Clubloose does.....ROADCOURSE!

So with Nopi coming to englishtown Clubloose set up 2 practice days for nopi liscenced drivers and a couple good buddies. This being the FIRST EVER drift events held on Raceway Parks Beautiful road course.. Lets just say everyone was in love with this track for drifting.

To quote Stewart Leask of Texas "I think we are gonna buy a house around here..are houses cheap in this area?"

Raceway Park built this exciting road course like 5 years ago and due to permit problems the track has been a ghost town until recently. Some of the pavement has fallen into disrepair but that didnt stop us from killing the shit out of this amazing facility. here are som pictures of clubloose regulars killing it from the ace lens of ADAM LAM! thanks Adam for the great shots.


Will Moore made a great showing after a couple of years of struggle with his pretty silvia
Big man on campus Rich Abella working the kinks out of the new Eshiftpro.com 1jz powered s14
Local Ripper Rod Campos doing it real well under the raceway park main gate sign.

Recent transplant Dennis George Mertzanis having some fun through the splash zone in on the back course.
The always present Carlos Doria getting to full lock.. get em carlos GRRRRRRRRRR!
Clubloose Staffer Shawn Milone Piloting the RTtuning.com Onevia! I love his facial hair concept.
Jon "vosko""I had an FD" Voskinarian giving that bank Hell! What a great shot by Lamtron!
Even I got some runs Thank to Justin Pillings New ripper! How 2002 is this car i love it.
So there you have it.. It is also Fact that clubloose is in the process of booking at least 5 more events on this facility YEEEAH!

I can has van!

So my dreams have been realized in the form of a SWEET 1996 Honda Odyssey!!!
With having the house and constantly driving to RT and such i need both a reliable vehicle that was good on gas and could hold tons of shit.

I WIN!


Fucking sweet.!!
All that room for stuff and dogs... this was the first vehicle to have the fold flat third row seating.
Keeping it Mid 90's son! Gotta get that OUTTA HERE!

so hopefully we will begin the upgrading asap with some coils,wheels,kit,stereo shit and darker tint.

too fast too live too tired to fall asleep

I have been going crazy lately. Working,Nopi,Clubloose,House,dogs,finding a new car. I dont know how people get shit done. I need adderall more than ever. Anyway.. i have been trying to update and i get like 3 in a row and then lose steam. So i will add something every day even if its stu[id and even if you comment and say its stupid.. So tonight i talked on the phone with Vaughn Gittin Jr.

He said he liked the new DA shirts topics and i busted our asses on (more topics than me) So in celebration of our hard work go buy a shirt. Tell them i sent you so we can make more and i will feel like our hard work is getting noticed. . Its hard to go from like 20 designs and cut it down to like 5 hoping people will buy them..Especially since most of the designs i come up with (ideawise) i want to go to print.

DA clothing is a labor of love for topics and I and we try to work with new artists as well as our old favorites. I would love to do this shit for a living however its not to that point yet. I am an idea man so im looking for a few good artists. We are trying to get to 5 new designs a season spring/summer/fall/winter and keep around the ones that sell.. We will also be doing some limited edition shit this year.. So if it says limited you better buy buy buy cause once they are gone they are gone.

go buy some shit
THE DA SHOP
I am so sleepy its time to hit the sacek

Leave me some comments to wake up to

Aint no team like a DA team cause a ........

So its luke warm off the presses , but Drift Alliance rolled all competition in Long beach.... Yes ALL OF THEM..

Drift Alliance the most winningest team in American drift history (i will check and get back to you on that fact) killed it on "the streets" bro.

here is an amazing quote from urban racer

"Sunday's main event witnessed Team Drift Alliance put on a clinic, as the threesome of Tony Angelo in the Maxxis/Mazdaspeed RX-8, Chris Forsberg in his NOS Energy Drink/Maxxis 350Z, and Vaughn Gittin, Jr. in the Falken/Ford Racing Mustang GT significantly raised the bar in the budding sport's standards. The trio's flawless parallel pirouette through the Turn 11 hairpin, complete with smoky tire destruction, will go down in drifting history."


DEAL WITH THAT DRIFTING WORLD!!
Pics from Drift Fotos

This is your DA Class Of 2008!!!!!!

A sweet ad for Drift Alliance
Brothers forever!

Earthquakes, Monsoon rains, and a banged up shin cant stop an event.

Day One:
Thursday night
So after a terrible showing in Moroso, I wasnt going into NOPI St Louis with a lot of confidence.... The first thing to go wrong happened shortly after stepping off the plane in St louis. I was tired from traveling all day and excited to be hanging out with Rob Fleming (another NOPI Judge) again and wasnt paying attention to where i was going and BAM! i slam my shin into one of the rows of chairs in the Airport. Great 10 minutes in the state of MO and im ready to go home. Strike one.

Upon arrival i met the "new guy".. Jason Jiovani, Apparently Jason did the whole nopi season last year and drives pretty awesome. Jason is a ripping dude, knows his shit and works hard man.
You might know him from ripping this machine..

Anyway, so we are heading through St Louis and then bam we end up in Illinois. So im all "What the fuck i thought this is Nopi St louis... turns out the track isnt even in Missouri its in Illinois!
You can see the gateway to the west aka The St Louis Arch from the track we ran "Gateway Int Raceway".
Here is a picture i took of it when we went out for karaoke. More on that later.


Day Two:
So Friday we go to the track and its raining crazy off and on all day.. During the night we had an EARTHQUAKE! Yeah it was my first one i ever lived through.. and i woke up for like a second.. then went back to bed..

I dont get "Phased" by earthquakes man.. I mean like i cant believe how fast they are . California is a bunch of sissy's always crying about the earth trying to swallow them up..

The gang at Adrenaline Motorsports were running a qualifier and the track conditions looked terrible. All of a sudden the sky opens up and its pouring.. Like buckets and buckets, Cats and dogs, whatever you want to call it, its raining hard. Doppler says the end is not in sight and we cancel the rest of the day ... Sorry St Louis .
Here is a picture of the ground that Wrecked took... it was wet man.. and the wind broke a patio umbrella in half... thats a fact. I didn't take pics cause i like to keep my camera working.


Saturday:
Saturday starts practice it was cloudy and cold.. I was shivering the whole time.. All i had was this crappy childs rain coat with a fake fleece liner that we bought from walmarts. I was mega cold. I watched some practice then tandem practice... then i went to karoke in down town st louis.. Killed some of my favorites and hung out with this guy.. he lent me his chain for the picture so i could set my street cred meter through the roof! Then he karaoke RAPPED!
Thats how they do in the STL dogggg!


Sunday:
So practice is over. We went straight into qualifying.. after the smoke flew away the sun came out and the qualifying ladder looked like this.

1. Aaron Losey- TX
2. Nate Brasz- VA
3. Sammy Tiger Racing-GA
4. Forest Wang-HI
5. Jeremy Lowe-FL
6. Matt Waldin-PA
7. Kenji Yaminaka-Japan DUDE!
8. Chanin P.-GA
9. Ali Aljibouri-TX
10. Esteban Falero-FL
11. Sean Love-FL
12. John Wagner-PA
13. Bill Sherman-FL
14. Jason Beatty-AZ
15. Juan Henao-FL
16. Nick Thomas-Who Knows?

Then we went into tandem.

On The podium was were these men
1.Aaron Losey

2.Kenji Yamanaka


3.Forrest Wang:
All in all St Louis err.. Illinois was awesome... I had a great time and cant wait for Jersey see y'all there.
Photos W/watermark By Wrecked Magazine

To the Topics at hand!

Well the first round of Formula D has come and gone.. On the Podium, above the Number 1 stood CL legend Chris Forsberg. Chris has made all the right calls in the realm of professional drifting and being a natural hasnt hurt either. Congrats to the whole Forsberg Racing Team. Good luck for the rest of the season...
Love Clubloose!
Chris Forsberg Racing!

Dear Syn ... Thankyou.

So when i came back from Miami there was a sweet package from Syn Lee. He sent me a sweet shirt from his company Drift 411 Poke around on there the site is radical..These guys do lots of stuff but what i like about Syn is he loves skateboarding.. And this is the shirt he made. This little beauty is an homage to Thrasher magazines' "skate and destroy" shirt made popular in the late 80's or early 90's
Brilliant Syn... brilliant!
www.drift411.com

The daily grind!

So i said earlier that i gots me a new J-O-B. This new job has been taking a lot of time out of my day, but the good news is its fun. I started working at R/T Tuning in Lansdale PA. Its quite a haul (about hour and 20 minutes each way) but the shop is busy and HUGE! I have never worked at a shop this busy. Thats why i have no time to rap on the interweb. But R/T got all the sweet shit to build rad cars.
Dyno .....Check!
This is where i can find out my corolla is still slow as shit
Sweet alignment rack..


Check!
This is where i can find out that giant pothole on the highway knocked my alignment around like a battered wife.


This is the office where you can find me. Slaving away answering ?'s about what head makes most pony's when paired with a B20 Block.... i still dont know..

The best part of hanging around here all day is working with Pat Dulcey and his car.
Pat is awesome and does most of the hard/dirty work around here.(thank god)
You may know Pat from such shows as "I have the sweetest FC ever Built"

Oh yeah Pat Owns this gem of an FC..
Fucking deal with THAT!
Attention magazine dudes... get to this car before someone else does..... for real!
call pat at the shop... 215-855-5565 (or me if you are bored)

But back to my drive.. I drive forever to get here.. In passing here is some of the shots i see on my way to work.. I have been really into scenery pictures as of late. Bucks County is a treasure trove of old shit... houses,roads,broads, you name it .. Bucks county PA is old as dirt and its real rural still.. that means i see cool stuff you don't see every day if you live in the suburbs or the city.



These houses look to be American Revolution era..
Thats a horse... those hangout along the side of the road all over the place.

This is the Pineville Tavern.. which is on Durham RD in Pineville PA. Its in the middle of no where..According to Susans dad has really good Stew and a great variety of beers on tap.
So thats that... cant wait for motorcycle weather to explore PA a little more.

So i have been on hiatus

So due in large part to running crazy , getting a new job and trying to actually sleep a little has hindered my attempts at "bloogging" doggggg!.So with that said im gonna get to work on doing this every day from now on. Even if its annoying as hell, i will in fact do a recap from AZ to now. Shit is bonkers "y'all" , so gimme a break. This blog will rise from the ashes like a phoenix... lets hope it is back on track by next week.. Sorry!

But in the mean time here is a picture from testing at E-town in the RT Tuning 240sx

Where I have been

Man it has been a bad scene around here. I got the sickness from hell. Sweating,fever,chills,stomach pains, dizzyness,cough,runny nose,aches and pains. Not to be dramatic but i wanted to die. It was horrible. In my down time I had a chance to get some things done and other things had to fall by the way side. But here is some updates.

Up to this point, this blog has been fun and hopefully funny. But i have to put on serious face when i show you the things i saw below.

I am gearing up for Arizona and i was poking around on the local forumstrying to familiarize myself with some of the locals cars and check out any media i found. I almost vomited (not cause of my flu like symptoms) when i saw this. These are some pictures from a local Tucson event (thank god not the same group i am judging for.) that happened a little while ago. With all the negative press drifting gets as it is, i would hope people would think a little bit about how their actions on the track impact others, and by others i mean drifting as a whole. Who knows what insurance these guys use i would be really really excited if they were insured by the same company i use. Think how sweet it would be when they have an accident that was due to one of the things shown below...I cant wait to explain to the insurance company that the drifting events i run are different than the events they run. But seriously this is 2008 and as long as drifting has been in America i thought we have gotten past all this dumb shit.
Here is a tandem run with some little kid in the car and the car doesnt have a cage. SWEET! All we need is some 8 year olds death on driftings record.. that will make sponsors really want to get in on this money train!
The rodeo... i have never seen this before. How do you do that. WOW !! At least he has a helmet on so if he hits the ground he will be safe right before the still rolling car runs him over.

Oh the old front wheel drive drift.. CLASSIC! But these coo coo birds took it up a notch.. NO SEATBELTS ,HELMETS OR EVEN DOORS.. Man you guys are really pushing the limits here. Good work.

So i just want to thank the guys over at AZ Drift Machine for putting on SOLID events. Oh and thanks for trying to shit in the cereal of every other organization in this country who tries to hold fun, safe events. Next time i think you guys should put some land mines out there as course markers. That might make it a little safer. At least it will weed out the sucky drifters.

Gotta Know Where To Go!

So how many times have you been driving your radical drift car on the street or rocking that all too cool Drift Alliance hoodie and someone goes "Oh man you drift , thats so awesome.. where do you do it?" Then you have to give this person like 40 websites that he will probably forget in like 5 minutes because you confused the hell out of him. Well now all you need is one site.

Wheretodrift.com was started by my good buddies Vaughn Gittin Jr and Josh Baker to take the guess work out of finding a safe and reliable place to annihilate rubber. This all in one guide for the drifting and perspective drifting community was needed for some time. The website is being populated as we speak (yes Clubloose is part of the program) and should be fully operational before you know it. This handy website could also be a great service if say you are vacationing or on business in another part of the country and want to check out the events in that area.

Currently the USA is the only region being covered but Vaughn Jr assured me that once they have the USA organized they will try and conquer the WORLD!
I went to the site to check out the setup and found it really easy to register CLubloose and then i poked around and noticed the link for sponsors and other related links. This website could possibly turn into a home base for everything drift related.

So if you run events be sure to get on here and register. Also the next time you are asked where to drift just throw them this URL
www.wheretodrift.com

Who knew you could send love through the USPS?

So today I went to my mail box and the wild and crazy boys at Shift-lock.net sent me a sweet sticker pack. I asked Colin Frost from Shift-lock to bring some to AZ cause we will both be judging the event i mentioned earlier. But he bypassed all that BS and just sent me out some. It was sweet and totally not expected. I really appreciate it.
So you know, since i have these sweet decals you now need them. They have hilarious sayings that will be sure to polish your turd of a drift car. Here is what they look like.
So get your own cause these are too sweet to share.


So get your butt over there and buy some of these .. they rule. Profits from the sale go to help Colin's Privateer run at Formula-D.. So help a brother out.

Shift-Lock!
Thats the link so Hurry up and buy!
Thanks Colin and Jon and good luck this season!

Wrecked Issue 3 out on cyber newstands everywhere.!

If you haven't heard about Wrecked magazine and you are into drifting you live under a rock.. or an elephant.. or whatever, something heavy that would keep you from hearing about this diamond in the rough. In a sea of online content this Drifting magazine shines like a beacon of hope. Guiding you safely into the port of good content. Its articles are witty, informative and presented in a style similar to skateboarding mags of old. The photo's are choice and the little video's they give you in the pages leaves you hungry for more. My favorite part of Wrecked is not what it has but what it doesn't. It lacks the boring tech shit that most print and online mags ram down your throat. Seriously, how many times can we look at a coil over install on some rusty project 240. We fucking get it already(other mags take note). So if you want a fresh look at the future of drifting without all the bullshit to waste your time. Check out Wrecked. It gets a Matt Petty seal of approval for excellence and awesomeness in the world of drifting media award.
Good work on issue 3 guys!
Wrecked Magazine!

THE NEEEEW MR AND MRS TOPICS!!!

So my long time friends finally put the hammer down.. They put the hammer down on marriage. Erik Forsberg and Courtney Hellyer tied the knot this weekend and became Mr and Mrs Erik Forsberg.

I wanted to congratulate my friends on getting their collective ass in gear and sealing the deal.

Erik is the man behind Drift Alliance Clothing and Courtney is the woman behind the man.. So in fact, Courtney is the boss and you should now run all things past her. If you need Topics for anything or if you need to make plans with him don't just assume he will be there.. He is a married man now and with that comes responsibilities. So with that said...

Courtney, can Topics and I go play motorcycles soon?

Good Luck guys.
I love you.
Matt!

Workin on some NIGHT MOVES!

So everyone knows Clubloose and drifting as a whole has been a labor of love for me. I try really hard to bring sweet drifting events to the east coast that give drivers both cheap prices and lots of seat time. I hope 2008 will be the same story.. Here is the the schedule for drifting practice events at Raceway Park in Englishtown NJ. These will be practice events for beginner drivers and dudes looking to do the drifty in a safe place while not breaking the bank. Here is the "flyer" for those events. They start at 5pm and go till 10pm I hope to see you there this year.

Also stay tuned for updated dates for Advanced drivers ... these events will be run on a new course and feature higher driving levels and hopefully a better "show" for spectators. But in the mean time.. print this flyer out and share it with your pals.

The tattoo shop is CLOSED!!!!

So sadly Dave is gone and my heart aches... but luckily my arm is throbbing with the sweet sweet memories of Dave Edge Tattoo Party 2008 Man Fun Extravaganza with Needles and Blood!
For the rest of you who missed the fun times here are some of the finished products that were in daves camera.
Tim Johnsrud of Theory In Practice got this show stopper. He is also doing the cage in Dave's glorious FC . This is the reason this party happened in the first place since Dave had to trailer it down from NH to tims shop in Yardley, PA. This tattoo is an homage to the old saying "Almost only counts in horse shoes and hand grenades" It was a great idea Tim came up with and i dont think Dave could have drew it any better. Its AHHHSUM!
My Lovely girlfriend Susan is having Dave do her whole sleeve this is the start of something great.It will be old time nautical theme, like an old sea fairing map.. This compass rose started it all off .
EVO Mike Hannan was back for some more tattoos . You may remember his sweet "EAST COAST FUCK YOU" neck ringer from the last tattoo party.. If not check the link in the first tattoo party post.. You have to see it ! This is his PA pride tattoo . The eagle is holding PA's state symbol the "Keystone"
Travis came through and represented his home state of NJ with this amazing work .. I actually threw him the idea for the hat and the banner. It is the "town motto " from where i grew up in good old Hillsborough NJ
And last but not least my tattoo.This was a sweet mind meld for Dave and I. We have been talking about this gem for months and he had the time to do me. I really really love it and think it shows Dave's amazing talent. It actually looks better in person you can really see the little details Dave puts in...

So its a little quiet around here without the Buzzing drone of Dave's tattoo apparatus. But the good news is Tim will be getting Dave's car done really soon and then we can have another jam session. Hopefully the next time Dave will stay longer and we will have a nicer chair for him to use. Stay tuned for updates on the next tattoo party.