“Double Drift Race At Achna Speedway. Drifting After Covid-19”

Where we left off

Well it is a fact that the 2020 year has been a terrible train wreck that brought the planet to a halt. With it of course it brought the motorsport scene to a halt as well, causing all sorts of mayhem to the event organizers and hosts who where forced to postpone any racing action until further notice from government officials. With a whole racing season being shorted down to just a couple of months before the end of 2020, the Power Drift Club, was forced to held a Double drift race at Achna speedway .

You heard that right, so the second and third race of the Cypriot drift championship organized by the Power Drift Club took place in consecutive days. A great challenge for both the cars and the drivers that’s for sure.

The usual suspects

Well if you ever attempted any drift event in Cyprus, I am sure by now you know the usual suspects. Kicking things of you got Patak in a Subaru chasse is a classic combination since he knows those chassis so well, even though he changed between a few powerplants through the years now he’s running a BMW sourced V8 engine out of an E39 M5 with a supercharged slapped on for good measure.

A unique setup but it brings the heat every single race.

Being different is always cool, but what about the tried and tested recipes? Having spent years and years behind the same steering wheel it gets you to a level that you can start pushing the car and its technologies to its limits.

For example, this r32 driven by Sparsis of LCE garage, has been driven with its 1000hp RB engine the past few years and now is at a point that it uses a DCT gearbox out of a BMW! Flappy pedals on a drift car, madness!

You can’t mention s chassis without mentioning Tsodas and Tsouris, although both using the 200sx/s13 chassis the similarities end there as Tsodas vehicle is fitted with a 2jz and Tsouris a stroked rb series. (Whats your poison? Let us know in the comments). Tsodas vehicle is really a show spec car with no expense spared whatsoever!

The man with the blue beard, Tsouris is a crowd favourite and he never disappoints to put up a show, although he missed the first and second race of the season due to driveshaft issues, now he is back and ready to party.

Sergio Grigoriou or Sergio express as you might know him, is a genuinely nice guy, his E46 though is the exact opposite! This car saw many iterations over the years but now it runs on a massive turbo and with Sergios experience behind the wheel it’s more competitive then ever.

Last but not least is Giorgos Christoforou or as he goes by Ela Koko, we are used to seeing him in his E30 over the years, going from a M20 turbo to a s54 turbo. This year he switched to a E88 chasse (1 series), this got some people by surprise as they thought that he would be out of his water with the new platform, they couldn’t be more wrong as he had no problem slaying the track. The man is a machine!

A name that is missing from this list is Pambos Charalambous that even though he competed in a borrowed car and managed to score impressive results, unfortunately his new M4 wasn’t ready for the event on time. We can’t wait to see it in the next event.

Weapons of choice

Three capital letters are realy well known in the drift scene of Cyprus; “BMW”. Well the German coupes are the usual suspects in Cyprus for a good reason. Availability. We are full of them, E30s to E46s, you name it, we got you covered.

Synonymous with drifting are engine swaps and let me tell you, I have witnessed the E30/36/46 chassis running all sorts of powertrains; you can imagine. From sr20s to turbocharged s52s, m52s all the way to 2jz swaps so saying that these chassis are a favourite choice amongst the locals is an understatement.

Begging to differ from the crowd is Christoforos Constantinou who built a 2002 for drifting using a V8 sourced out of an e39 M5. No we do not know how it fit in there but let me tell you that tiny chassis has a lot of grip for what it is. Would be hella interesting to see it in the future after a bit more development.

As you might have seen we have a lot of Japanese chassis such as S and R chassis competing in the series, but they are competing with the same chassis for years now. Hopefully, in the near future we will see more people starting to switch to new platforms such as gt86s or even the new supra!

Sunday’s race

The race was split up in two categories pro and semi-pro. It is supposed to equalize the field in regards to horsepower levels and experience. As usual in drift events, drivers need to score high points on their single runs to progress to the elimination battles.

After a day’s worth of battles in the pro category the two finalist were Giorgos Christoforou (Ela Koko) and Pambos Nikolaou with his LS powered S15.

As for the semi pro category, the finalist were Andreas Nestoras and Polis Konstantinou with two very different built E30s. Nestoras car is powered by an SR20DET of all things, and Polis car follows a more traditional route using an S50 with a dash of nitrous for that extra push.

Unfortunately for Polis this was not enough to overpower turbo power and Andreas took the win.

The big winner of Sundays race was Ela Koko with his absolute weapon s54 turbo powered 1 series. Three wheelin his bimmer to the victory, Ela Koko shows that he is the man to beat this year, will he have a contender after Pambos turbo S54 swapped M4 is ready? We can’t wait to find out !