August 24, 2009

Night Time Means Play Time

We have a monthly JDM meet here in Queensland, and created it to escape the perils of the losers in the scene who ruin it for everyone else. Lot's of tough cars turn out for what is basically our monthly social meet up. There isn't really much to say, so enjoy the shots.

Unfortunately this meet had some un-expected rain which meant that photos were a little harder to take, but the meet did go on, and we all know what wet roads mean.






August 19, 2009

Give It Up For Drift....

With great pleasure i bring you our first Video thanks to Mez, this kid has major talent and we will be bringing you more of his footage from the local drift scene here in Aus. If you wish to see some of his older Videos we have put his Vimeo Channel in our Support sites to the right, so check it out.

SecretDrift.com.au held a private day out at Queensland Raceway. Had a mad story clip planned but someones 1jz 180 failed lol :P. Its all good im filming on Sunday so expect something cool later this week :)

-MeZ

Links for you guys to check out
secretdrift.com.au
mezproductions.com
driftkulture.com
cluboutrun.net

Secret Drift Private Day from MeZ Productions on Vimeo.

August 18, 2009

Germany's Finest

There has always been one manufacturer who has consistently proved it's worth around any circuit, anywhere in the world. Being known for its knowledge in car balance and proving displacement means nothing. I am of course talking about the only car manufacturer in the world who supplies Track Insurance to their customers, Porsche.

Porsche's are alot more affordable than the majority of the other car makers out there like Ferrari and Lamborghini, but are just as good if not better. Of course they also have a few models which cost in excess of 350,000 big ones, but for average Joe they are quite an affordable super car. There is no lack of stunning examples here in Australia and especially up north here in Queensland, with the Porsche Club supplying all manner of car porn. I am fortunate enough to be good friends with an owner and decided to head down and see how the upper class of cars held track days.

This time it was at the quite infamous Lakeside circuit, known for it's unpredictability and dangerousness to anyone who does not respect the track. Only recently has it been holding track days due to it being shutdown nigh on 10 years ago, so the city council could build housing developments around it. But it was bought out in 2008 and put back into working order, in the three sessions i have been to at the newly opened Lakeside, there has been a crash every time and this day was no different, which really shows how full on it is.

Upon walking into pit lane it takes a while to adjust to just how many Stuttgart's finest were in attendance, and there were some big named ones at that. With almost every model being represented; 944s, 993s all the way up to 997's. There were some big dollar examples out in force such as a 997 GT3 RS, multiple 996 & 997 GT3's, some almost fully race prepped 911's, an APR Tuned Caymen S and of course the always mental 997 GT2.

It was not an all Porsche affair though as many of the owners also have other cars, and brought them out for a few laps, some even keeping the Porsche's in line, such as a gorgeous Aston Martin V8 Vantage, and track only Mazda MX5, a fairly serious Subaru STI and the car that had everyone gobsmacked an old Nissan 240Z supporting a full RB26DET swap from a GTR. It was a great day, perfect weather and a perfect line up of cars. Definitely looking forward to their next event, hopefully next time the Carrera GT will be out.....













































July 26, 2009

Lack of Anything Really....

As you may have noticed as of late there has been a distinct lack of anything being posted on our site. This is mainly due to a very last minute trip overseas to Dubai, however we are now back home from abroad and have tonnes of event coverage, photoshoots and even some drift video coverage to post.

The lack of posting has given us time to really knuckle down and edit, so there will be big dumps of threads in the coming weeks. Thanks for waiting it out, and be sure to stick around for our coverage of the insane rides that reside in Dubai.

Cheers,
Downshift Crew

Here is what is to come....







June 9, 2009

High Rollin' Heavy Hitters

There are quite a few prominent clubs here in sunny Queensland Australia, but only a few stand tall above the rest in terms of a car roster. In that select few are the two rival clubs of Most Wanted and High Rollers; both of which have the pleasure of saying they have some of the toughest cars wearing their insignia. But, as of late, Club High Rollers (CHR) has been on the uprise, and I was fortunate enough to be invited to one of their famous Dyno Days.


Now, I say 'famous' as it is a well known fact that big numbers are always produced and for this day, some of the biggest and baddest cars turned out to show what they were all about. They say it is all about having the connections, and being good friends with some of the High Rollers members definitely has its benefits in terms of access to out-right car porn. The Dyno Day was held at the infamous Aussie GTR tuner Godzilla Motor sport which plays host to not only the second fastest GTR in the world (which runs a 7.84sec pass) but also the fastest low mount twin turbo GTR in Australia with a 9.8sec pass. And, of course, Godzilla Motorsport is now home to the mentalist RH9 R34 GTR which not only ran a 9.73sec pass in street trim, but managed to push out 1250awhp on C16 race fuel, that is just over 1400hp at the engine, and close to 1200hp on pump fuel. So to say Godzilla Motorsport (GM) know what they are doing is an understatement.

Upon arrival to GM with the train of CHR cars behind me, it was obvious by the idols of each car that today was going to be something special, with all kinds of GTRs, a Supra, Evo's and some older Datsuns waiting to slowly creep into the quite steep entrance. Straight away, the first entrant was strapping onto the Dyno getting ready to punch out some numbers, and this would be the layout for the next few hours; chatting about all things cars and sussing out everyone's rides in between each set up.

When you first set your eyes upon the club cars in attendance, there are some that just make you gasp starting with a 'F' and ending with an 'arrrrrkkkkk'. The standouts were Adam's 'FATGTR' R32 rolling on some super stretched Work Meister's and supporting a T51r and full Tomei 2.7l stroker kit. The noise of the T51r spooling is easily up there with one of the worlds best car noises. The 'RH9' R34 with those awfully expensive 20x10" GTC's (which would probably cost somewhere around $9000AUD)but the car that stole my heart was easily matched by Justin's gorgeous R32 'DARE YA', wearing a deep dark blue paint matched with some dead sexy SSR Type C's. Not only does it look good, but it also managed to push out 498rwhp. Stay tuned for an upcoming feature on it. A special mention must go to Tess with the '080OST' R32 GTS supporting a full dog engagement gear box and helical cut gears. The noise it made was about as good as it gets, and the clunking through gears was euphoria to my ears. Also, being a car driven by a girl, 505rwhp is pretty intense. Who said women can't drive?

As with every dyno day there were some cars everyone was itching to see run, and cars that were expecting some quite ridiculous numbers. Those cars were Adam's pearl silver R32 GTR 'FATGTR', Mick's 'DRAGER' Supra and Paul's silver R32 GTR 'TWO.06L', but unfortunately the crazy RH9 was not going to be running due to it being too powerful for the dyno too handle, and the 7sec GM R32 was without an engine. Oh well, maybe next time. In saying this however, Adam, Mick and Paul did not disappoint, with Adam pushing out 720rwhp in FATGTR, which was his biggest power reading to date and puts him oh so close to that fabled 1000hp. Mick, even with a bad tune, managed to churn out 652rwhp and almost pull the wall down upon hitting boost; tugging so hard that the exhaust was actually sparking on the dyno rollers. Paul with his brand new high mount set up managed a quite insane 698awhp, technically taking out top honors, but it was all about the readings so FATGTR managed to snatch the title.

As much as these three took the lime light away from the others, big numbers were produced all day with the lowest reading being 292awhp from Jason's Evo. Some would argue, though, that in technical terms Chloe produced the lowest reading with 329rwhp. But in saying that, for the lowest reading to be basically 400hp at the engine, it really shows that the quality of cars is phenomenal. I will definitely be covering all of CHR's events in the coming months, as with cars like this they are proving themselves to be the ones to beat and it will only get better. Watch this space...

Special thanks to Jay and Justin for the invite.