1:25.0200

One minute twenty five seconds and 2 milliseconds, that’s all it takes for one flying lap of Eastern Creek Raceway.

Well that is if your Warren Luff behind the wheel of the ‘Nemo’ Evo, running the blisteringly fast lap time and taking the win for the 2012 World Time Attack Challenge this past weekend and with 1:27.1820 the Tilton Interiors Evo coming in second, nearly two whole seconds off first place.

In a sport where every millisecond counts and all that crazy aero mean the difference between places, a two second win is a mind blowing feat.

Many people doubted the nemo evo coming into competition, with their engine blowing at Queensland raceway just a few weeks before competition, the haters came out in droves. Though as the day unfolded the much coveted Cyber Evo, being the reigning champ had much to defend though an engine failure early on Saturday morning saw them bow out of competition.

Being a ‘World’ invitational the call went out to some pretty high profile Japanese and British tuners.  Top Fuel came out with their S2000 running a 1:29.0520, the almighty RE-Amemiya came out with their fresh hurricane rx7 running a best of 1:29.8020. 

Pan Speed came out with their RX8 this year, ditching last year’s rx7 for the deafening roar of their NA 20B crossing the line with a best of 1:35.5750

Under the watchful eye of Suzuki, the team from Scorch racing brought their S15 out for another go, eventually running a 1:28.3290 successfully putting them in fourth place, just nudged out from third by the guys from MCA with they’re crazy S13 with a best of 1:27.8080 making it an all aussie podium finish.

The Tectaloy International Drift comp was held on Friday and Saturday nights, which saw competitors for OZ, NZ and Japan.

Being an invitational, the bar was raised pretty high, with some monstrous weaponry hitting the track.

If you haven't seen this 350 yet, you'd better.  With no expense spared by the guys at Monster Energy, this thing is quite the machine, Check out the full feature in Drift Battle Magazine.

Team Orange came out to compete with their RWD Evo and RWD WRX respectively.

These guys were hitting the first turn at around 160km on the night, shit was getting crazy.

Unfortunately for Mad Mike Whiddett and his Madbul RX8, his comp ended on Friday with some 'engine complications'.  I feel bad for the fans, as the sound of that NA 20B on full noise is quite something to behold.

 

All the action wasn't just out on track as a few clubs were reppin hard out at the show n shine area.

This killer beetle was stanced out all day

I love going to genre specific shows and seeing something out of the ordinary, this beetle would have to be one of my favourites at this years time attack.

Speaking of favourites, Nigel Peitrie from Engineered to Slide was back again this year with his comp 180 and his in the build drift hilux, if you haven't checked out his blog, sus it out here, this thing is truly amazing, i think its safe to say that Australia has a new hero.

As was the case with this year, I know next year will be bigger and better, now that Nemo has raised the bar, lets see who steps up to the plate for next year, we'll keep our ear to the ground on any builds that are in the making and give you guys the hot scoop.

A massive thank you goes out to our photographers Chelsey Kosalka and Aaron Bondarenko for their mad skills, now go like their page!

See you at the track

-Willie

ALRIIIIGHT

Cheeea, fresh off the press!!!!

New BadNewsPanda stickers, they're about half the size of an A4 piece of paper, look hella rad and also have some pretty decent sticking quality. Grab yours today, pm us on Facebook or drop into NewGel and see willy or brett and we'll hook you up for the reasonable sum of 5 of your human dollars.

YOUKNOWIT

Dolls N Shine Rockabilly Sideshow

After following the upcoming show on facebook, it felt that the 29th of July would never arive and with what seemed like a lifetime, the Dolls n Shine Rockabilly Side Show finally came around, with miserable weather all week it didnt look too good, though sunday came and the sun showed us whats up, and a good thing too!  Such a quality show was on, we didnt get as many shots as we would have liked but hey you get that on the bog jobs, we'll deffinatly stay in the loop for the next show, which im told will be in a bigger location and if this weekend was anything to go by, we all have alot to look forward to.

Click the jump on the sidebar for pics.

Dont forget polling for bretts drifter closes this friday!

- Willie

MDTC time attack

Over the weekend we headed out to a driver training centre in Marulan to check out a time attack comp they were running, things started out pretty interesting as neither of us had heard of or knew how to get to the track and once we got there we found out we had our dates mixed up.  Though it wasnt a total loss as we got to chatting with the owner and his crew.  A day later we headed up to see the real action unfold.

The BMW's were quite well represented, with majority sporting semi slicks

This early model swift was throwing down some pretty impressive numbers, quite the competitive entry level track car, it was even sporting rear leafs and a side pipe!

 

  This XR Falcon was quite the sleeper, the fog lights were removed and you could just sneak a peak at the larger-than-factory oil cooler.  Being quite a heavy car, especially for this tight track, the owner opted for a set of lightweight enkei racing wheels, complete with full slicks, though it had a little trouble getting them to warm up on the cold track.

  The poor 200 had its work cut out for it against the onslaught of beemers.

 This M3 was blindingly fast, taking no time to towel up the opposition.

Stay tuned as in the next few months as plans are currently being drawn up to organise a Bad News Panda track/skid pan day, so keep checking our facebook page for updates.

Polling also closes on the 4th of August for bretts new car, so if you dont want him to get a 180, get your friends to vote, maybe for the silvia, the poor S13 isnt getting much love.

- Willie

Honour thy modder...

Fatlace.  Speedhunters.  Nissansilvia.

If you’re perusing this blog then no doubt you’re familiar with these names.  These monoliths dedicated to our most beloved obsession.  Personally, Speedhunters is the first blog I trawl when I turn on my computer, and generally the last as well.  I’m also a regular on NS, if your building a Nissan then there’s no doubt you could build a complete car from the used classifieds alone!

 But are all these international blogs and forums helping the scene or hurting it?

I still remember the day fatlace was registered in my favourites, I was trolling the s14 picture forum on NS and there, sitting in all its glory was a slammed, kitted matte grey zenki S14.  At first glance it looks like regular garden variety primer but upon further inspection it turned out as ‘battleship grey’.  This played quite a part in the colour I ended up painting my 200.  Though with the Fatlace influx came the Hellaflush movement.  In the states they have no laws that govern how high your car must be while rolling, so that we poor sods in Aus are saturated with all these images of super slammed imports and sedans that we could never replicate without some handy air tanks in the boot.  Noooo, 100mm at the lowest point for us, well unless you want to keep your rego anyway. 

On the other side of the coin however, where would we be without the inspiration found abroad?  Anyone remember ‘that 240’ from speedhunters?  Without any images from Wekfest, Hellaflush or Gatebil events clogging up my hard drive I’d hardly be the worldly automotive guru that I so clearly am.  So with our scene being so saturated with all these standout rides across the world, what does it take for us to be surprised?  If you go out to any local show, you can be guaranteed that there will be rides there that took 100+ hours to build that dude spent in his garage with his welder in hand or some kids pride and joy, who probably started an apprenticeship just to fund the custom paint for his fist car.  But because we’ve seen that particular car with wider wheels/ lower stance/ crazy paint we just dismiss it.  Sucks. 

So I think when it comes down to it we just need to get out more and really appreciate the story and effort that was put into them.  Get a back story and if you get a chance, congratulate the guy who took the time and had the guts and vision to build something that he or she can be proud of.  Who cares if it’s not your cup of tea, if you’re involved with the scene in any way, shape or form, you can appreciate what hard work looks like.

See you at the track!

-Willie

Ps, voting for bretts drifter is still on at our FB, so check it out!

BDL sound off

Come and sus out the sound comp over at BDL in fyshwick on Sunday, a few of the crew here at BadNewsPanda will go along and check out the proceedings so come and say hi.

See you there

Willie

IDA Drift day

So a few weeks ago there was an IDA drift day that hit wakefield park in goulburn and i thought i'd might as well post up a few pics.

Photos are courtosy of the ever talented Chelsey Kosalka, if you want to check out some of her other fine work, hit up her facebook.

 

 

 

A somewhat wet and miserable day, though time spent on track beats time off any day of the week.

With any luck by the next drift day we'll have some stickers for you guys to bomb with, so keep checking back here to know what to look for!

 Stay sideways

-Willie

Question of Questions

If, like us here at BadNewsPanda you like cars, you’ve pondered over a particular question, plunged down that dark rabbit hole into a world that many of us have been through, do we go for ease of column A, the cool of column B or the ever elusive column C?  Such is the predicament of us in the automotive scene, it doesn’t matter what religion you follow be it hurtling down the 1320, smashing corners in a track demon or hitting an apex at 120 sideways, which car should I do it in?  The question of which platform to go with is sometimes a hard one, though if your loyal to a specific automotive stable the decision becomes much simpler. 

Brett of Reborn and Newgel fame, wants a car in which to drift, and as a man with a penchant for Nissans he has shortlisted his decision, and this decision, dear reader, will ultimately be yours.  Oh yes friends!  You’re the one that ultimately decides his drifting fate.  But whoa ho! Let’s not get to the amazing amazement just yet, as there were a few more front runners vying for some well-deserved sideways love.

Having owned a Mazda previously, Brett was quite familiar with rotors, also handy when you work down the street from a well renowned rotary tuner.  As such, he looked around and did a bit of research on FC rx7’s, although a totally different chassis to the series 2 he owned prior, he felt it wouldn’t take too much to get used to the motor and its handling.  However the FC wasn’t to be as this car is to be streeted, and driving a ported, flame throwing rotor to work every morning would garner too much attention from the local PD, not to mention the massive hole in his pocket due to petrol prices.  Send in the next one!

Another runner up was the ever classic KE70 corolla.  Having recently discovered the nimble goodness the old rolla possesses and being quite impressed by a little yellow example at a recent drift comp, Brett quickly started more of his research.   Sure the 4AGE is quite the screamer and gets up when it wants to but Brett didn’t feel it had quite the power he was after.  scratch that one

 

So the decision was made to go with the trusty ol’ Nissans, more specifically, those of the S chassis.  I can hear you from here, and I know there are already plenty of Nissans out on track but hey! You can’t really beat the ease and workability of the chassis, not to mention how cost effective they are, too many off the shelf parts to pick from, a plethora of body parts at your disposal and racks upon racks of spares, because let’s face it, shits breaks.

Now that Nissans are the order of the day, three come straight to mind.

S13 Silvia

180SX

S14 200SX (series 2)

The choices pretty much speak for themselves, 180s and Silvia’s are more or less the same, however the prices clearly aren’t.  In my opinion 180s look the goods regardless but you really can’t go past a Silvia on pricing, 200s on the other hand are coming down in price lately and a good one won’t be too far off, however they do have more to offer than the latter two.  One thing is certain, they must be manual and SR powered.  That being said, if a cheap Silvia pops up and Brett finds himself a suitable candidate for a heart transplant, which could well be on the cards. 

 

So it’s up to YOU planet earth, what car will Brett and the team from NewGel be dealt with??

 

Hit up our Facebook to vote, and like our shit while you’re at it!!!  

-Willie

Zenki....the story so far

Ok, so its about time I threw up some photos of my beloved 200.

She was bought off a friend of mine after he picked it up as a stolen recovered vehicle, needed a few things here and there, though things looked pretty good, it was a standard burgundy affair and things looked pretty .... standard

Being in my first year as an apprentice spray painter I was quite eager to get my hands dirty, I needed something a little different, a bit of love or hate kind of swag would do the trick.  Being obsessed with the Fatlace S14 at the time and I knew I wanted some matte happenings.

So this happened...

So the poor old girl sat around for a few years, sometimes being driven, most of the time not, as it was stolen twice since I've owned it (curse green anyone?).  After moving house a few times and just watching a few track days I knew I had to do something about this thing in my driveway.  So with the meagre funds I have at my disposal i bought myself some 2nd hand supermade goodness, and my lovely girlfriend bought me some lows in the form of brand new crisp BC coilovers last Christmas.

So the old girl looks like this...

And so the saga continues, more will be done to this magnificent magnificence in the future, as well as updating pics, however I have a trip to Bali to save for at the moment, so these things will have to wait.

Also thinking of changing the colour.....Thoughts?

- Willie

take to the streets

yo, ok, so i know things have been prrrty slow around here but thats only because things have been going so fast... or something.  working on my own car would be one, pics coming soon, also a small project im painting for a mate happens to be taking residency in the garage, pics also coming soon.  ive also started my new job at Newgel, after starting my apprenticship there i knew that getting asked back was a big deal for me, career and otherwise, i know that they're a crazy good bunch of people and i look forward to working with them again.  check out their website here.

so while your waiting, ive thrown together a few photos i have from a cruise a few of the boys went on a while ago. enjoy

-Willie