NOPI Nationals

The official J1N video from NOPI thanks to EXEDY CLUTCHES:


NOPI is a well-known name in the automotive community for many years now. When I heard they were having a drifting demo at the annual NOPI Nationals, I wanted to get in there. After a few short emails, I was granted an invite to drive. Exedy provided some assistance to make this event possible for the J1N team, so I wanted to give a special notice and thank you to one of our longest running partners!

Friday, we set off for Atlanta Dragway in Commerce, GA after a few snafus. This J1N trip was only myself and my fiancée Hazel. The 9 hour trip turned into 10, and we ended up checking in to our Hojo at 3:30 a.m. to, quite possibly, the worst hotel room I’ve ever seen. Immediately we started looking for a new place even though the area was sold out for the last 3 weeks. Dandelion Inn had a room and we headed over. Insanely nice for the low cost (cheaper than Hojo!), we finally put head to pillow at about 4:30. 

The damn alarm blared just 2.5 hours later. We headed for the dragway to check in. The day was gloomy and dark from the start. Shortly after we are in and setup, a short drivers meeting ensues. The drift area is relatively small, but good enough for a demo. We are able to reach speeds around 50 mph into the first sweeper- basic 3^rd gear stuff for our LS powered banana. Unfortunately, due to insurance, we cannot take passengers. After 2 shakedown runs, the surface is really slippery and its beginning to drizzle. I line up as the center of a group of 3 for a tandem run, Jonathan Nerren leading, Brian Phillips (SWD Pro Am organizer) chasing. We had a pretty solid run of the course, Brian doing his best to keep pace with out V8 cars. Then we are told the facility owner, not NOPI, deems the area too small for more than 2 cars, so no more trains.

Stuck with only 2 car maximums, we make the best of it as Mother Nature keeps increasing the H2O quantity on track. The only plus for us drifters is that we can run in the rain, where the drag strip is dead from it. We became the main attraction! Teasing the walls became the best way to have fun. There was a real gamble in doing this- one rule was that any wall contact would result in losing our privilege of drifting- they wanted to keep drivers in check and fans safe. There are some really intense video segments where we danced within inches of the wall!

Eventually, the rain won and the entire facility emptied as people were realizing the downpour wasn’t letting up. This gave us a really nice break from the all go, no stop usually felt at events. We were able to actually shower before grabbing dinner (a luxury drivers rarely get!). Hazel and I met up with one of my team partners, SSP Vinyl, for some R&R at one of Commerce’s only hotspots- AppleBees. Late night fun…. Doesn’t exist, don’t waste your time. Locals told us the movie theatre, the outlet mall, or Walmart as places to go…. Yep- WALMART is the cool hangout. Funny enough, we ended up in the gross Hojo parking lot watching random ricers do burnouts as onlookers egged them on. Good times.

Next day was like a totally different atmosphere. Bright, gorgeous skies greeted us as we started to put rubber down. Drag racers were finally getting behind the wheel and making passes- the event was in full swing.  We had lots of great runs with a few different drivers, focusing on the fun of shredding with new friends. Chasing down Sean Morgan, we had a tire de-bead-  or so I thought.  I exit course and find out that my gas pedal is no longer influencing the wheels to turn- clutch/transmission/driveshaft….. didn’t matter, any one spelled the end for us. After some creative work, we towed the car back to pit with our newly acquired craigslist scooter! This actually got a bunch of photos taken of us, creeping through the pits at all of 5mph.

We toss the jack under the rear just so we can diagnose and get a head start on what needed done when we get back to Florida. Oddly, one of our axles simply sheered the bolts holding it to the differential housing, and the LSD allowed the car to slip to the now disconnected side – resulting in no motion. We dismantle and install a spare axle with some new bolts. So many little problems with tools, the 30 min job became a nightmarish 2 hours. Drop the jack and head back out.

We got in another 6 runs and were able give Emma (1UZ powered s13) a taste of tandem with a licensed FD driver. It wasn’t long before our Achillies ATR Sports (left over tires from Curacao trip) had enough. The crazy part was when I put it in 4^th gear and was drifting with over 100mph wheel speed in this small area!

I’d like to again thank Exedy for helping us bring the noise to the 2013 NOPI Nationals!