For years I’ve enjoyed being able to pilot some of the best sports cars on a track, but there’s one thing I’ve yet to learn – drifting. Yeah I’ve tried, quite unsuccessfully in a parking lot, but my skills were never anything to write about here. Well thanks to Toyota, I was able to learn with the pros at Irwindale Speedway in Southern California.
It’s pretty crazy to see how far Toyota has come in the last few years with its sports car lineup. Toyota has a long history of creating iconic sports cars, like the Toyota 2000 GT, Celica and AE86 models, but at the beginning of this decade, Toyota was more focused on hybrid and SUV models. Now Toyota is back in the sports car game, with not just one model, but three. There’s the purist GR86, the legendary GR Supra and the newcomer, the GR Corolla hot hatch.
I’ve driven all three of Toyota’s famed GR models on a track, but up until now I’d never tried to drift in them. Toyota invited a handful of journalists out to the Irwindale Speedway to “Learn to Drift” with the pros: Fredric Aasbo, Ryan Tuerck and Jhonnattan Castro. Aasbo and Tuerck also gave ride along rides in the GR Supra and the GR Corolla to let us see how the pros do it, leading up to the kick off the 2023 Formula a Drift season.
After a quick walk around Aasbo’s GR Supra and Tuerck’s GR Corolla, it was time to learn some drifting skills behind the wheel of the GR Supra and GR 86. The GR Corolla was also on hand to let us tackle the cones in a slalom.
Toyota’s pros jumped in the passenger seat and showed us exactly how to utilize understeer and oversteer to drift around a circle of cones. Yup this was way better than just trying to do an amateur donut in a parking lot. Zooming around a track at speeds over 100 mph can easily be mastered by most drivers, but drifting is a completely different animal. It requires patience and for the driver to be fully aware of the feedback that its getting from the vehicle.
Turn the wheel too fast or giving the car too much gas can easily get you unintended results. For starters no brakes are required to demonstrate the perfect donut. It took quite a few tries for me to be able to get the GR 86 to consistently drift around the cones, but once I did, I couldn’t stop smiling. It was so much fun. This speaks to how great the GR 86 and why its easily labeled as a purist’s sports car. The GR86 easily becomes one with the driver, making it easy to receive the feedback.
After we spent some time with the pros in the passenger seat, we were ready to compete. No we we’re going to attempt to drift around the track like the pros, but instead the group of us each took a chance to see how many times we could drift around the cones with the goal of achieving five perfect donuts. Given the fact that I probably had the least experienced drifting, I was able to make a few rounds around the cones, which I thought was great considering that I had just learned how to do it an hour or so earlier.
Many race fans may not even know the skills that are needed to become a drifting pro. The driver has to become one with the car, remember exactly how much gas or steering input is required and be able to remain calm even with all the excitement that’s going on. Thanks Toyota for all the fun.
