Forgestar came through with a set of 19″ F14 wheels so we could mount some sticky 19″ Hankook Ventus RS3 tires on what Carl calls his “practice car”.

The RS3 tires are a perfect fit since they are Hankook’s Porsche 997 GT3 setup and the rears stretch nicely over the 12×19 rear wheels:

Front: 235/35ZR19

Rear: 305/30ZR19

Carl claims that equipped with these tires, the Porsche will be able to beat the laptimes he set in Redline Time Attack racing the City Tire 350Z (also on Hankook RS3 tires). That means FAST so it’s not exactly a humble statement. We are excited to see the results so stay tuned to find out which car wins!

Check the pics out!

As most of you know, we will not be running our 350Z this year in Formula Drift. We do still support many of the drivers with tire and service from City Tire. But I wanted to take this oppurtunity to grab some tickets and go out to Long Beach to be a spectator. Laid back, great weather and crowd and cheering on all of our friends competing this year. One of them being Formula Drift Rookie Fredric Aasbo from Norway. He was killin’ it all weekend and easily became a crowd favorite finishing 4th!!! Great job Fredric!!

Many new cars and teams in their first debut on the track. On the left is Joon Maeng driving the Full Tilt – Bergonholtz RX8 from last year. On the right is Conrad Gruenwald in the brand spankin’ new Hankook Camaro. In my opinion the best looking car in Formula Drift. <3 

Sam was in the new Charger, showing phenominal control in that giant beast. Jarod (Formula D announcer) hyping up the crowd.

All day people were getting crazy with this wall, scraping all over it. Andy Yen (Formula D Judge) approves.

In the end it was J.R. taking first blood. Round 1 Champ was elated! Congrats to Falken, Ford Racing, and J.R.! Great way to start the season.

www.formulad.com

On the same weekend of XDC, we packed up and went straight to Top Drift Round 1 in Willow Springs for Sundays competition. Super busy weekend, thanks to our entire crew for making it happen. With fresh tires on all the cars were lined up for qualifying. 

The judges Henry Schelley, Hiro Sumida, and Justin Pawlak were awaiting to sort out the top 16, and here they are! 

Now we are ready for some tandem. Great battles!!! Many of the XDC drivers made it out so the competition was fierce. Charlie O was a busy man on this Sunday.

 In the end, David Briggs.. yes the Canadian guy that won XDC takes it home! Great weekend for him. Big Congrats for the weekend sweep. Not easy to do with guys like Ryan Kado and Steve Chan driving against you.

-John

Both representing common partner Hankook Tire, AE Performance and our driver Carl have entered a hard-charging team collaboration for the 2010 season of Redline Time Attack with the main target to go for podium positions with full force. Alongside AE Performance’s  Redline franchise ‘factory’ cars and drivers; Paul Dentice in 370Z, Rich Taylor in BMW E92 330 and The Fast and the Furious Paul Walker in BMW E92 M3, AE Performance will also back Carl in the Porsche with track support and tuning parts.

With this we can also officially announce that we as a new Hankook Race Program Dealer will keep our focus on Redline Time Attack and other possible racing venues this year, and pass on 2010 Formula D. We are working on a plan to bring the City Tire Formula D Nissan 350Z TT to one or two demo events during 2010 though besides development / testing / practice to give our fans and supporters a chance to see Carl and the CTO Z33 lay down those clouds of Hankook tire smoke at full drift.