Formula Drift kicks off 11th season on Streets of Long Beach

Filed under: Motorsports, Coupe, BMW, Ford, Nissan, Racing



The 2014 Formula Drift series kicked off last weekend in Long Beach, and saw Chris Forsberg, who you'll recall went mad and drifted around a warehouse in an Infiniti M, take the title behind the wheel of his Hankook Tire Nissan 370Z (shown above).

Forsberg ran away with the first round of competition, beating out second-place finisher Kenneth Moen and his Bridges Racing Nissan 240SX in the head-to-head final. In third place was 2013 championship winner Michael Essa and his Yokohama BMW M3, who beat out Justin Pawlak for the final podium spot thanks to his top scoring qualifying run.

In the manufacturers' title, Nissan took an early lead with 122 points, which isn't a huge surprise considering five of the top ten drifters were piloting either a Z or a product of the brand's S platform. Ford, which had two drivers (Justin Pawlak and Vaughn Gittin, Jr.) in the top ten, took home second place, while BMW is currently third in the manufacturers' standings.

While Forsberg, who finished second in the overall standings in 2013, has pulled out to an early lead, there are still six more events in this year's championship. The next contest is set for May 9th and 10th at Road Atlanta. You can check out the entire Formula Drift schedule at the series' homepage.

We had photographer Drew Phillips on hand for the Long Beach contest. Take a look at his gallery of smoking tires and sideways cars at the top of the page. You can also scroll down for the complete results right from Long Beach.Continue reading Formula Drift kicks off 11th season on Streets of Long Beach

Formula Drift kicks off 11th season on Streets of Long Beach originally appeared on Autoblog on Tue, 08 Apr 2014 17:44:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.



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