Vic Drift’s final event of the year was the practice day held 11 December. What better way to spend it than with up and coming superstar (his words, not mine) Chris Flecknoe, the Primal Garage lads, and Ballarat’s own Ghetto Garage Drifters?

I decided to split up my coverage of the event and do things a little differently. As Chris was good enough to give me a lift to the event, I thought I’d do some in depth coverage of our trip and his day. And also I’ve been promising to do a post on him for like 18 months… I’ll do another post later on The Ghetto Garage boys.

Our trip started on Friday night in a truck trailer yard. Naturally. If you ignore the Falcon, this pic looks really Japanese for some reason.

After countless hours on Dr Drift’s dyno, Chris’s 180 is now making 260-270rwkw thanks to an S15 motor with a TD06. We were tipping all these tyres would be needed.

After a lovely night at the Leisure Park in Benalla with the Primal Garage crew, mosquitoes as big as Smart Cars and an SBS documentary on 101 fun things to do with ice blocks, it was up early and back on the road to the track.

Making the short trip from Benalla to Winton, 180 in tow.

With thanks to David from Primal, we scored a garage for the day. Here is the man himself, Chris, showing the sort of attention to detail that saw him stick his numbers on in the wrong order at the last event. He does, however, show great attention to detail when matching his sunglasses to his car.

Styling-wise, Chris has hit the nail on the head with this car. Although it is drifted hard, and often, it always looks great. The recent additions (Topstage lip, Vertex skirts and Type X rear pods) work together with the SuperMade wing and SSR meshies to give it a real Japanese look. I’ll do an in depth feature on the car as soon as I can.

And so to the whole point of the trip.  Unfortunately, track time was limited after the head gasket, which was on the way out prior to the event, went bang in the first session. Chris soldiered on, though, through a boost controller falling off and intercooler pipes popping off left right and centre, to still get in a few good laps and rep Team Maraca and Primal Garage in style.

Here you can see the visual benefit of the matching sunglasses. Unfortunately Chris’s trademark Smurf outfit is not visible in this shot. You’ll just have to use your imagination.

Even down on power and with water temps that looked like cricket scores, Chris was one of the quicker cars on the day. Unfortunately some other competitors were not as quick. (wink wink…)

One event worthy of mention was the visit we received from the drift bird. This little champ was so keen on going for a ride that he jumped into the car and then, when we tried to get him out, flew under the dash and refused to leave until he had been taken out on track.  Although he didn’t have a passenger wristband (don’t tell Yoshi from VicDrift, whatever you do) Chris headed out on track with Rob (who you’ll see in an upcoming post) and the DB for a few hot laps. By all accounts, DB loved it. We hope to see him again next year.

Despite the problems, which culminated in a busted exhaust manifold gasket that ended the day, it was a fitting end to a big year. Expect bigger and better things in 2011. You’ll see it all here.