The Formula Drift Championship rolled into Englishtown NJ this past weekend just in time to watch the East Coast heat index climb. Tony Angelo and his Maxxis Tire / MAZDASPEED Team came ready for battle and he impressed his home town crowd with a revamped RX-8 and a top qualifying spot.

After extensive preparation, the JIC Magic / Hankook Tire Porsche rolled out of the transporter ready for competition.  The Porsche hit the track in its inaugural runs on New Jersey’s English Township Raceway; a new track recently added to the Formula Drift Circuit.  Having never raced at this venue before, the JIC Magic / Hankook Tire Team went to work, fine tuning the Porsche to suit the needs of this high speed course.  This course begins with a high speed straightaway leading to a wide left turn with the first clipping point just mere inches away from the dirt, followed by a sharp left with an inside second clipping point, finishing off with a wide right to the checkered flag.  Piloted by Tyler McQuarrie, the Porsche recorded the highest entry speed out of all the other competitors at over 80 miles per hour, while maintaining a deep angle with the help of the high gripping Hankook Ventus RS-2 Tires. 

COOPER TIRE & RUBBER COMPANY (NYSE: CTB) announced a partnership with Formula DRIFT for the fifth consecutive year for the entire seven round 2008 Formula DRIFT Pro Championship Series, a fully sanctioned national premier drifting event competition. The series got underway in Long Beach, Calif., April 12 and continued into Braselton, Ga., May 9-10. Many exciting events are slated for the coming months:

Formula DRIFT Round 3: The Gauntlet has been relocated to New Jersey’s Englishtown Raceway in Englishtown on June 14, 2008. The change of venue is due to the previously announced closing of Wall Township Speedway.

The closure of Wall Speedway only impacts the location for Formula DRIFT Round 3: The Gauntlet. The event will be held on its originally scheduled date of June 14. Englishtown Raceway’s 1.35-mile Road Course will provide the backdrop for the drifting track and will offer drivers and fans a unique course that will host its first major drifting competition.

BFGoodrich Tires had an impressive showing as the 2008 Formula Drift season kicked-off with on the streets of Long Beach last weekend. Two-time Formula Drift champion Samuel “The Crazy Swede” Hübinette captured the top qualifier honors and continued his momentum straight through to the finals where he earned a runner-up finish behind the wheel of his NuFormz Racing Mopar Dodge Viper SRT10 equipped with BFGoodrich g-Force T/A®KDW tires.

Formula DRIFT kicked-off it’s fifth season to a near sell-out crowd for Round 1: Streets of Long Beach with Chris Forsberg and his NOS Energy / Maxxis Tires Nissan 350Z Roadster taking home the first victory of the season. The Long Beach Grand Prix Street Course hosted the opening round and the teams came prepared to start the season off. Scion’s first entry into drifting had Ken Gushi and his RS*R Scion tC make the Top 16, Daijiro Yoshihara made incredible adjustments from a RHD Nissan Silvia into a LHD Pontiac GTO to finish in 5th place overall, and newcomers Justin Pawlak and Michihiro Takatori also advanced to the Top 16 competition. The highlight of the day came when Long Beach local Kyle Mohan battled through the competition to finish in 4th place overall, the highest finish of his career.

Binter & Co. will be releasing grandstand seats in the coming weeks for the inaugural Formula DRIFT Singapore competition to be held on 27 April 2008.

Held at the new Changi Exhibition Centre - same venue as the Singapore Air Show Grounds - Formula DRIFT Singapore is the circuit’s very first championship to take place outside of North America. This one-day event promises to raise the profile of the local motor sports scene onto the next level.