So this is the story how I came from grip driving to drifting and how it helped me in the world of big angles and smoke.
I started driving my back then Impreza GC8 in slalom and hillclimb races all over Switzerland. Up to today this still is the only legal type of car racing besides rally in Switzerland due to the most stupid law ever. Race tracks are banned by law due to accidents in Le Mans in the 50’s????
I do not want to get into this topic since it would take your whole day reading and my whole night for writing it.
So anyway this was how I got started with racing a car. I had my Impreza modified to a decent spec. So I bought some A048’s and off I went to the first event. I still remember this like yesterday.
It was one of the bigger slalom events in Switzerland with lots of really serious cars and lots of different classes. The hardest thing for me was to find a good line around the cones and having no clue what comes next. Memorizing the track in just one warm up lap and then having three runs was quite hard. This also showed me that experience on those layouts was very important. Over the season I set up strategies for myself how to tackle the different tracks and earned some points here and there for the championship. So after this first season I entered winter time with a top 15 ranking in the Impreza Cup and some podiums in different slaloms.
The following year I got my Ae86 and besides starting in some races of the Impreza Cup with my GC8 I also started to race the AE86 in some Slaloms. The AE86 is a common sight in the swiss racing scene and there are some really serious cars out there. That Year I managed to grab some first places in slaloms with the Hachi and that was great fun. Despite being low on power that car just handles like crazy.
Same year I participated in my first drift practices and I was thinking this is also great fun. It brought some very different aspects to driving and I was like I want to master this too. So a plan started to grow in my mind.
In early 2009 I was talking to a friend of mine and we decided to try to qualify for the Pro class at the International Drift Series. After being able to qualify I was like what can you loose and signed up for the complete season. This first full season in a car with around 100hp less then any other car in the field prooved to be a great learning experience.
From Grip driving I knew that nothing helps more then experience on the tracks. In contrast to the grip driving I did up till then you had massive track time at the drift events. So whenever there was practice time I was on track and tried different lines and techniques. One other thing I learned from grip driving was that you have to set your goals for the day or event. So every drift event I told myself to master this or that technique during the event. So over the year I learned shifting while drifting, clutch kicking, different entry techniques…….
Grip driving was of great benefit also to have a fast line during drifting. This is something I see from people who do not have a grip background. Sometimes they are all over the place and can not incorporate a fast driving line in their runs. This helps especially if the clipping points are at the apexes, where they usually are. Another great benefit was the knowledge of setting up a car, especially the suspension. This was something I worked myself into after having had a workshop with one guy from Whiteline suspension products. He gave an insight on how different suspension aspects can help with driving. I tested this stuff thouroughly during my grip racing and could change suspension setups from my prior experience and how I felt the car during the drift events.
Last but not least there is the aspect of things breaking. Unfortunately things will break on your car during grip or drift driving. I had been working on my cars for a few years prior to entering drift racing and modified a few things on them. This meant that a lot of stuff was already uprated and proven in the field and additionally I knew my way around the cars. This can safe you a lot of money if you are able to work on your cars yourself.
Today drift driving helps me also with grip driving and of course the other way around. There is a lot of things you can learn from either one and incorporate into the other one. So I would tell you go do both!