Mad About Cars

So yes, we all love drifting / power-sliding / broad sliding, whatever you want to call it!

And if you can actually drift across one end of a car-park to another then hands down to you but what actually goes on with the car when in this breath-taking motion???

Well, were about to find out!!…

The word ‘drifting’ obviously comes from a Japanese derivative (dorifuto sōkō?) and looks a bit like this – (ドリフト走行) – and is it surprising given our far eastern friends are the brains of all rapid technology!
And all the fun!!

They are masters in producing technology their forte being ‘engines’ and equally supplying the support gear needed to be able to control the car in adverse situations, and electrifying the crowd!

A real drift is where a driver will intentionally over-steer a vehicle through turns which results in loss of traction at the rear wheels. At the same time they are still controlling the vehicle whilst exiting the corner at high speed.

A car is said to be drifting when the rear slip angle is greater than the front slip angle prior to the corner apex, and the front wheels are pointing in the opposite direction to the turn (e.g. car is turning left, wheels are pointed right or vice versa).

The driver is always controlling these factors, and that’s what makes drifting an art!!! We love it!!!

Today im going to look over the art of Left-Foot Breaking!

A more commonly known action in motor racing, however very popular in a range of driving methods…

This technique allows drivers to operate a vehicle’s brake pedal using the left foot – as opposed to the right foot, which is usually naturally bound to the break and acceleration pedals.

The advantage of this method is ‘time saving’, as in racing, – every second counts!

By leaving the left foot free to operate the brakes and using the right foot only to accelerate, it allows the driver to gain fractions of time where it would usually be lost during the change from throttle to brake pedals. These are the minimal, but very beneficial effects when taking part in events utilising time trials and so on – like Sports Racing and Rallying, and technically, it is also possible to control the weight distribution of the vehicle when travelling, particularly cornering at high speeds through the left foot braking method, thus also saving seconds!!!…

Here we have the beautiful Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren.

Jointly developed by two of the longest serving motor industry manufacturers – Mercedes Benz and McLaren Automotive, this is one of the most substantial cars on the face of the planet

‘SLR’ – standing for ‘Sport, Leicht, Rennsport’ (Sport, Light, Racing) says it all in terms of the cars purpose. It has a front-mid engine placement arrangement governing an automatic gearbox resulting the Sport Light Effect.

Its rivals are in catagories such as the Ferrari 599 GTB Fiorano and the Aston Martin V12 Vanquish.

Around 3,500 are still in the process of being built over a 7 year span since 2003, and this machine, will set you back in the region of £300,000 smackaroonies!……

NASCAR – one of the most professional and popular motorsports in the U.S with television ratings ranking it second place just behind the National Football League. In terms of money Nascar is also the second richest motorsport in the world, with only Formula One taking the lead.

Nascar is the largest body of stock cars across the united states, its three best races being the ‘Camping World Truck Series’, the ‘Nationwide Series’, and the ‘Sprint Cup’, and Nascar sanctions more than 1,500 events at over 100 tracks across 39 U.S states between Canada and Mexico.

With races drawing 75 million fans across 150 countries and spending in a region of $3 billion in annual sales these fans are considered the ‘brand-loyal’ of all sports.

Best of all is ‘Daytona Beach’ where the best and most extreme land-speed records are set in the world! Synonymous with fast cars, and 8 consecutive World Records between 1927 and 1935.

Lets go there!!!

Red Bull put a spanner in the works by battling two legends head to head on the infamous 800 metre ‘Mur de Grammont’ cycling track in Belgium this weekend.

Just a week before the Tour of Flanders cycle race is due to fly over, the occasion marks the first time that any vehicle, not to mention a ‘rally car’ has had the privilege of driving over the cobbles during race periods.

Yes that’s right, 5 times World Rally Champion Sebastien Loeb went up against 10 time World Motor-cross Champion Stefan Everts – Citroen C4 against KTM MX.

Two test runs were done prior to the event but both times were kept a secret leading up to the big duel, where eventually time was on the bikers side but winning by only a ‘tenth’ of a second!!!

Wow, now that’s close! – but for Sebastien the forfeit was to clean Evert’s motor-cross bike after the competition had finished. What a great event idea! Thank God for Red Bull!!!

Sebastien said – “It was a fantastic experience.” Red Bull came up with a great idea when they suggested this duel, and I’m delighted to have had the opportunity to meet Stefan. He’s a truly magnificent champion, and his 10 world titles are an exceptional record of achievement. Of course I would have preferred to have won our duel, but it was a very close contest! I had the upper hand on certain parts of ‘The Wall’ but I lost time in other places. At the end, it was too close to call.”

And Stefan replied – “I hope I’m the only person to beat Sebastien this year – or at least I wish that for him! It was a real honour for me to meet him. I’ve got a deep respect and admiration for rally drivers. I just tried to ride very cleanly in order to gain the maximum time possible and win.”