It's this methodology that permeates the contemporary professional drifting scene. Cues from the road-racing world have replaced cracked bumpers and zip ties, and many top drifting machines can put current time attack competitors to shame. This has only made pro drift cars faster, trickier to drive and capable of generating more smoke and holding longer slides. If Sumida can teach us how to drift this car, a stock 240SX should be no problem at all.
And drifting isn't something you can learn by watching instructional videos or discussing on the internet. It's like surfing-all the yapping in the world doesn't mean squat until you catch the first wave. And you'll know it when you do. Those who think they're drifting just from catching the occasional oversteer are still far off the mark.
For dyed-in-the-wool road racers, trying to drift is as hard as trying to train yourself to use chopsticks with your non-dominant hand. In road racing, we're trained to drive the car right up to its traction limits. It is, as we've proven, the fastest way around a racetrack. Any time a car gets past its limits, instinct forces us to get it sorted out as soon as possible, to get back to that limit. We never really bother exploring what's on the other side. Who wants to waste time and tires scrubbing speed, learning to be slow, right?
But just because it's slower doesn't mean it's worthless. We try to justify our drifting ignorance by stating that drifters might not have any concept of a fast lap. But the bottom line is this: drifters have intuitive car control and built-in ass gyros that are highly calibrated. Those who can drift and are still fast usually fall into the category of rally driver.
Driving a car at its very limit is essentially an act of balancing the car's weight on top of a needle, which holds the car at its center of gravity. Throttle, steering and brakes are all used to transfer weight smoothly between the four tires to maximize the amount of grip from each tire, as well as adjusting on-the-spot oversteer and understeer attitude. Obviously, the more planted each tire is, the more grip there is. We're used to driving cars set up with a neutral balance throughout the entire corner, which have similarly shaped friction circles on each tire. This way, the friction circle profile is always the same and only changes in size depending on the weight transferred to each tire. Getting more grip is a matter of transferring more weight from one tire to another, in as smooth a manner as possible.
For the most part, a big-power, pro-level drift car is set up to be just as neutral. Unlike the old days, where obscene amounts of camber and bumpsteer, overly stiff rear spring rates and over-inflated, rock-hard tires defined a drift car, pro drifting requires huge rear grip and proper balance. Drift teams go to all sorts of lengths to ensure proper suspension geometry. Instead of slamming a car to the ground with super-low springs and miniscule suspension travel, many teams are learning to relocate entire subframes upward to ensure that each wheel maintains its original camber and toe curves.
Even alignment is kept straightforward, with zero toe, lots of front caster (which makes the cars extremely easy to caster-steer and maintain camber during turning) and reasonable camber to maintain traction and provide the necessary grip to push the car forward and maintain high-speed drifts. This is also why high-speed drifts actually require sticky street tires, not bald mud-and-snow rubber. Without them, you'd just be making smoke and going nowhere.