C16 Autostyle

C16 Autostyle is a cool car and lifestyle magazine run by our friends at Overamerica. The latest issue had a nice spread on our American Touge 2 event from last December. Thanks guys!



Also this issue's main theme is The Hot List 06 where they have different movers and shakers of the import industry give a list of what they think would be hot this year.
The hot list panel includes RJ deVera, Stephan Papadakis(racer/drifter), Ryan Sage(Formula D), Rich Chang(Journalist)some others and yours truly. Pick it up if you have a chance.

Wairudo Supeedo

Veilside cars from Wairudo Supeedo 3

Somewhere in Japan there are guys that sit in their offices and say, "hmm, what kind of ridiculous movie titles can we come up for the next Hollywood flick that reaches our shores"?

The Fast and the Furious was not an exemption as it was labled "Wild Speed" pronounced Wairudo Speedo in Japan. The new Tokyo Drift is naturally called "Wild Speed 3". Not that the Fast and Furious is a great name or anything.

This has happened in Japan since foreign films have been around in Japan. Recently, I think the fact that the Japanese have been getting used to English words in general have helped the situation a bit. They just use the "katakana" letters to phonetically describe the title. "Misson Impossible" would be "misshon imposhiburu". You think that is bad, it is worse when the Japanese movie distributors try to come up with the J names themselves. Because some are just plain aweful.


The 1981 CHARIOTS OF FIRE was the "The Burning Runner(translated in Japanese)"
When I came back to Japan as a kid my friend asked me if I had seen, "Michi Tono Sougu". I said I hadn't and was left out of a conversation. Later I found out he was talking about "Close Encounters of the Third Kind". "Micho tono sougu" means "encountering the unknown" in Japanese. How would I had known?
My favorite still must be a "Gentleman and an Officer" which was released as "Aito seishun no tabidachi". It literally means, "Journey of love and youthtime spring".
FORREST GUMP still cracks me up. It was called "Ichigo Ichie" which is a 4 letter Japanese proverb that means "Treasure every meeting, for it will never recur".

Beautiful, but I wish they had just stuck to simply calling it "Fohresuto Gampu"...
You decide which is better.

GT Channel.com

GT Channel will be our new site dedicated to bringing all kinds of car video content to consumers. First it will roll out as GT Channel.com offering free Best Motoring Intl. and Hot Version Intl. short clips thru the website. Eventually we will offer VOD content thru mobile and cable as well. Beta site is being worked on right now. Something should be up and running by mid June. Stay tuned!

Back in LA

Here's me taking a photo of everyone at Denny's. After the event, every restaurant was closed so our only choice was basically this Denny's off I-10 in Tempe near our hotel.



We were practically regulars there. The HKS Red Army.



After Phoenix, we returned to LA. I had a couple of business meetings and everyone from Japan had to return. Here's a photo of Ken's dog, Hana-chan. She's sweet as candy but no, I would never mess with this dog!


A photo of the boys chowing down. Man, look at the size of that Chicken Fried Steak! I thought it was a skate board with gravy on top.

GTLIVE Phoenix 2006

I just got back from a week in Phoenix Arizona. Boy was it hot!
Zigzag Asia was there for a couple of reasons. One, to coorinate the XDL drift team with both JDM Drifting stars Manabu Orido and Nobuteru Taniguchi. Also Taniguchi was entering the Grand Am series in the SpeedSource RX-8 so I had to make sure everything went as smoothly as possible with his new team. When I went, I wasn't expecting to be his spotter on the radio but the team members didn't speak Japanese so naturally the job came to me. The race report is on the BMI blog.
The below photo shown is the RX-8 Taniguchi and his team mate Tarzan Yamada drove.

The second reason we where there was to follow Orido and Taniguchi around during the entire GTLIVE weekend and capture it on video. It will be for the reality style corner we have on our DVD called LIFE IN THE FAST LANE. It will be an interesting take on what these guys do on and off the track. This segment will be in our DVD scheduled for release at the end of July.



The drift demo went extremely well despite of the heat. Drifting puts so much stress on the engine and tires that we were lucky if we can put on a good 7 minute show. That just shows at what level a drift car needs to be set up to put on a good show. The day time demos were the toughest. Orido and Taniguchi would come around a do a few tricks in front of the crowd and then have to go back to the pits to spray water and ice on the engine to cool it down. Then they would go back out to burn more rubber. The Phoenix fans loved it. I believe it was the first time for many of them to see drifting. I think they got a chance to see what the fuss about this drifting was all about.

Old School Racing