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 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!
‘Fiddy’
Eleven years in the making. ClubFR has hosted their 50th Drift Day Midwest event. It was a kind of odd event. The roster was long and there were a lot of new faces out this time around. Possibly due to the popularity of Final Bout last month, also hosted at this track, by ClubFR. Whatever the reason, the number of drivers made for a pretty constant flow of drifting through out the day. I however stayed up the night before and did some photo shooting on the track. I have some more time lapses to put together and these could benefit from some editing, but here is a hasty slap job of what I was capturing that night. Apologies for the low quality of Vimeo’s free accounts, it looks a little better if You watch it on their site instead of mine, but not much..
These guys even had the great idea of printing up shirts, with a list of all 50 events. Well, DD43 is not there and they kind of failed, by not putting check boxes for people to mark the events they attended. Even so, it’s a great t-shirt, that I will enjoy having for years to come. I think these two will enjoy theirs as well.
On sunday morning, there was a quick drivers meeting and things got rolling. It was sunny and bright and I had forgotten to pack a polarizer, or neutral density filter. I tried My best to shoot things dark and spent a fair amount of time working My way around the track, to be on the sunny side of the action. It worked out, sometimes..
The day went along pretty well. There were a few people that got beached off track and somebody did spill a fair amount of oil on the advanced coarse, but that didn’t hold things up very much. After a couple hours of running, there was a short break and the traditional skateboard race was held. The winners actually got prizes too!
To add to the charm of this event, there were two big give-aways and a raffle. All three awarded the same prize, a season pass for the ClubFR 2015 drift season. Award number one, was fittingly given to Ben, a true ‘OG’ in the midwest drift scene. Considering he was at the first one of their events, as well as the majority of all subsequent events, it’s only fitting that free driver’s admission for a season goes his way. The second season pass handed out was the raffle. Every driver at the event that day, had their names written on paper and thrown in a hat. The winner? Jake! Who’s car is pictured at the very top of this post, among other places here. The last season pass, was not given to Billy Lemke, but instead to his wife, for putting up with all of the drifting antics and also as a wedding gift…
After those short festivities, the track went hot again and stayed that way all afternoon. There were a lot of people that were clearly very new to drifting, but there were some good drivers too. It has been a while since a drift day has drawn out such variety of skill levels. Recent years have had a sharp contrast of good/decent drivers and ameteur/beginner drivers. There was a distinct middle group that was kind of fun to watch at DD50. The bright sun eventually gave way to some clouds, I was struggling a bit to keep up with the constantly changing light all day. I did wander around and snap bunches of pictures until it was time to head back to Minnesota though.
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…
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…
Andor’s Traditional Ribs!
Yes! This is it! The ribs I served for several years at gatherings of many varieties. This is a time consuming recipe, but it’s actually quite simple and pretty easy to accomplish. The seasoning is a pairing of sauce, dried herbs and spice blends that are available at most big box grocery stores. If You have eaten My ribs in the past, You were very likely devouring the following recipe..
With that said, this is slow cooking! It’s very simple, but since You are cooking at low temperatures, it takes a while. Barbecue is different from grilling in that You tend to use indirect heat. Many hours will pass by once the actual cooking commences and every 20 or 30 minutes, You’ll be adding wood to the coals, flipping racks and spreading thin layers of sauce! One must have the dedication to give 4 to 8 hours of loving to Your ribs for them to acheive that highly desirable, fall off the bone texture. As such, I have divided this up into two recipes that have the same seasoning arrangement. ‘The Way of the Food Junky’ delivers the afore stated texture, as well as that lovely smokey flavor. Taking 5 to 8 hours depending on the temperature in Your smoker/grill and the thickness of the meat being used. ‘The Slacker’s Attempt’ is done at higher temperature in the oven, which means it cooks through in 3 or 4 hours, but brings forth tougher meat. Both do taste quite good of course!!
Ingredients(listed per 1 rack of pork spare ribs with the cartilage tips not trimmed):
1.5 tbsp – Garlic Granules
3 tbsp – Chili Powder Blend(the kind for making chili!)
3 tbsp – Ms. Dash Lemon Pepper Blend(or 2 tbsp of regular lemon pepper)
2 tbsp – Dried Thyme Leaves
2 or 3 tbsp – Dried Terragon Leaves
2 tbsp – Freshly Ground Peppercorns(the multi colored peppercorn blends will add a lot more depth than just black pepper)
Salt to taste, although, I’ve rarely ever salted this recipe…
3/4 of a cup or so of BBQ Sauce, We all have our favorites, or hate the stuff. This recipe is based on the thick midwestern, tomato based sauces. I use Ken davis, which is from Minnesota and Sweet Baby Ray’s, which I beleive is from Illinois.
The Way of the Food Junky: The First Method
Supplies Needed:
Baking sheet with raised edges that is large enough to hold Your rack of ribs. A Very sharp knife for slicing. A brush, fork or spoon for spreading sauce. Smoker or large grill(You don’t want your ribs near the coals). with enough of a tasty hardwood(cherry and hickory are My main choices) or charcoal(1 to 1.5 standard bags), to keep a decent temperature for 6+ hours. If You are using charcoal, You shall also require chips/chunks of one of the afore stated woods, along with a large bowl or 1 gallon bucket, with water high enough to cover the wood chips.
Prep:
Get Your smoker or grill started. I tend to start large in My modest smoking pit. If using a regular grill however, You’ll be needing a very small pile of coals. The desired temperature is about 260F, starting a little hotter than that won’t hurt at all. I would avoid going over 300F for any period of time when Your cooking. While the fire burns out and becomes coals to cook with, You’ll be seasoning Your meat.
On Your baking sheet, lay the ribs in-side up(the bones should be curved like a shallow bowl). Evenly spread half of everything EXCEPT the sauce across the ribs, press or pat them in a bit, so the herbs don’t just fall off and flip the rack over. Spread the remaining herbs and spices over the top side of the ribs and press them in a bit as well.
Once You’ve got coals instead of flames, it’s time to get smokin’
Cooking:
If using a smoking pit, simply place Your ribs on the rack and close the lid. For charcoal users, You’ll need to soak the wood chips in water for an hour or so before use. Add wood/charcoal to the coals as needed to maintain the desired temperature of 260F or so. When adding to the coals, it’s best to spread them out a bit and put the fresh stuff centered on top. This will get the new stuff burning and formed into coals the fastest, as well as add a perch for the wet wood chips, thus protecting the coals. Some put the chips in foil, I just lay it on the top in a fist sized lump. Every 20-30 minutes, You’ll need to add another fist-full of wet wood chips to the top of the coals, so as to keep the smoke billowing out.
Continue this cycle: flipping the ribs before adding more charcoal and wood chips, every half hour or so until the meat seems fully cooked, but not yet tender. On a hot summer day, this can be done in about 4 hours, however, on a cool spring or fall morning, it will likely take 6 or more hours to get it cooked through. Then, You want to start brushing on the sauce in thin layers, while continuing the flipping and adding to the coals cycle, adding sauce every time You flip the ribs. Keep it up until You can wiggle the bones away from the meat. Remove from the grill and let the rack rest for 10 minutes before slicing and serving.
The Slacker’s Attempt: The Second, Shorter Method
Supplies Needed:
A baking sheet with raised edges and a sharp knife for slicing. An oven safe bowl with 1 or 2 cups of red wine or sherry and an equal amount of water. A brush, fork or spoon for spreading sauce.
Prep: Preheat Your oven to 400F. Season the ribs as described in the prep section above.
Cooking:
Put the bowl containing the watered down wine on to the bottom rack of the oven. Place the pan laden with ribs middle rack of the oven and immediately lower the tempurature from 400 to 300. Bake for an hour and start flipping them every 30-45 minutes for an additional 2.5 hours. The meat should be just about cooked to the bone at this point. If it doesn’t feel cooked, then let it bake a while longer. Sauce the bottom of the ribs first, then flip and sauce the top side. Place the ribs back in the oven for 20 minutes, or until the sauce has thickened. Remove from the oven and let it sit for 10 minutes before slicing and serving.
Notes:
All cooking times will vary depending on the tempurature, thickness of meat and bones, etc…
On a regular grill, such as a Weber, You’ll want to shove the coals off to one side and place the meat on the rack as far away from the heat as possible. If You can’t manage to cook without burning the edges, You may want to consider starting the ribs on the grill. Using very little charcoal, but a lot of wood in a short period of time, say 45 minutes to an hour. Then place the ribs in the oven at 260F to actually cook them. This will give You a nice smokey essense and reasonable control over the texture of the meat. This is also the best method for those who live in the north. Trying to smoke food in temperatures under 20F tends to give a more jerky-like texture. As well as force You to use 3 or 4 times the amount of charcoal.
I use to peel the membrane off of the under-side of the ribs, but in the last couple years, I have swayed away from this. Leaving it in place does reduce the thickness of the smoke line(the red’ish color in the outer sections) in the meat and thus decreases the smokey flavor slightly, but it makes it a little easier to control the texture by holding in more moisture. It’s a preference thing that I don’t think makes much of a difference.
Using the ‘Slacker’s Method’ You can also achieve that succulent, fall off the bone texture. Instead of cooking at 300, lower the temperature to 260 and add an hour or two to the cooking time.
This recipe is actually pretty tasty without the sauce, so long as You don’t burn the spices and herbs during cooking. This will make it a bit bitter. It’s better to use fresh herbs if You’re going this route though.
The Charcoal quantities listed are for use with My pit smoker which has a 15×18 inch burning chamber and a 15×30 inch cooking area. You’ll use less with a normal grill.
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.
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