Another Glance at Final Bout
I do like drifting. But the real reason I still go to these events has little to do with the cars, or the driving. To Me, camping is the good life. Out under the stars, the sounds of wind, sweeping through the trees, the lack of sirens, which never stop at home in the city. Race tracks aren’t exactly what most people think of when You say camping, but they’re a great alternative to the many popular parks, which are often booked full, or only offer a gravel parking lot full of other people and claim it’s a camp site… Usa International Raceway has, for many years, been My go to camping track. I first pitched a tent here in 2006 and have been happy to do so at least once a year since. It’s not a secluded hike in camp, nor is there a waterfall to soothe the senses. Though it is pretty sweet waking up to wailing engines and screaming tires.
Naturally, I took the time to shoot the stars on both nights this Final Bout weekend. This after all, is what I love to do most… Don’t mind the terrible video quality, tis the way of things when You get free hosting. If You watch it on Vimeo’s site, it will look a little bit better. Just don’t expect it to be great.
I would like to point out how lucky we were, or how lucky this guy was anyways. To survive without a fiery melt down. There was once a Hyundai Genesis that went up in flames and burned til it was no more than a pile of metal at this track. Though it would’ve made great pictures to see this s14 burn, I’m happy it didn’t. Please note, the flamable liquid flowing from behind the door for the gas cap!
Though My goal for the weekend was to capture as much carnage as possible, I didn’t get any. I even missed Tim slamming his car in to the back of Fish. Which looks to have ended the life of Tim’s s13 and delt a fair amount of damage to Fish’s freshly built Boss Datsun Camaro Rocket Mustang Silvia Bunny, or whatever the hell You’d call it. And so, in the absence of destruction of whole cars, here are a few more views of tires being ravaged by horsepower and tarmac. Among other things.
Final Bout: Round Two
The most anticipated drift event of the year has come and gone. Three days of hanging out with drivers, their significant others, media people and random car junkies from all over the continent. The competition seemed to take back stage to the over all sentiment of fun and friendship. I had a great night hanging out with My old friends, the Vatos and Anonymous Gangster crew. Twas also great to run in to one of the raddest characters in the midwest scene, another old buddy by the name of Derek King. Meeting the fine ladies and gents that are ShaDynasty again was also quite rad. I drool quite heavily when seeing their cars! No one else is sliding such stylish machines and if they try, it’s doubtful they would be half as awesome. Though that’s likely a personality thing… Special thanks to Stevie and Ben from Dirty Love, for helping Me out through out the weekend. Many thanks to the king pin of the midwest drift scene, Phill Lee (Grip Gambler), for making these events happen. Those of us who have been around for a long time know that without Phill, Maggie and the rest of the ClubFR family, the midwest drift scene may never have left the streets for these greener pastures we find ourselves on now. All of the other organizers in the region owe their position to You guys and I’m thankful to have been able to watch it all happen over the years.
As for the event it’s self, the trophy still resides in Chicago. Though it changed hands, with the v8 chorus of High Fade being eliminated before the semifinal round. Another eclectic crew, draped in red, rallied late and threw down their best run, claiming the win. Congrats to the guys of Risky Devil, Final Bout Champions. Nevermind the fact that at least one, if not more of Your cars were totaled by the end of the weekend. You’ve got a nice, cheap, trophy to stare at for a year while contemplating what to do about the vehicles…
I don’t function well in the heat, so I was quite lazy about shooting all weekend. I missed a lot of the action and then went home pretty early on sunday, missing more action…
I’m actually going to split this in to two posts. The bulk of which will be in this one. But, I shot a few time lapses and did some night shooting over the weekend, so that will come, with a bit more drifting, in the second round. Until then, here are four hundred and twenty views from the weekend.
Drift Day Midwest: Version 53
This wasn’t My best outing on the photography end of things. I usually snap 1200, to 1800 pictures at each event. But, this time I only managed 327. Fortunately, the number of decent shots was higher than the usual 15%. Some how nearly half of the pictures I took turned out decent enough to post. Though I still need to take the time to take pictures of people, which is something I rarely ever do… I stayed up all night drinking whiskey and shooting the stars. Finally getting around to pitching My tent at 5am, proceeding to sleep for less than two hours and spending the first chunk of the day quite drunk. I think I did pretty well, all things considered. Better than Maggie anyways! Along with the 140 shots of cars, here are a few views from the night before and a video of the 3 time lapses I shot over the weekend. As usual, Vimeo’s free hosting makes video look like garbage, but Ye get what You pay for I guess. Hit the “HD” button to see it in slightly better, but still quite poor quality. No there isn’t any audio, because it’s 3am and I would rather go to sleep… I will add the handfull of clips I shot riding along with people at a later date. However, as an added bonus, here’s a picture of Pat, looking angry…
Now that we’ve got that out of the way, on with the good stuff.
Drift Day Midwest: Version 51
Year twelve of ClubFR’s Drift Day events has begun. I’ve gone to about half of them and always had a good time.. It was great to see so many familiar faces and spend some time talking to friends from far away! DD51 was a bit odd for Me though. I was very lazy for the first half of the day and then managed to snap off almost three thousand pictures in about four hours. It wasn’t the best day photography-wise. I shot a lot with sunglasses, which always makes for bright pictures. My success rate was pretty low too, only 1 in 10 pictures was acceptable. I probably should have done some editing, a few of these got darkened/brightened, but this is pretty much how they were shot.
Below is a pair of short time lapses I shot before the track went hot and during the lunch break. Because I love shooting time lapses… After that, is the 300ish pictures that weren’t too blurry to post. :) May load slowly!
Final Bout
ClubFR came up with a truly great event, which promises to be the continent’s most beloved annual drift spectacle. Teams from coast to coast, north to south, gathered in a small town in rural Wisconsin. Unlike most drift events, this was a battle of teams, as opposed to individual drivers. The stage was set at My favorite track, USA International Raceway, known to most as UsaIR. A hilly, winding cart track located just outside of the town of Shawano. To those of us from the midwest drifting comunity, this place is also called the rollercoaster of love. Now, the love has been shared with a selection of crews from far beyond our region. I hope they all enjoyed it and come back for more next year!
Never have I seen enough people to be called a crowd of spectators at this track, until now. They certainly got to see what they came for. Two days of tire shredding, wall riding and relentless attempts to get right up on the door of each other, the drivers in attendance left nothing on the table. The judges for the event were three heavy hitters, though one is more a regional legend, they were a good choice of respectable drifters. They narrowed down the field to four teams and after another run from each, made the verdict. Fourth place was taken by ShaDynasty, a crew from Washington State. In My opinion, the cars driven by these guys were the most interesting collection there. Third place was handed to regional heavy weights, Risky Devil, from Chicago. Second place went to the Hot Boyz, hailing from Alberta, Canada. They were outshining just about everyone on the first day, but a concrete barrier decided to intervene and change things up. The winners of the first annual Final Bout, team drift battle? High Fade, also from the Chicago area. They were very consistent all weekend. It looked to Me like they had been practicing team driving more than anyone else. Before launching for each run, the lead car would rev it’s engine twice and wait. The last car in line would then rev it’s engine once, signalling everyone was ready and off they went. Most of the crews ended up spreading out during their runs, but High Fade stayed together every time. Some may argue otherwise, but these guys earned the win for sure!
I was not on the media roster for this event, so this is not a complete coverage kind of post. In fact I spent half of the weekend working the entry gate, so I did miss an awful lot of the action. However, for Me, there is no such thing as going on a road trip and not taking a ton of pictures. Happily, the ClubFR family are friends of mine, so they thanked Me for helping out and let Me go do My photo geek thing for a while. Phill, Maggie, Simba, Ilia and the rest of the crew, thanks a bunch for coming up with the idea for this event and making it into reality! I had a great time and I’ll see You when I see You, hopefully that will be soon.
More to Come
This is a teaser… Though I spent half of My time at Final Bout working the gate, I did manage to get out on the track, as well as walk pit lane for a while. It will likely take a couple of days to sift through all of the pictures I took, so here is a little sample to gaze at until the rest finds it’s way here…
Another Cold, Windy and Wet Day at the Track
The first gathering in ClubFR’s 2014 season has come and gone. As expected, there were not a ton of entries. Even so, for the first time, I neglected to take pictures of every car on the track. Many of the guys were just starting to figure out how to keep their cars sliding. Another thing that I chose not to do so much was to point My camera at cars with missing body parts. After nearly a decade of shooting pictures at drift events, half dressed cars have gotten really boring. Making a day of one, 5 hour lap of the advanced course in the traditional UsaIR, dual track layout. Here is what some of what I got for You.
Please note, in the very last picture, the driver of the red BMW has his eyes closed!
Drift Day:Midwest, Season Finale
USA International Raceway, a cart track just outside of Shawano, Wisconsin. No carts are buzzing around the track today though, Drift Day Fourty-Six has arrived. The squealing and smoking of tires, rapidly burning through layers of rubber has come again. Lots of familiar faces and the rolling hills that this particular track is draped over, always make for a good time. The day started at 30 degrees and a thick fog lingered all around.
After an hour or two, the fog had lifted, but there was still an overcasting of grey clouds keeping the sun at bay. Heading indoors to warm up a bit, I ran into more Minnesotans and We did that which We do..
In the early afternoon, the temps were into the 40’s and the sun popped out for fifteen minutes or so, allowing time for a race of those with skateboards. Around half the oval at the top of the hill and down past the pits, through a couple of turns, to the lowest point of the track. There are also a few shots of some of the guys playing about on pit lane.
There were a few hours of clear running. As anticipated however, the rain began again. Half of the drivers kept drifting for a little bit, before people packed up and headed towards their hometowns. I ate a lot of ribs this weekend, from two different places. Not to mention hash browns, fries, fried chicken, bratwurst and a bags worth of dried meats and candy. I also bowled one of My best games, took a personal low number of five hundred pictures, while standing in the clouds of many, now destroyed tires and got to see a bunch of My friends that live hundreds of miles away from Me. Thanks to the homies at ClubFR for bringing these events together, year after year…
AutoMass Round 3
Another fine day in Chicago. AutoMass is a car show and drift event with a side of food trucks. It makes for quite an enjoyable gathering, which is no suprise considering ClubFR and Touge Factory are the organizers. I’ve been to many of the ClubFR drift events and have always had a great time. So, a perfect opportunity to test out My new Sigma 70-200 f/2.8 OS. It’s so nice to be able to get a reasonably close in shot of something that is more than 25 feet away. The spotty cloud cover was hard to work with, but here is a taste of what I got.
I didn’t actually eat a lot from the food trucks. I started the day at the Baby Cakes truck to take the edge off My hunger. I then had three varieties of delicous cupcakes from the friendly guy at the Chicago Cupcake truck. The strawberry shortcake cupcake was quite something, a crumbly bottom supporting a heavy cake, stuffed with what was almost like candied strawberries, but it wasn’t too sweet and topped with a nice creamy strawberry frosting. I’m usually a fan of light fluffy cupcakes, but the layers of texture and flavor offered in this one were just lovely.
There were also some tricksters, burning rubber and maneuvering about on their motorcycles. I was mostly impressed by the guy with a prosthetic leg, He wasn’t the weakest of the handful of riders there either. There was a couple doing some pretty rad stunts too, some of which were done at high speeds.
Looking Back: Clouds of Rubber
I was sifting through all of the 44,000 pictures I’ve taken since the end of 2008. I wish I still had the pictures I took before that, but they were lost years ago to hard drive failure. Food and drifting have been the main things that draw My lenses into action. The first sideways driving event I went to outside Minnesota, Drift Day 14(I think) in Joliet, Il, seems so long ago. So many good times spent around the midwest drift scene. Here’s a little blend of memories for all of You who are itching to get back out there this spring! These first 3 are courtesy of Opposition Keith at Kaizo Photo, from 2006-07. Leegro in the old ‘pink panther’ and Ryan Clemens in the last two incarnations of His s13. I just had to squeeze these in, since I did most My travelling with the TMFOpposition crew…
The rest of these I took at various events around the midwest. Thanks to all the people from around the scene for letting Me share in on the fun! What a great way to learn how to use My camera and become a photographer.
Drift Day 42 @ Shawano, WI
Ah,yes. Another journey to My favorite race track has occurred! I had never had a bad time at ‘UsaIR’. This time however, it was cold and perpetually raining. There was a lot of driving time for the 50+ entries. I’m sure they all saved some money on tires as well! For those of us standing out around the track, it was quite crappy. Just as the rain let up a bit, the wind kicked in. Drenched and wind-chilled, some of us tried to get some coverage of the action. Certainly the worst conditions that I have ever tried to ‘do photography’ in. I had to create a make-shift rain cover for My camera out of a trash bag and elected to use My old 450D, instead of risking the new 650D.. The majority of My shots came out terribly bad, like this. .. …
To Simba, Maggie and the rest of the Clubfr crew, as well as the drivers in attendance. Sorry, I didn’t get much worth looking at! It was just too bleak for Me! See You all in the spring!
Another Glance at Automass
And so, We are on the way…
We know how to eat on a long drive.. Sandwich anyone?
These next two pictures were taken by Kenda with My 450D.
We didn’t really hang out with any friends in Chicago. It was a bit of an ‘in and out’ type of venture. So on our way out, we made a point to drive up Lake Shore Drive. Sarah snapped these two from the car as We cruised along.
The following is perhaps the worst skyline photo in the land. However, it’s the only one we managed to get. Good job Sarah, through the back window of the car, in traffic. .. …
Automass, a day in Chicago…
Last weekend, I headed down to the Chicago area with My sister-in-law and two of Our friends for the second round of AutoMass. It was a car show, slash drift event, with a row of food trucks on the side. A proper recipe for an enjoyable day. Having not really planned the trip, We assembled ‘the crew’ for the weekend and hit the road, quite late. It had been two years since I made it out to see some drifting. I’m really glad I got to attend..
Back for More... 