Firstly I would like to apologise for this late coverage of this event, but I feel I have to give it the coverage it deserves.
This being the first ever Awesomefest, I really had my doubts as did many. At first I was sceptical about this event, I feared that the attendees to this event would be very fan boy-ish and the event even appealed to the wrong crowd. However..I was pleasantly surprised.
On the Friday, I made my way across to Glasgow to meet up with the rest of the
SXOC and
JDMTAS people for a big convoy down. On the way across I managed to bump into John Fallon with the "White Dragon" R32 Skyline GTS-T and Danielle in her little MX5.
They followed me to the meeting point for the convoy where we met up the SXOC and JDMTAS convoy. Turns out they were meeting up with
JDMy0 convoy. In the end all of the Scottish lot convoyed down together. It was pretty fun in all honesty. Stu from
garageLSD jumped in my car to keep me company. Scadden from
JDMy0 took some rolling shot of my car too:
On arrival at Mallory Park after sorting out a few things we went over to the camp site to set up camp before going out to take a look at the track.
The Mallory Park logo has a slogan underneath which states "The Friendly Circuit" and it truly lived up to that slogan.
I pitched my tent with the SXOC and JDMTAS lot and prepared for the weekend. Albeit with a car full of food and drink. Think I had a 20 pack of quavers, 36 pack of walkers, 100 tumbler cups, 12 large muffins, 1 bottle of Whisky, 6 x 2 litre bottles of Irn Bru (for the hangover), crate of honey green tea, crate of red bull, a bottle of Jägermeister and a crate of Mountain Dew...I think I was prepared lol...
Friday night was mainly a set up night for most folk. As people made their way down to Mallory Park. People kept trailing in until late at night. Some of the cars that was allowed in was amazing to say the least.
Garage LSD lot started making their way across to the track to see what is going on that night. In order to get to the main area we had to cross a foot bridge over the track as most things were set up in the middle of the track. The pro drifters had a paddock in the middle of the track right next to the trade stands and clubbing tent. The paddock was open to everyone and if you manage to catch the drivers (they tend to be floating around their cars), you can always go up to them to have a chat. I am sure quite a lot of folk were chatting to the pro drivers drunk - I could name a few.
The clubbing tent (a.k.a. Sky Insurance Sound Stage) was getting packed. The free fair ground rides were getting used and the drinks were flowing at the bar. Music was provided by Propaganda DJ Nick Finning and The Futureheads DJ. Few beers and some tequila shots down us after visiting the clubbing tent, we started making our way back to camp. The SXOC tent was already bustling with chatter and commotion. I cracked open the Jägermeister and joined in. Needless to say the Jägermeister was finished pretty quickly...which brought me onto the Whisky and Green Tea combination (Try it! It tastes a lot nicer than it sounds!...Honestly!...try it!!). I have to say through this night, I am very glad that I joined the SXOC and met some amazing people. The banter and the fun I had was immense, but I was out at about 3:30am while the rest partied on.
Saturday morning alarm were provided by the Moto-x bikes that got up early to go on the moto track...it didn't help that people were revving their bikes right next to our tents. Morning drifters woke up early also and got their cars ready for the full day of drifting. As people slowly waken from the previous nights escapades, I realised that the track was already in full swing. I think this picture of Jules pretty much sums up the morning:
Mint was getting his car ready to go on the track:
Cam was also getting ready...for something:
As the day went on details about the track came through. There was one corner that most folk were scared to drift. Gerrards Corner was the nemesis of the track. The Hats after a while of saying that he isn't going to drift that corner ended up doing it anyway:
Kyle from
Chizfab, and Jeek along with the
TrampDrift lot was also down for this event.
Jeek had some issues with his car so he couldn't use the maximum potential of his car on track. Whereas Kyle was running fine and ended up drifting the whole of Gerrards Corner:
In between the action we visited the trade stands to have a look. I actually thought there would be more trade stands than what was there, hopefully next year there will be more. There were some interesting cars on show though:
The ramps were also being put to use including a young lad that was doing tricks on his little scooter, who was really impressive being as young as he was:
The main track was used for drifting which was open to anyone that is wanting to buy some time on it. However the professional drifters that compete in the drifting championships were allowed on to use the track during any of the sessions. Mint from
No One Fresher (minty.fresh) explained to me that you could be happily drifting away then Phil Morrison in his 2JZ powered S15 (First picture) will scream up behind you and you will get scared, anxious and then proceed to let them through. This seems to happen with most of the Professional drivers. I even saw Steve "Baggsy" Biagioni in his RWD converted Hawk Eye Subaru Impreza drift around another drifter. It truly was great to see the big guns so to say mix it in with the small fry.
Mind you not everyone that made it there with their cars made it home with their cars...like this guy:
Who I heard head butted a marshal when he got out of the car after doing this:
As evening came everyone was in great anticipation for the evening event. Night drifting. Most or all of the professional drivers were out on track to drift the track in the dark. Although there were sections lit up by flood lights, there were also sections which were really dark. One thing that stood out for me was Phil Morrison drifting in the dark with no headlights on. That memory for some reason stuck with me a long while after the event. It truly was a spectacle.
After the night drifting, we wondered back to the SXOC tent, which we were greeted by the resident DJ playing in the tent. There was a rave going on along with a full projector light show. As the night went on the tent got more and more packed. Everyone that was camping started to gather there. The party started to become busier and louder. Outside of the tent some other SXOC'ers made a bonfire where a few people were huddled up for some warmth. Everyone was drinking again and chatting away again. I was too tired and went to bed quite a bit early in the night knowing that I had a 5-6 hour drive the next day.
Sunday morning, the drifters/moto-crossers/bikers/skaters were all up early on the last day. Sunday was a lazy day for most. All recovering from the night before and people started to leave. As people left I was actually a bit saddened as the realisation of the end of the event is setting in. I went to watch more of the drifting and made a last pass at the trade stands. Relaxed a bit and watched the day go by. Around 5pm (ish) I started making my way back up to Edinburgh. Again it was an epic drive through all seasons of weather...
In conclusion...it is safe to say that Awesomefest 2011...was awesome.
::Jeff
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