chassis for more than 100 hours so far, and this is how it looks at the moment:

some more work needs to be done before i can get the axles back in.

the rebuild

2010-07-29T08:56:00.000-07:00

unfortunately the chassis specialist told me that it will be too expensive for me to repair my S14. I had this car for 8 Years and now i had to look out for a new Shell.

Surprisingly i got offered 7 or 8 rolling shells. i never thought, that so many bare shells are around :) The Prices started at 600 up to 2500 Euros :-O

And suddenly a member of the SXOC.de wrote me, that his Mother must have an S14 in an old barn on her farm that i can have for free.

On the weekend, i was booked for some race taxi rides for Mercedes at the F1 in Hockenheim, where i went to visit another german Drifter, Dom from charged import racing, who gave me some head lights, Feders and more bits for my S14.

On Monday morning i started a 1.300km road trip together with my father up to northern germany where we met Burkhardt to pick up the chassis. First of all we had to move some stones and other stuff to get into the barn, and there it was - a nice S14, same year of build like my old one, same colour. It ran for 50.000km and was sitting in the barn for 8 years waiting fo me to get picked up and become a drift car :)

Martin

Dotz Drift Battle 2010 @ Sosnova Czech Republic

2010-07-13T13:09:00.000-07:00

i was really looking forward to this event, because lots of friends from Hungary, slovakia, the czech republic and even from norway came.

The track was nice, and the organisation was amazing. 5 Cameras on the track with life footage to a huge video screen and a beatbox champion commenting on the microphone.

we arrived on friday in the afternoon for some practice runs, and i really liked the track.

VIDEO: 2 practice laps
VIDEO: 1 more practice lap

And on Saturday it happened :(

i was initiatind my drift in a practice run in 3rd gear on the limiter. I went sideways to the outside clipping zone and lifted the throttle for too long. The car straightened at a speed of over 100 km/h and 7 - 9 m before the wall. I tryed to brake but i hit the wall pretty hard.

Afterwards i had really hard headache, and a sore neck. So i went to the doctor who diagnosed a brain concussion and whiplash.

Because i just can´t stay at home i went to see my car today, and undo some of the damaged parts. And even here i didnt have luck and cut myself through a leather glove deeply in my hand.

This week some chassis specialists will have a look at my car and see if its repairable. Unfortunately it will take a lot of time until i can afford the repair and all the parts :/

Martin

Nissan Sportscar Trackday

2010-07-02T09:45:00.000-07:00

Nissan Sportscar had a nice trackday at a small airport near Munich. Cars for the day were 370Z´s with M/T and A/T and a GT-R.

It was a very hot day with 32°C and the tires of the cars had a hard life;) Unfortunately we were not allowed to swich off the ESP. And thats the only thing on the car i really dont like. The ESP starts correcting very early and very long.

Now im preparing my drift car for a road trip with Axel Mack to the Dotz Drift Battle in CZ.

Meet the Driftking @ Impuls Arena Augsburg

2010-06-18T06:30:00.000-07:00

On Sunday, 13th of June, we had a drift demo / show and fun competition on a bis soccer stadium in Augsburg City.

The event was meant to be a pilot project to see if we can run a drift event right in the middle of a city regarding the noise restriction.

It was good fun even though we had to wet the area in the afternoon. We also did a new world record in (let´s call it) mass donuting. 39 cars drifting a small circle at once.

after the event i fabricated a catch tankt for the gear box breather pipe, because there is always a bit of oil dripping out. Next step will be a new and bigger brake system.

i know it was just a show, but the track was so slippery that i had to run very low tire pressure, i dont like drifting without grip :)

3, 2, 1 .... startooo

POV Video

2010-05-24T22:47:00.000-07:00

i filmed with my helmet camera and cut something together, check it out on Vimeo in HD:

VIDEO: TurboGrinch @ Hockenheim POV

1st event in 2010

2010-05-23T13:31:00.000-07:00

The Sport Auto Drift Challenge is the most famous and the biggest drift event in germany.

This year it was the first drift event for me in my drift car, and i was not able to test it before. I knew it will take some time to get used to the new gear ratios, but i didnt expect to have more problems.

The day before qualifying i had no handbrake and a stuck rear brake calipper. Luckily i managed to repair it in time, just to find out that my boost sensor is doing some strange things and it felt like i was missing about 100bhp. Not enough even the clutch started slipping in 4th gear after a hard clutch kick. The electrical problems could be solved with my mates Laptop.

All these little bugs became 1 big, and was out of training. qualyfied 19th out of 72. NOT statisfying to me.

here is a short video of some entrys i practiced:
VIDEO: practice run

pushing harder and harder and then too hard :) went a bit off the track and had a small impact.

the next day we had some Demo runs and some hours of practice. I was so happy to get proper track time, and the only reason why i left the car in slightly over 2 hours, was because i had to change the tires. Lots of practice laps later and i felt comfortable again.

a demo run on red smoke tires:

HKS gearbox

2010-05-10T00:56:00.000-07:00

some asked me to take a video of how the gearbox sounds and works. To be honest, the sound quality is poor, but it should be okay to see how it works.

im still running in the engine, so i was running a medium boost setting.

VIDEO: HKS gearbox

german press release of the DTM weekend

2010-04-29T01:54:00.000-07:00

Deutschsprachige Drifter im Dauereinsatz bei der DTM!

Am Wochenende startete die DTM mit Ihrem Auftaktrennen am Hockenheimring in die nächste Saison. Mit den neuen Mercedes-Piloten Michael Schumacher und David Coulthart weht auch ein neuer Wind durch die Marteking-Abteilung.

Denn in diesem Jahr griff Mercedes-Benz zum ersten Mal während ihrer "Experience-World" auf deutschsprachige Drifter zu.

Carola Mecan, Markus Millitzer, Martin Reinsch, Gabor Csabi, und Dino Rockstroh, allesamt durch die "International Drift Series" gestählte Drifter, sowie Weltrekord-Drifter Harald Müller fuhren unermüdlich Gäste von Mercedes-Benz auf einem hochdynamischen Parcours. Vorgestellt dabei wurde den "Taxi-Gästen" die neue Mercedes-Benz E-Klasse u. a. mit dem neuesten Top-Modell 500 e als T-Modell (Kombi).

Neben viel Rauch, Gummi und Emotionen gabs auch Wissenswertes, so stellten die Fahrer während der heißen Runden auch die Sicherheits- bzw. Komfortfeatures der neuen E-Klasse vor. "Es macht uns ganz außerordentlich stolz, für eine solche Veranstaltung berücksichtigt worden zu sein, denn das zeigt, das die Drifter langsam aber sicher als ernstzunehmender Partner im Motorsport Ihre Akzeptanz finden." so Harry Müller.

Dieses neue Konzept von Adrenalinschub und Informationen war genau nach dem Geschmack der Drifter, die nun auch Ihr Können evtl. während der Formel 1 bei einer erneuten "Experience-World" unter Beweis stellen dürfen.

a weekend at Hockenheim

2010-04-27T04:02:00.000-07:00

last weekend, i´ve been hired by mercedes to do some taxi and demo rides for the DTM spectators. I was so happy to have a comfortable car with aircondition at this superhot weekend.

right now im preparing for our first testing session and the first event this year. The Sport Auto Tuner GP & Drift Challenge. Its the biggest drift event in germany with more than 20000 spectators.

Magazine

2010-04-15T05:00:00.000-07:00

The Auto Bild Sportscar made a report about the IDS Series in 2010.

HKS gearbox installed

2010-04-11T08:09:00.000-07:00

yesterday i took the car to Seifert Performance to put the new HKS gearbox in.

It was a straight plug & play appart from the gearbox mount. We made a custom mount and i will check if the rb25 or Z32 mounts will fit.

On the way home i did the first 110 miles with the new box. Not that noisy like expected, only the gear changes are a bit noisy, but thats fine.

first roll out in 2010

2010-04-03T11:52:00.000-07:00

the snow is gone and i´ve got both S14´s back on the road.

the daily S14 got some new 245 summer shoes, and the drift car needs some more cruises to run in the rebuild engine.

the new HKS gearbox will be mounted within the next week. After that i will raise the boost a little bit and hit the 600Nm mark later this year ;)

carnival drift matsuri

2010-02-13T20:55:00.000-08:00

and again i came in my daily driver for some fun on the Hockenheimring.

It was around -5°C all day long but so much fun with a lot of different drivers, and very crazy track conditions - snow, ice, water, oil - pretty much everything.

Drift Demo @ ABF expo Hannover

2010-02-01T23:10:00.000-08:00

My friends company Driftworld did a Drift Demo at the ABF show on the Expo Hannover.

My car for the weekend was a E39 M5. I really liked the 5.0l V8 and the handling of the car.

We did a show for slightly over 20000 spectators on one weekend.
VIDEO: my onboard footage
VIDEO: some practice footage

Drift Matsuri Nürburgring

2010-01-02T23:48:00.000-08:00

2nd of january we had a small drift matsuri at the Nürburgring GP-Track. As my drift car still had the engine rebuild i went in my bone stock daily driver and had some really good fun out there.

the rebuild

2009-12-16T18:44:00.000-08:00

after i did the motorshow essen, i decited to rebuild my engine. We took it off the car and some new bearings came in, that i can really upping the boost in 2010 ;)

Essen Motorshow 2009

2009-12-03T14:30:00.000-08:00

The Essen Motorshow is the bigges car & tuning show in germany.

As part of the Sport Auto Drift Team i was invited to run a indoor drift show during the show.

VIDEO: Motorshow Essen drift demo
VIDEO: TV-report
VIDEO: Motorshow Essen Drift demo 2

2009 season summary

2009-11-15T15:36:00.000-08:00

All in all i finished 12th in the IDS Pro championship, wich is not statisfying. I am okay with it, because after round 3 my personal targed was, to stay in the top16 and stay qualified for 2010. However doing only 4 out of 7 rounds, getting a 3-point penalty and blowing 6 gearboxes and 2 drive shafts / axles the 12th place is not too bad for me.

For 2010 i definately need a stronger gearbox :)

A big thanks to my supporters Seifert Performance and ZEX Tuning and of course to my Dad for helping me out a lot.

IDS the final

2009-11-01T22:48:00.000-08:00

The IDS final and the Falken European Drift Final were at the same track like round 4 - the faster part of the Nürburgring GP-track.

I was very happy that some of the english drifters came over.

The first trainings was good, i early noticed im faster than most of the other cars so i raised the tire pressure.

Qualification was okay, not really smooth but okay and i was happy with my 10th position.

My first oponent was Michael Scherr, a german driver in a 300ZX. I was happy to have him as my oponent because our cars weight about the same and are running similar power.
But then again, i struggled with the speed difference, because Micha ran out of tires and had to use some cheapish 205 tires. I tryed to overtake him on the grass and spun.

In this picture i already spun about 180° and i was still right behind him :)

VIDEO: first half of the battle against Micha
congratulations to Micha, i was really happy for him, because he is one of the drivers who just enjoys drifting and a really nice person :thumb up:

In the Falken Final my first oponent was a guy from Finnland in a turbocharged E36 M3. To be honest i was a little bit scared, because they were good.
I won this battle 6:4 and 7:3 and made my way to compete against Big Remmo in his 400bhp-V8-powered E30. It started to rain slightly and i knew Remmo is fast so i lowered the tire pressure again.
I was surprised that i could do a 5:5 against one of the best drifters from europe in the first run. In the second run the judges scored it 5:5 again but they had to make a decision because we ran out of time. So Remmo won because i made the a small mistake in the second run. Good feeling to nearly do the even against on of your role models :)

VIDEO: big Remmo vs. me

some really cool picture were taken by Ross from Doristars - take a look at his website: www.doristars.com

and two more videos:
VIDEO: some of my own footage
VIDEO: very nice footage from Pascal Aachen

IDS rd. 6

2009-10-10T23:20:00.000-07:00

was a round on a racetrack i have never been to - the Lausitzring. It is a super modern race track where the indycar series used to race in the past.

We had our own pits, with heater, toilet, showers and more luxury, than we ever had before.

Also the track layout was mega cool. We were doing 200 kph entrys just to see how fast we can go and also very fast 4th gear drifts through some banked corners.

The judget section was a very long and technical section including about 7 corners. And in training we were allowed to drift the whole entire track wich meanes you could kill a brand new set of tires in less than 2 laps :)

As much as i liked the Track, as much i was annoyed after i destroyed my gearbox before the qualification. Bad luck, but it seemed that im running slightly too much power for the standart gearboxes.

This was in the Oil, when i released it:

And this is a picture of my 3rd gear - not only 1 toot left:

that was gearbox number 6 so far.

But i shure i will be back at this really nice track!

my drift car in the Forza game

2009-10-07T12:14:00.000-07:00

one of the Users from our driftforum has designed my ca in the Forza computergame - looks pretty good.

VIDEO: my S14 in Forza

road trip to England - JDM Allstars final

2009-09-07T12:06:00.000-07:00

a friend of mine bought a car in england, so i organized a little road trip. We took the plane to London, were picked up from the airport in a big new Jaguar XJR.

and here is the scooby :)

after we picked his car up, we visited some friends and their shops and watched the final of the JDM Allstars series before we started our trip back home - 1300km.

IDS rd. 5

2009-08-30T12:03:00.000-07:00

was held without me. I was just to annoyed of all the crazy decisions and the devious things wich happened under some drivers.

my second S14

2009-08-22T11:55:00.000-07:00

a friend of mine was selling his S14. It was in mint condition with very low milage and i just could´nt withstand.

Here it is, my new daily driver - a ´95 S15 in bone stock condition.

of course it has to be tested properly and wich track would be better than the Nürburgring?

the fastest lap time i recorded was a 9:01 in a standart S14 with 200bhp :)

IDS rd. 4

2009-07-19T21:21:00.000-07:00

the car was repaired and ready for the 4th round at the lower course at the Nürburgring GP track. A very fast track - apex speeds thru the "Schumacher-S" were at around 120 - 125 kph.

I really liked that track, but had technical problems again (broken gearbox and a snapped drive shaft / axle). In the qualification i blew a boost pipe off and only did 1 qualification lap - enough to qualify on 6th position.

I lost my first Battle against one of the polish guys. He simply overtook me in the first run on the inside. There was nothing i could do as my tires were cold and i washed out. An agressive but fair maneuver - drifting should always be like this!

3 days after the event i´ve received a phone call from the IDS orga telling me i got a 3 or 4 point penatly because i only did 1 instead of 3 qualification runs.

Okay thats it, im out of this stupid series - i was so upset about what drifting became in germany. Other drivers complaining and asking for penaltys for nothing - that no fun!

Sport Auto Drift Challenge / Tuner GP

2009-06-27T22:45:00.000-07:00

every year this is one of the biggest events. In 2009 it had nothing to do with the IDS and it was a "just for fun" event.

And thats what i had - fun.

we did single drift runs, twindrifting and drift trains - everything that is fun and the crow wanted to see.

VIDEO: brilliant HD footage from 2Pmedia
VIDEO: group drifting
VIDEO: entry :)
VIDEO: another entry

and my favourite shot:

IDS rd. 3

2009-06-21T11:01:00.000-07:00

was together with the famous Recaro Days at the nurburgring. Because i liked the track that much last year i was very excitd to got there again this year.

Some guys from the Moscow Drift Team came all the way - nearly 3000km - to drift with us.

And my car had boost and gearbox problems. The first "no contest" for me in 2009

Thats not all the bad news. I still had not seen only 1 cent from my main sponsor. some weeks later i found out that he went bankrupt with his company.

IDS rd. 2

2009-06-07T23:30:00.000-07:00

was a Track i have never been to before - Oschersleben. The track layout was one of the trickyest i have ever driven, a very fast and very long left hand corner with 3 apexes. Entry speed was about 150 - 160 kph, and apex speed was around the 120kph mark.

I had so much fun in the practice and was raising the boost to 1,3 bar over the day.

qualifyed on place 6.

no twindrifting!
it started to rain during the qualification and the organisation decited not to run twinbattles because it was wet and slippery.
We all had to run a second qualifying again and these places counted.

I was so upset about this decision, that i was thinking of stopping driving there.

VIDEO: random footage of Oschersleben
VIDEO: mash up from Alok
VIDEO: random footage of the whole event

IDS rd. 1

2009-05-24T23:44:00.000-07:00

Nürburgring, the famous 24h race and the IDS was part of it. On a tight track in th FSZ1 we hade fully 3 days of drifting.

the main thing to me was test the new engine setup, the differen suspension setup and see if the car handles well. - it did :) Even though i was only running 1,1 bar of boost because the track was pretty slow.

The judging in the single rund (qualification) was done in 2 sections, one with 75 points and a smaller section with 25 points. The Judge who was judging the smaller section gave me a the worst score i have gever get. But thats what i was used to in the 1st round of a pro series.
Luckily the Judges in the main section knew what they were doing 74 points with a mega entry were enough to qualify. Also the Driftbox was part of the judging.

Ogien from poland was the name of my first oponent - like it was very often in the past season.

VIDEO: inboard footage of the qualification runs

and my favourit picture of the weekend - Big Remmo applauding in the rear:

qualification: place 9 - i lost the first battle and took place 9 home with me.

Not that lucky was Dino, a friend of mine who crashed into some gantrys and damaged his car pretty hard.

a big Hammer, some cable ties and 1 intercooler later the car was running again.

the IDS Pro search

2009-03-22T10:07:00.000-07:00

was an interesting event held in hockenheim at the paddocks. I was honestly a little bit shocked after i saw, that the IDS orga gave 45 Pro driver spots to 46 drifters. It was´nt really a pro search as everyone became Pro because 1 driver was disqualified.

got boost?

2009-03-03T07:48:00.000-08:00

back from the states and freshly inspired i took my car to Seifert Performance to get it mapped from RNT

i actually wanted to get the car mapped at 1,8 bar of boost. but unfortunately the fuel pump died in the mapping session after we hit the 1,5 bar mark. But that was okay, the car was fast enough and had a lot of torque.

It did the 100 - 200 kp/h in 9,4 sec. @ 28°C temp. and the big GT-wing on it. Thats faster than a Lamborghini Gallardo Superleggera :)

trip to the united states of america

2009-02-21T05:51:00.000-08:00

After all the work on the car was finished (appart from mapping) i went to the USA to watch NYC and some of the US drifting and of course some sightseeing.

bullriding :)

Brooklyn Bridge from the Hilton Millenium 52th floor:

times square:

statue of liberty:

emire state building from the top of the rockefella center:

on the other side - the central park:

big cat :)

and squirrel wrestling:

and now the car part:

Matt Walding (Formula D)

B-Rad (Formula D)

from IDC to IDS

2009-02-06T10:36:00.000-08:00

after a lot of discussions and trouble the name IDC changed into IDS with a slitghly new organisation.

I normally dont really care about names or politics and was happy to start into a new season and see whats coming up.

Unfortunately the sponsorship with my tiresponsor endet because of the economic crisis. So i had to find myself a new sponsorship wich was not easy. With a little bit of help of the IDS organisation i found a new sponsor and were able to start into the new season.

new power for my car

2009-02-03T16:50:00.000-08:00

After finishing the 2008 season with such a good result it was obvious that my car needs more power.

A lot of modifications together with a nice Garrett GT 30/71r should give me what i need.

with a lot of help from my Sponsors Seifert Performance and ZEX Tuning i finished all the work on my car in time.

2008 season summary

2008-12-23T15:36:00.000-08:00

i started into the season and wanted to know if im able to compete in the pro level.

At the end of the year i finished on position 7 overall (2nd in the german ranking) and did all that with a fully street legal daily usable 280 bhp car. Even though the judging from round one and my "no contest" at round two i managed this result, wich makes me happy.

For the season 2009 i wanted to go for more power.

IDC Finals

2008-11-02T22:30:00.000-08:00

A massiv flu and immense headache i had and did´nt really want to go all the way to Brüstem in Belgium. But i had to because i wanted to know my position at the end of the season.

So i travveled nearly 700km in my drift car with a bunch of tires next to me.

The Track was really nice rough tarmac, very fast i really would have enjoyed it, if there were not the flu.

Some fancy medicine made me stay up and do the qualification - place 12 was what i got no idea wich line i took, or how fast i went :)

My Oponent number 1 was Ogien, the polish vice Champion in his M5 powered 400bhp-E36. The first battle was 6:4 / 4:6 and the "one more time" run was tight 6:4 / 6:4 to me. This was a really hard and tight but a fair fight.

lucky i was when i got out of my car and take some medicine again - but i had no medicine for my next battle agains (Big) Remmo Niezen. Remmo is imho definately one of the very best european drifter and a learned a lot of him.

After loosing the first run where i nearly overtook him in the first section and doing a mistake in section 2 i decited to link the two sections wich left foot braking instead of using the handbrake. I just wanted to show Remmo that i practiced the left foot braking - and messed it up right infront of him with a nice spin, d´oh.

Anyway i felt better after Remmo said that i was one of the fastest on this track.

and some video footage of the weekend: random footage of the IDC final 2008

IDC rd. 6

2008-10-18T23:55:00.000-07:00

After all this little successes i thought i should finish the IDC championship and see what i can get. Luckily i found a Sponsorship wich supported me with brand new tires and so my car got a new outfit with a lot of funky stickers :)

Hungary was the next place to be - A nice carting track near Budapest was our next target.

After a very long trip without sleeping we had some nice trainings with the hungarian drifters.

We put all Pro Drivers together for qualification, so there were nearly 70 drifters fighting for the top16.
Judging was very interesting, because 2/3 were judged by the driftbox score and 1/3 was judged by a team of international judges (line and style)
My overall result was position 4 (IDC 3) wich was not too bad. But i had the advantage to practice with the driftbox in the past so i knew how to get a good score = massive angle.

My first oponent in hungary was Alex Gräff, another german drifter in a V8 powered E28. After having a massive advantage in the first run by 8:2 for me i took it easy in the 2nd run. I struggles to keep the low speed alex was going and spun in the last corner - damn!

the new look of my car:

Krsko Avto Magazin Drift Pokal reloadet

2008-10-18T04:35:00.000-07:00

We just had to go there again. So many nice people, good drifters and a cool racetrack.

So we went to the Finals of the Avto Magazin Drift pokal in 2009.

The Judging ist a bit different over here:
Top16 = 4 runs and 3 out of them will be judged
Top8 = 4 runs and all 4 will be judged - no mistake allowed ;)
after that twin battles.

I qualifyed into the top 16, and messed it up then endet up taking place 8 for me. But the big Final was the night drifting. We had to qualify again wich i did with brand new grippy tires on the rear and did a 100 point run - awesome tires!

My first oponent was the austrian vice champion in a 360bhp E30 - a lighter car and more Power than me - i was a bit excited. But took the advantage of my tires and won 7:3 and 7:3.

Nest one pleas :) Here he was Cimpo the slowenian champion and a very agressive drifter in a highly modifyed E36 M3. Okay i just tryed my best and spun out in the 2nd corner - next run was a 8:2 but im shure Cimpo did´nt fully attack .

VIDEO: Avto Magazin Drift Pokal 2008

IDC rd. 5

2008-08-05T00:02:00.000-07:00

Recaro Tuning Days at the Nürburgring was our 5th round. We were dirving the Mercedes Arena on the GP-Track against the normal direction. That meaned a long 3rd gear uphill section with only 280bhp.

But i really liked the track layout and qualified 3rd overall with 1 point missind to the 2nd :)
VIDEO: one top 3 qualification run

My first oponent at the Nürburgring was no one else than Berend van Berkel in his widebody M3 GTR. Unfortunately my reartires were already falling appart in the warm up lap and i was not allowed to change them. So i was a bit angry and put the pressure on Berend. That worked out, i won the first battle.

round 2 - fight!
Oponent number 2 was Paul the Driftking Vlasblom again. Remember: he tricked me at rd. 3, and i wanted to win this battle :D
In the warm up i was not drifting, and in the first rund i was leading doing a massive backwards entry (no left foot braking) but that was just right, Paul struggled and had to stop his drift for a short time, but he got back manjiing the uphill section and nearly crashed into my passenger dor.
Run 2 was 7:3 for Paul because i thought first run was a 10:0 for me, because he stopped drifting and nearly crashed into me.
BUT the Judges decited Paul won - even Paul said this must have been a "one more time".
All in all this was still statisfying to me, because Paul ist one of the most experienced drifters in Europe and i just saw a little chance and will continue here the next time :)

Overall Result for me was 6th position again and i had a great weekend with good battles.

In the Championship points table i moved up to Rank 9 "Hell yeah im in the TOP10!" :)

Drift Demo @ Reisbrennen 2008

2008-07-27T03:51:00.000-07:00

The Orga-Team of the Reisbrennen meeting asked me to do a drift show for their huge jap-car meeting.

Unfortunately the show was cancelled after about 20 minutes because we were too loud.

But hey, lets go for some 1/8 mile drag racing instead :)
VIDEO: 1/8 mile drift record

IDC rd. 4

2008-07-06T23:55:00.000-07:00

the Yokohama Tuningdays at Hockenheim were the place where our 4th round was held. Typical for hockenheim there was a huge crowd and lots of spectators.

I managed to qualify 7th and my first oponent was Ogien, a very aggressive Drifter from Poland in a 5l V8 Powered E36.
VIDEO: some practice runs
VIDEO: qualification

VIDEO: warm up lap
VIDEO: the first run
VIDEO: the second run

After i won this battle my next oponent was Frank van Heeren from Holland.
In the first run i had a 6:4 advantage but spun out in the second run:
VIDEO: the second and last run

The 4th round found an end with me on place 6 overall. With the result of rd. 3 i joined the top 16 of a pro series for the first time in my life - ranked as number 12.

IDC rd. 3

2008-06-21T21:30:00.000-07:00

The 3rd round of the IDC was just around the corner and i went there because i already payed the fee for the whole year.

It was a very very hot summer day and i felt very confident on the small track.

Qualified 16th and my first battle oponent was no one else then the Driftking.nl - Paul Vlasblom.
VIDEO: qualification

Paul tricked me in the first corner but even without that he would have won.

To me it was a good thing because i noticed i did a lot of twindrift practice in the past - but i never practiced entrys in battle situations. 1:0 for Paul, but i will be back ;)

After this event there was a huge discussion about the judges and from rd. 4 on there will be new judges.

some more practice

2008-06-15T22:30:00.000-07:00

instead of concentrating on the IDC i did some small practice and broke some wheel studs on this event.

Luckily a friend of mine and his girlfirend were there too, the same one who gave her Skyline to me in the year before. Now she had a nice FD3S twin turbo RX7 - and i couldnt say no drifting this thing :)

IDC rd. 2

2008-05-20T06:17:00.000-07:00

i did not compete in the second round because i was still so upset about the worse judging from rd. 1.

IDC rd. 1

2008-05-10T23:10:00.000-07:00

was held at Hockenheim together with the biggest time attack event the "Sport Auto Tuner GP"

I managed to repair my engine (worn cams and rocker arms) and run it in on the way to the competition - yeah my car was still road legal and i used to go to the events in my drift car.

In the competition i had some really good runs but the judges had no idea about drifting unfortunately and so they preferred famous names and female drivers lol.
VIDEO: qulification

some high speed dirt dropping:

the IDC Pro Search

2008-03-29T22:30:00.000-07:00

was the day i had to proof im good enough.

i did not to bad in the first 2 of 3 parts, but were not able to start in the 3rd part because i had engine trouble wich i could´nt fix within the short time.
VIDEO: pro search

but who cares - i managed to get the IDC Pro licence :)

Engstingen Season start 2008

2008-03-16T21:45:00.000-07:00

The year 2008 i wanted to see if my drift skills are enough for the european Pro level, but nothing without a first beginning of the year practice :)

testing the new steering lock:

and some tandem practice could be helpful :D

Drift for Aid

2007-10-28T23:20:00.000-07:00

a friend of mine organized a charity drift event where all the money went to help kids fighting agains cancer.

and in a friends skyline:

Brithday drifting :)

2007-10-07T05:41:00.000-07:00

on my birthday i joined a drift event at Hockenheim.

Krsko Avto Magazin Drift Pokal

2007-09-29T22:30:00.000-07:00

that was my weekend :)

We were invited to the Final of the Avto Magazin Drift Pokal at Krsko Raceland in Slowenia. I did pretty good the whole weekend and became 4th overall with just 1 Point missing to the 3rd.
My best competition result so far - and the guys over there really can drive, so that is a well remembered 4th place.

VIDEO: Avto Magazin Drift Pokal 2007

this is one of my favourit drift pictures ever:

Drit Challenge Wachauring reloadet

2007-08-18T14:29:00.000-07:00

a bit of challenge was needet again so we went back to the int. Drift Challenge at the Wachauring.

Tuttlingen Airport - evil drifters

2007-08-11T05:14:00.000-07:00

I signed in for a drift practice at a huge airport near Tuttlingen.

It turned out to become a high speed entry competition between my mate Dino and me. My top Entry Speed was 185kph on the speedo.
VIDEO: Tuttlingen Drift Day
VIDEO: Tuttlingen mash up

Wachauring D-Day #2

2007-07-07T05:17:00.001-07:00

after the great success of our first drift day at the Wachauring we decited to do it again, and here it was 07.07.07 was the date of Drift :)

Wachauring D-Day #1

2007-05-01T05:09:00.000-07:00

The Driftblog-Team planned a very very big drift day at the Wachauring in Autria.

And what can i say - it was awesome! Brilliant weather LOTS of drifters and more than enough track time for everyone.

Teesdorf practice day

2007-04-08T17:05:00.000-07:00

Teesdorf is a nice and small track in Austria where i traveled to as our next event.

I was totally sick this weekend, but it was a gread day and i could improove my drifting a little bit more.

2007 the year of the drift

2007-03-23T05:00:00.000-07:00

In 2007 i wanted to do as much drift events as i could afford.

Also with our new website: we planned to organize some drift events.

It all started in March with a Driftblog Practice day at the Sachsenring.

after the challenge

2006-10-02T01:48:00.000-07:00

i met some new friends at the drift challenge in austria, one of them was no one else than Zax, the croatian drift king.

He invited me and my friends Dino and Dimitri to come over for a drift weekend at a very very nice carting track near Zagreb.

here is a picture of Zax´ and my car at the drift challenge austria:

the first drift challenge

2006-08-28T16:36:00.000-07:00

After a lot of different drift practice days on the Sachsenring, Boxberg and the Wachauring in austria i decited to sign in for the first drift challenge in my life.

The international Drift Challenge at the Wachauring in austria.
I have been very exited and was even more happy after doing a Top10 finish in my class.

D1GP exhibition match at Silverstone

2006-06-21T04:57:00.000-07:00

The stars of the drifting szene came to Silverstone for an exhibition match.

Luckily i could get a VIP-ticket and meet all the famous faces know from different Videos :)

It was amazing to see them and their machines.

Croatian Drift Weekend

2006-05-12T05:22:00.000-07:00

We went to Novi Marof near Zagreb to have one of the most fun Drift Days ever.

It is a huge carting track and perfect for drifting.

VIDEO: Novi Marof Drift Day
VIDEO: Novi Marof Drift Day II

the first steps in drifting

2005-07-02T20:41:00.000-07:00

over the year i did some more practice days and started working on my drifting skills and on my S14 aswell.

All the parts wich were required were fitted on my car: Nismo L.S.D., Tein Suspension, and other more and less importand parts.

Neuburg Drift Day

2005-06-06T10:04:00.000-07:00

I have organized a little drift practice at a Airport near my house. But after we have been drifting there - the whole day for free - the Airport decited no more drifting in future.

a little bit of Nürburgring

2005-04-25T05:28:00.000-07:00

i also still did some so called tourist laps on the old Nürburgring over the whole year.

my first official drift practice

2005-01-24T18:36:00.000-08:00

Some friends of the famous OPT Drift Club in England invited me to come over and visit them at Silverstone.

In january i jumped into the plane and had a nice week at Silverstone, Milton Keynes and Northampton with the OPT guys.

After some little lessons by Brett Castle in a borrowed S13 i decited thats what i wanna do with my S14 when im back home :)

- Martin

how i got into drifting

2004-12-24T14:32:00.000-08:00

i have bought my S14 in 2002 and started making it faster. After a couple of trips to the Nürburgring i noticed that the art of going sideways is something i need to learn because its so much fun.

Over the years i did some first try outs in the local industrial area.

- Martin

Hi and welcome to my new blog

2004-10-07T04:07:00.000-07:00

my old blog and my old website are not working anymore so i started a new blos on here.

stay tuned for some actual drifting news and my trips all around the world.

- Martin