The “Kansai All Stars” annual drift competition seeks to crown the best drifters of the Kansai region of Japan, pitting drift teams representing different prefectures against each other in five-car trains. Because it is 2018, the full event coverage was quickly uploaded online, and in it we are treated to the story of the Idiot Son drift car.
I clicked on this report from the longrunning Video Option production companyjust to watch a bunch of cool cars go very sideways next to each other, but then came a segment at about 6:48 in.
Kansai All Stars is a decidedly amateur-style event, so it’s a surprise when one car rolls into the pits looking very much like Kazuya Bai’s car, who runs a similar all grey-composite Nissan in the top D1GP professional series. What’s the story? Our announcers wanders over to speak to the owner.
But the owner it is not! The driver in question, Tamura Kenta, explains that his car broke down before the event, so he borrowed this one.
Advertisement
He explains that Bai, a host of the event, helped him out with this thing and gave him old body panels, explaining the look.
But our announcer notices, uh, what’s up with this banner that reads “Idiot Son?”
Advertisement
As it turns out, his folks gave it to him. They’re the ones who have dubbed him an idiot, and both his mother and father drift. It’s one thing to have a married couple both entering one competition, the announcer explains, but a mother, father, and child is something he’s never seen before.
Advertisement
He suggests going to interview the mom, Nishi Ryota but then decides against it, reviewing some old footage of his mom being, uh, extremely cool on camera from past competitions.
Advertisement
Included is also this wonderful graphic wondering what talk over the dinner table is in the family. “Any time you open your mouth, it’s drifting,” our Idiot Son explains.
Advertisement
The organizers then decided that the only appropriate thing to do is to send Tamura out in a mini-competition before the main event.
Advertisement
Out goes Ryota, who starts strong but loses it mid corner.
Out goes Tamura, who makes it through.
Advertisement
And out goes Mifune, who starts strong but also loses it halfway through.
And thus, Idiot Son is crowned the champion of the Tamura family.
Advertisement
This is how car competitions should go down. I bet there are a bunch of short tracks in America where parents and children show up to the same event, and I want to see them duke it out on track.
I’ll also add that a few years ago I wrote a little article on how the internet has made available so much more footage of rallying than ever before. No longer was it something only seen if an event went through your town, or if you caught a glimpse on the Wide World of Sports, but something anyone could just look up on YouTube.
And now I’ll add that it’s amazing that not long after a regional event in Japan, I can just tune in and see full event coverage online. This is the power of the internet working as it should.
Advertisement
Delivering me parental owns from half a world away.
Correction: This article initially suggested young Tamura competed against his fellow family members. It appears he competed in and won another mini-competition, and was thusly deemed the best of his family.
Leave a Reply
Leave a Reply
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
