This probably doesn’t sound like a lot of fun for most people, but there are very few ways I would rather spend my weekend. It included three cities and more shutter clicks than I can count.

On Friday we left Regina and arrived in Calgary to visit Eric Zapata of Hotboyz drift and Arif Jina. Until hunger and exhaustion kicked in, we followed them around Calgary looking for spots to shoot.

The next day we made the trip from Calgary to Edmonton for DriftWest Round 1. It was there we ran into some old friends of our site. After DriftWest finished on Sunday night, we set up shop and continued shooting some features. Paul Harrison’s Beams 3sge-powered Corolla has long been one of my favourite drift cars in the west. You can expect to see much more on his car soon.

It would be wrong to talk about Corollas in the west and not mention Dave Vickers. Some people are just meant to drive a certain type of car. Its like it’s in their DNA; for Dave, that car is the AE86. Dave was nice enough to set up a shoot for us with the guys from “Mellow.”

Included in the upcoming Mellow feature will be DriftWest Round 1 winner Devin Horsley’s AE86.

This week’s post is a brief overview of what we got up to last weekend because I couldn’t decide what car to feature first. Next week I’ll roll the dice and choose one of these cars to start with.

The first run of the top 10 was Jon Schildwachter vs Chad Simpson, with Jon knocking Chad out.

Next up was Travis Clark and Nathan Forsberg. Travis did very well on his lead run but spun out on the following run, so Nathan and his FC moved on.

Paul Harrison and Chad Sager put down consistent runs throughout the event. It came down to the judges’ decision that Chad would move on. It was truly a spectacle to see the angle Paul could hold in his 1972 Toyota Corolla.

Tyler Miller Hurman and his 1UZ swapped S-Chassis faced up against Jesse Wiesner in the next battle, with Tyler taking the win.

Devin Horsley was another person consistently running all day in his V8 powered AE86. During these two runs, he was able to move on after knocking Nathan Forsberg out.

The fight for 3rd and 4th was between Jon and Tyler. Jon edged out Tyler and landed himself a third place finish.

The battle for 1st and 2nd could easily be described as epic. From where I was standing, I saw nothing but amazing runs from both Devin and Chad. For me, it would have been impossible to judge.

In the end a decision has to be made, and Devin Horsley was crowned the 1st place winner of Round 1..

Keep your eyes peeled for more coverage of this event; we have lots more to share!

While I was making the rounds at the event, I came across this Skyline and something looked familiar about it. Upon closer inspection, I realized my hunch was on point. Well, that and the fact that the owner caught me staring at his wheels and was nice enough to reassure me that they were, in fact, my old Work XD9s.

My spares had went to Carter and I couldn’t be happier to see someone actually use these wheels. I can’t believe I let them sit in a box for two years. I also can’t wait for Carter to get some fronts to match his rears.

All kidding and cringing aside, I do appreciate when drifting finds its way into the mainstream media. It was nice that some local news outlets were willing to come out and give the Drift West Matsuri some exposure.

I think it’s safe to say that drifting has officially entered into its third chapter in Saskatchewan. For those of you new to the scene, you may not know the first chapter was written somewhere around 2009 when QCMA started hosting drift events. The second chapter happened around the same time DODOlogic started; this also marked the closest yours truly would ever get to being a drifter, and even that’s reaching.

So why am I telling you a history of Drifting in Saskatchewan? No, it’s not so you’ll take time from your day to search for coverage of the “Big Valley Drift-oree” or “Drift Away Camp.” Rather, I want to illustrate how fast everything can go away.

Saskatchewan has a great talent pool of drifters and maybe my favorite part about these Kings Park Speedway  events is watching people learn and improve.  That is why it is important that we as a community support these events, so that they can continue and that talent pool can continue to grow.

Drifting in Saskatchewan hasn’t reached its pinnacle yet. It still has many chapters ahead of it. Hopefully with the help of Drift West and their upcoming drift events, drifting — or “drift racing” as it’s become known — can continue to grow.

At this point you’re probably thinking, “Hey Ryan, that’s all fine and good, but what you’re talking about doesn’t really have anything to do with these pictures.” My answer to you, observant reader, is “Thank you for actually reading the article.” Let’s be honest, most people are just going to scroll through the story to see if there are pictures of them going sideways.

For enduring my Sask drifting lesson, I will leave you with some extra pictures of people going sideways.

I will also urge each of you, if you’re truly interested in drifting, to attend drift events both local and abroad. And try to get to as many as you can. If you have the time and funds, take in some DriftWest this season. If you have even more money and time, try to visit some of the drift events in B.C. like the Drift Union Invitational or some of the Pacific NorthWest events.

When drifting first arrived in America in the 1980′s, the hive of activity was in California. Try hard to get to events there. Although this probably goes without saying, try really, really hard to find the money and time to get to a Formula Drift event. Or go to Japan to experience drifting where it started.

Just don’t call it “drift racing.”

You might remember Paul Smyrski’s Civic from a Wheel Wednesday post a while back. At the time he had Baby Blue 17″ SSR Professor SP1′s. Now he’s changed it up and is rocking Rotiform NUE’s fitting 17×8 +30 in the front (with 5 mm spacer) and 17×8 +20 in the rear. All four wheels are gloss white with blue pearl and wrapped in 205/40r17 Neuton nt5000 tires.

The car itself is a 2007 Honda Civic LX and getting it to the height it sits at are a set of HSD DT coilovers and Buddyclub rear camber arms. Stiffening up the rear body is a VMS lower tie bar.

The list of visual modifications to the car include an SI headlight swap, a fog light kit, HC1 front lip, Carbon fiber grille, JDM emblems, side window visors and a rear window visor.

Letting the car breathe a little better is a full 60mm exhaust with J’s Racing C304 Dolphin tip/turndown muffler and an AEM intake. I asked Paul if he had any future plans for the motor and he told me one of his favorite things about the car is how good it is on gas, so he probably won’t travel too far down the adding-power road.

No bags here.

There were so many amazing vehicles; it was like visual overload for my eyes. I couldn’t decide what to  look at first. Then I saw it — a car after my own heart.

What a vision! It was like my car’s prettier sister.

This blue MX-5 popped in the sunlight and I had to grab a shot of it.

I have such a weak spot for the Datsun 510′s.

More Datsun love here with this beauty of a Z. Nissan makes good-looking cars, I must say.

I enjoy the unique colour on this Scion.

This BMW definitely has some attributes that could be linked to Rusty Slammington. Plus, the paint is perfect for the track where this car is drifted. It’s an awesome look for this car.

There’s something about this Honda I adore, but I can’t quite put my finger on it.

For my first Defrost meet, I have to say it was tons of fun. I hope I can make it out for more awesome meets in Regina. It’s a really nice city.

As promised, here is the second part of our Defrost coverage. It was nice to see that Rich Anderson from Saskaton brought down his FR-S with its newly fitted suspension and Forgestar F14′s.

There was a surprising amount of off-road rigs that came out to the meet. They pretty much need spring so they can roll around with no doors or roof. Plus, I hear the mud is fun.

Cam Johns has been working on this car since I met him many years ago. It was nice to see it out at the meet.

More Subaru for good measure with the ever-so-recognizable RSOC sticker.

Good Guy Stereocases even made it out to the meet. There’s something about a speaker system built into a piece of luggage and strapped to the top of this Justy that makes my day a little brighter. If you want to find out more about these units, check out  http://www.theoriginalgoodguy.com/ or follow them on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/GoodGuyStereocases.

I only get to see Tyler Prill’s 370Z twice a year; once at Defrost and once at Fallout. It always puts a smile on my face and warrants pictures every time I see it.

If this is your first time reading DODOlogic, then you may not know that I know very little about domestics. However, I do know this Ford picked up an award at the Majestics Car Show and it looks real good.

A little cross-promotion between http://driftwest.ca and Works Engineering Canada.

This Lotus Esprit rolled into the lot and turned a bunch of heads. I thought I would end on this for now.

“Sir, get back in your vehicle!” The U.S. Border Patrol Officer scowled at me, and I scurried back to my car and frantically seated myself. The motor that powers my passenger window died last year and my car is right-hand drive, and since I didn’t have Ryan Benoit to assist me this year, I was a ‘one-camera band.’ After being scolded, I was allowed to carry on through scot-free. So I hightailed it out of there with the biggest grin on my face — probably because I felt like I was inches away from being detained. Welcome to America, indeed.

I was on my way to Monroe, Washington: home to Evergreen Speedway, the track that sees regular amateur drift events and of course, holds one of the rounds of the Formula Drift series.

It was raining; this is the Pacific Northwest so it’s often raining. I was feeling optimistic about how the day was going to go. But when I arrived at the track I met up with a fellow media friend, Wes Barber, who came down from B.C.’s interior to take photos. It was good to be around ‘car friends’ once again, and regardless of the rain I knew it was going to be a great day.

I won’t dive into the nitty, gritty details; now it’s your turn to investigate what went on. I hope you get a feel for what it was like to be there and remember, this video was made possible by good ol’ fashioned American freedom.

Here’s a fun fact: Don’t put a Pedo Bear decal on your window. An Border Official had never questioned me about that decal until that day, so maybe the time has finally come to take it down.

Once we got out there, we found out there was still snow on the track. But we all love drifting, so we weren’t about to let a little snow stand in our way.

The four trucks there started doing laps and breaking up the snow, while people shoveled the track. Eventually a hatchet, hammer and a few more shovels were added to the workforce. With all the help, they were able to clear a path.

Chris’ car definitely got an underside cleaning the first few times he drove through the pile.

But that did not stop the drifting.

This was Regan’s first time on the track and he was killing it.