We head to Meihan for an AE86, 4A-GE-only drift battle cup and collect an R34 GTR from the USS Tokyo auctions.
We returned to Tokyo; we met with our friend Alec, who works for speed hunters at Daikoku. Unfortunately, the spot was a bust, so I was offered a seat in Alan’s 86. Some older heads might remember this car from years ago; Alan worked for Tomei years ago and helped develop the Poncam for the 86. It was wild tearing around the streets of Tokyo in his 86. Eventually, we made our way to another parking area packed with Hiace vans and a few dotted 86’s. If you’ve seen this video, you’ve probably seen how wild this place was.
After we spent some time at this PA, unexpectedly bumping into some channel fans, which is a rare and exciting thing to happen in Japan, we made our way down towards Shibuya, as we had heard there was a low rider meet happening.
Sadly, luck was not on our side with this. The meet had been cancelled, but we stuck around with Dino and Alec to watch a very diverse selection of traffic, from American cars to traditional Japanese tuned machines, roll through. Enough rambling from me; enjoy the photos from this night below.
Here is a somewhat extensive photo dump from visiting a Fluke event at Nikko. This had a much more locals-only feel; we were the only attendees. First, we made a trip to the gigantic statue out by the Tsukuba circuit, as it is impossible to avoid if you stay near it. The statue is called Kamakura Daibutsu, and it’s a must-see if you are up in that area. The Nikko day was fantastic; I shot a few photos of Tec Arts and friends who looked to be having a day off from work. Winds Auto’s Hiromi and her husband Obata were there too. Nikko events never disappoint; there is always something to see.
I will only do a little talking or writing for this day; this was a lucky event that we chanced, and it turned out to be one of the most incredible days of my life. It was like a window into our future because it was related to all the cars we love and their older brothers. I love Tsukuba, too. It is my favourite track in Japan, so to have this experience, seeing all these essentially priceless cars racing around, was a lot to take in.
The JCCA meet at Tsukuba should be on your list if you go to Japan; this blew our minds. Let the rest of the photos talk for this one; I’ve left many of them in, as cutting them out is hard. One of the biggest things that drive me up the wall about old blogs is the little amount of coverage from an event like this; maybe im old school, but I want to see everything, so I’ve done the nice thing and put a gigantic amount of imagery in here for people who enjoy that sort of thing. I hope you like them.
We strike Gold at Tsukuba and witness one of the most incredible classic track days in Japan.
The next stop on our adventure was Weld, a shop we had wanted to see for years. We had a reason to go there, as we would buy some TC stuff. Weld has a huge RC drift presence with its brand Overdose, and we wanted to check out its workshop and pick up some small parts, too. They do officially licensed wheels from work and other companies and brands like Voltex, so it was super cool to see this place in real life.
Once we got back to Tokyo, the most important thing on the list was to slam the Probox for the upcoming event Andrew had organised for us. He had gathered a few people to throw the first-ever Juicebox meet in Japan, which was insane.
Andrew and friends put together a Juicebox car meet in Japan, and many cool machines came out of the woodwork.
Day four of our journey was true freedom; we decided to stay in Gotemba, as it was getting us down the road towards Osaka, and we needed to head down to try to remedy the plan and see where to go next. We didn’t realise that Gotemba was close to Fuji Speedway, so we decided to have breakfast at Fuji as it would have been rude not to. Waking up with nothing to worry about, getting into our newly acquired profession and hitting the road were some of the best feelings we’ve ever had.
The trip was starting to feel like a proper adventure. Our first stop was Breakfast at Fuji, which we hoped wouldn’t take too long, but we got easily distracted.
Our next adventure was to tick a few places off the list. We had never been to Revolver, and the owners seemed hesitant with foreigners. However, we decided to take a look anyway. Thankfully, we had Alex with us, whose presence was instrumental in breaking the ice and making our introduction smoother.
We explore the world’s coolest Exhaust and Muffler shop known as Kakimoto.
After an exciting night in Osaka with Rob and his friends, we ventured out to the wilderness to meet with an old friend, Alex from Circuit Soul. He had moved to the countryside outside of Osaka, and we would get breakfast with him and head to the central circuit as we had never been.
We head back to Osaka to meet the younger Kanjo enthusiasts with whom we went on the loop and see how they are doing.
On our mission to Osaka, we salvaged our trip to Japan by stopping at Fuji Speedway to see the old racetrack bend and visit a forgotten tuning shop.