GYARUTEN: Girl drifter-only Ikaten at Fuji Speedway, Part I

May 27, 2010 11:08 pm Published by


OK, this is going to take a little bit of explaining.

Today, I went to Fuji Speedway for an Ikaten. ”Ikaten” is short for “ikasu hashiriya chiimu tengoku” or “Cool Streetracer Team Heaven”. They’re a regular part of Drift Tengoku videos, and the usual format is that they go to a certain part of Japan and invite a few of the local amateur teams to compete and see who is the best team and individual driver in the region.

This time though, it was an all-girl event. My friend Shino was invited along with Gon-chan and Tomo-chan, two other girl drifters from Tokyo. Their team was called “Forty Overs” because all three of the members are over forty years old.

If you look at the team board, there’s a joke in the name that comes from the character “婆”, which means “old lady”, but can also be pronounced “baa”. “40お婆ーズ” in Japanese can be pronounced “forty overs” in English.

The theme of the group was “Showa yankee joshikousei“, or basically delinquent highschool girls from the 80s. These days, bad schoolgirls wear extremely short skirts, but the thing to do back then was to wear your skirt as long as possible.

The guys in the team did “cosplay” too, in “gakuran” male school uniforms and wigs. I had a particularly awesome red “Regent” pompadour to go with it. It would probably work pretty well for a cosplay of Sakuragi from the Slam Dunk manga too.

I’m guessing the expression on a lot of your faces right now looks a lot like the guy in the background.

There was another team of delinquent schoolgirls too!

They were part of the Kids Heart-backed team from Chuubu, which included Rie Shinmi’s R34 and Michiko Yasue’s S14, which was sporting a nice new bodykit and vinyl job.

When you think of Kids Heart, you think of Tezuka!

The boss.

Their team was called “Ikasu Hashiriya Tokai Joshi” or “Tokai Groovy Girl Streetracers”.

Out of all the photos I’ve taken in Japan so far, I think this one has just become my favourite.

I think my modern shoes kind of spoiled the look of the uniform. It’s a bit hard to find uwabaki in my size!

Michiko’s nightstick was the real thing though.

Delinquent schoolgirls take no prisoners. Or they do, in this case.

Here’s Team Kindergarten. I might note here that these ladies all actually have kids of kindergarten age. The guy on the left is a real teacher too, but at a local automotive college.

I borrowed his shinai sword and did some more yankee posing. Somebody who walked past said it looked really suspicious that someone dressed as a yankee high schooler was talking to people in kindergarten uniforms!

This spectator’s Mark II was nice, but it had Nissan Fuga 19-inch wheels and…

…an RB26! I think the guy secretly wants a Laurel. This is his daily driver too.

Here’s some more spectator cars.

This Chaser belongs to Ishiai-san, who is the owner of that mangled Cresta I posted a while back. He said that car is in the process of being repaired in the paint and panel shop he runs in Yamanashi.

This Cresta was pretty neat too.

Miyamoto-san from MISSILE was there too. His JZX-centered pro shop just recently celebrated its 10th anniversary.

More tomorrow!

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This post was written by Alexi

18 Comments

  • Isidro says:

    Excellent!! Funny costumes and nice 4-doors. Just what I needed right now.

    Does Miyamoto-san have a website for his JZX-centered pro shop?

  • epic fun photos 🙂

  • orion says:

    love the posing, and the your hairstyle/shades combo’s hilarious.
    KEEP DRIFTING FUN, they say!

  • GenJi says:

    .. is it some kind of Chick-drifter season in Japan ? . . 😀

    Are those Work Emotion XT7 on that black/violet Cresta ?

  • BlueSlug says:

    wicked post! can’t wait for more. i think this is the first time i’ve ever seen an anodized intercooler too 🙂

  • Henry says:

    Rad. Japan is so fun (and “different”).

  • Fury-S12 says:

    and this is wat you get to call work goddam

    side note: the episode of “i survived a japanese gameshow” featuring shino and drifting just aired in aus the other day so if you were hanging out for that …u nissed it lol

  • Shino says:

    GOOD JOB! ALEXI!!!
    I think a lot of friends abroad will be away from me as they saw me so scarely! I was really happy to be in this 40 overs team and you.

  • Jayzedex100 says:

    rb26 in a JZX100? get that fuck outta here. Most overrated piece of shit engine ever, and I’m speaking from experience.

  • Rurounimidnight says:

    Haha you look awsome, straight out of an anime lol.

  • Eiji says:

    Awesome costume Alexi! I didn’t even recognise you in the first photo.

    Looks really fun!

  • Simo says:

    JZX love Alexi! Did you happen to ask Ishiai-san why he is using a x100 cresta front bar and grille on his chaser? Havn’t seen anyone do that before, fitment of the bar is just off and grille is too big. Love teh colour though!

  • redsprinter says:

    ahahaha … looked like it was alot of fun.. so gotta wallpaper this one.. noriyaro_gyaru_ikaten_fuji_speedway_007.jpg

  • Alexi says:

    @Isidro
    Yes!
    http://www.missile-k-and-m.co.jp/

    @BlueSlug
    I asked him about that, and it’s actually candy paint, not anodising.

    @Simo
    There were a lot of things about that car I should have asked him about…it was quite interesting. I’m guessing they were spares from his other Cresta drifter.

  • Kenji says:

    Looked like a fun time!!

    More pics of the girl in red???

    Oh, and more pics of the purple/black JZX100?

  • Lone Racer says:

    realy cool

  • KameTrick says:

    Great to see some images from this event, with high skill/competition but drivers who aren’t afraid to be goofy too. 🙂
    I like that Ishiai-san’s chaser has the IC painted to match the rest of the car, that’s awesome. I’ll have to visit his shop the next time I go to Japan since I’ll be visiting Yamanashi anyway. ^_^

    Any idea where can I find a “gakuran” uniform online?? *goes to check j-list*
    -Ps: I thought the hairstyle was called “Resent” all this time…d’oh!

  • Frank says:

    Drifting and cosplay?! So awsome!!!!