Tag: Taikyu

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Close Up: The HKS GT1000+ – The Final Act V.2

 

The poster child of HKS Premium Day; the GT1000+.  An enormously high powered R35 that was built for the sole purpose of achieving the fastest lap possible.  The build, which will compete in WTAC next year, was also the other half of the final event where they pit the GTR against the Endless Sports z4 GT3 I posted just yesterday.

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Close Up: ENDLESS E89 Z4 GT3 – The Final Act V.1

 

Have you ever had this strange urge, when opening a new book, to read the last paragraph before you actually start to read it?   I have. For whatever reason, I’ve always been compelled to turn to the last page before starting.  Often times, it doesn’t yield any spoilers or give any of the plot away, but sometimes it can give you a pretext of what to expect throughout the new literature.

Event: Super Taikyu – A Pit Walk In Japan

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Here’s a post I’ve been waiting to share with you for awhile now.  Let me preface this by saying that the pictures won’t really do this experience much justice.  In Japan, a pit walk is something you can pay a little extra for to take an actual walk on the pit road to view the cars and team.  Well, I thought you could view the cars and team anyway.  In reality, it turns out it’s a mad rush for the thousands of spectators that are there solely for the race queens.  I literally had to fight my way through the crowd and sneak my way past the stanchions to get a glimpse at the race cars.  I was even told a few times that I couldn’t be past a certain point I had snuck by.  Seriously though, I paid for a pit walk to see the cars!  My friend and I were probably part of the 5% of people there to view the actual vehicles.  They should really look in to separating the girls from the garages a little; throw them out on the straight or something.   With that said, I’d do it again in a heartbeat.  I find it extremely amusing being the only foreigner in a crowd of crazed motor sport (read ‘race queen’) fans, and getting caught up in the moment.  You know the saying “If you can’t beat them, join them”?  Well, about halfway through I gave up trying to get car shots and ended up joining everyone else in snapping some girlies.  They were all about it too!  Perks of having blue eyes I suppose.  Click past the break to see the experience of my first pit walk.

Event: Super Taikyu Official Test Day: Fuji Speedway v.1 – The Integra

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It feels like it’s been so long so my latest post!  My apologies, as I’ve been extremely busy this past week; traveling for work as well as trying to buy some property.  I am super stoked on NDF though because I’ve been getting some really cool inquiries as of late.  I’ve also just got the go to start planning my next trip back to Japan – which is going to be quite awesome.  The best news is that I plan to share it all on the blog.  While I try to keep the ‘personal’ out of this page, and stick just to features, events, and auto related posts, it is after all a blog about Japan.  I figure the followers would be just as excited as I am to see what a week spent in Japan visiting tuner shops, attending a Super GT race and interviewing tuners is actually like.  March is a great month for motor sports all over the world.  I don’t even have to mention the start of Formula 1; but in Japan specifically it marks the beginning of Super GT, Super Taikyu, and a handful of other series.  JDM Clips recently attended the Super Taikyu Official Test Day at Fuji Speedway.  Needless to say, the 6 different classes involved in this series makes for a great amount of variety on track.  In my opinion, one of the coolest entrants is the DC5 – and it seems to be a popular platform as well.  In this post, I focused on only that chassis.  Click past the break for more!