You really need to check out our Podspeed podcast if you haven’t started already. We’ve been really fortunate to have some very cool and interesting people stop by to chat with Sam, Taro, and James.

They’ve spoken with everyone from former Indy Car driver Roger Yasukawa to former Top Gear USA host Tanner Foust and more.

In one of the more recent episodes the Podspeed crew had the chance to chat with none other than Jim Liaw, one of the co-founders of Formula Drift.

Jim’s journey in drifting is a very interesting one. He and his partner Ryan Sage actually started out running a marketing agency called Slipstream Global. Few people know this but Jim and Ryan saw how popular drifting was getting in the United States and actually were integral in bringing the D1GP to America for the first time in 2004 at Irwindale Speedway.

If you know your drifting history you will also know that the first D1GP event in ‘04 was massive and sold out Irwindale for the first time ever.

Seeing how successful that event was, Jim and Ryan tried to negotiate a deal to bring a full season of D1 to America but D1 ultimately declined. That is what led Jim and Ryan to set off on their own to start their own series, Formula Drift. The rest is history.

16 years later Formula Drift is the premiere drifting series with divisions all over the world.

If starting from scratch and building a global network of professional drifting weren’t hard enough, 2020 saw the series facing their biggest challenge ever.

Here are just a few of the things Jim and the Podspeed crew discussed

Doing a full Formula Drift season during a global pandemic

Formula Drift 2020 Champion Vaughn Gittin Jr celebrating a victory (while masked) at round 4 in Seattle. Photo by Larry Chen

Needless to say, when the global pandemic hit in 2020 it effectively turned all professional sports upside down; including motorsports. Series like Indy Car, NASCAR, Formula One and more were canceling events as regulations came down all over the world preventing large events and gatherings.

Jim and the Formula Drift team found a way to have a full competition season despite those insurmountable challenges.

“Our main goal in pivoting all year long and adapting to changing regulations really was to get a season done,” said Jim.

It took dropping four venues out of the original eight and condensing each stop into a double-header or sometimes even a triple header but the Formula Drift accomplished their goal of a full competition season and a champion was crowned. “At the end of the day we pulled it off, ran 8 rounds of competition at 4 venues across 13 weeks,” said Jim.

Could Rhys Millen hang with today’s Formula Drift drivers?

Rhys Millen piloting his Hyundai Genesis drift car in Formula Drift circa 2012. Photo by Andrew Beckford

One of the benefits of Formula Drift being around for 16 years is that a conversation can be had about the early era drivers versus the young aces that are currently competing. Specifically Taro posed the question how would former champ Rhys Millen do in his car from the early days against the current crop of drivers and cars?

“I think it’d be tough,” said Jim, getting straight to the point in his response. “I think guys like Rhys and Tanner [Foust] are definitely world class calibur drivers so I think from a driving skill standpoint they would be able to adapt.”

Where Jim thinks someone like a Rhys Millen would fall short is pitting a car from 2005 against the cars of today.

“The advancement and the vehicle dynamics of the cars is much different so they definitely would not be bringing the most advantageous tool to the battle,” said Jim. We’re inclined to agree with him as so much has been learned about drift car engineering and setup since the early days.

Electric Vehicles In Formula Drift?

Napoleon Motorsports "EL1" electric Camaro drift car. Image taken from Napoleon Motorsports Instagram page.

During the discussion our resident EV news enthusiast Sam took the opportunity to ask Jim about the possibility of Formula Drift adapting to the oncoming wave of electric sports cars.

“I think there's definitely room for that,” responded Jim. He then spoke of Napoleon Motorsports; A team that actually brought a full EV built on a Camaro chassis to a few rounds of Formula Drift competition.

He praised their efforts but cited that longevity is a current issue when it comes to an EV drift car.

“I think it definitely showed what's possible and I think a lot was learned from that. It still comes down to durability,” said Jim. The EV drift car was able to complete more than a few demo runs but the question is how it would hold up throughout several bracket battles in competition.

With the EV Camaro drift car due to its instant torque from a direct drive electric motor, it was constantly snapping axles. So there are definitely some things that still need to be worked out but Jim is very much open to more EVs coming to Formula Drift.

“Long story short I think there's room for that. I think there is a possibility of running them (EV & gas-powered) together side by side so it's a mix like it is now. Maybe the first step is an all-electric class of vehicles.”
An all EV-class of Formula Drift? Interesting to say the least.

Check out the full episode

If you want to watch or listen to more of the great conversation that the Podspeed crew had with Jim Liaw, then you’ll definitely want to check out the full episode. They get into so much more that we were able to touch on here and it was all great discussion! You can find full episodes of Podspeed on iTunes, Amazon, YouTube, and just about any major podcast distribution platform. What do you think about electric vehicles in Formula Drift? How do you think Rhys Millen would do in his Hyundai Genesis against someone like Ryan Tuerck or Chelsea DeNofa? Share your thoughts with us on Twitter at @GTChannel!

Formula Drift Head Jim Liaw Visits Podspeed