86 Vs Silvia
I’m still in the States taking sometime off and using this opportunity to plan my 2008 activities. I’ve had many talks with the team, and Ueo who has helped a lot with my progress in D1 international events. One point he has brought up is the vehicle. Ueo has also moved to a Silvia platform without much success, and I’m now in the process of switching cars.
The Silvia is a good platform but has totally different dynamics to the 86. We’ve spent many years with the 86 and my driving style is very much suited to the style of this platform. It’ll take time before I will be able to adapt to the Silvia. One good point he has brought up is, by switching, I would be taking a step backwards. I would have to spend a lot of time trying to tune, develop and change my driving style to suit the car, while other drivers will continue to move ahead. This wouldn’t be a wise choice if I was looking at developing my career in drifting.
The 86 is still competitive in the Japan series according to Ueo. But of course, HP has become the issue. Without HP it’s hard to compete in this 20+ year old platform. Everyone has resorted to NOS setups. Yoshioka is a good example. 200HP + 100HP shot of NOS. Very competitive setup, but down on reliability . DrooP went through 2 engines during the weekend but still fell into reliability issues midway of the World Championship.
I’m still in the midst of planning on how we move forward for next year. But for now, I will keep the 86 for international events and we will work further to improve the performance of the vehicle. The Silvia for now will compete only in local/S.E.A events to give us more time for development and for me to adapt to the new platform.
One plus point though. I know how the 86 moves. So we will make sure the Silvia can move the same way too.
