Yasuyuki Kazama

Yasuyuki Kazama
Nationality  Japan
Born (1970-02-01) 1 February 1970
Nagano
D1 Grand Prix
Years active 2001–2006
Teams Kei Office, DG-5, Team M.O.V.E.
Wins 7
Best finish 1 in 2005
Championship titles
2005 1

Yasuyuki Kazama (風間靖幸 Kazama Yasuyuki, born 1 February 1970, Nagano, Japan) is a drifting driver from Japan.

Kazama was first introduced to drifting at age 17 when he watched Gengo-San, who later became his spotter and mentor, drifting on a touge.[1]

As soon as he got his driving licence he began drifting in his Toyota Corolla Levin AE86 with the proceeds of his job in a filling station. He later escaped death when his car slid down underneath a crash barrier and fell 30 feet down the mountain.[2]

He later made a name for himself in drifting contests, driving a Nissan Silvia S14, and became one of the first drivers to use a S15 for drifting and was heavily in debt until his patience paid off when he was sponsored by Kei Office, a tuning company which was owned by Keiichi Tsuchiya whom he later worked for as a mechanic. From when he first started in D1GP series at the end of 2000, he had moderate success, but when he teamed up with Gengo, things started to pay off when he took up a runner-up spot at Round 2 in 2002 and then won his first event at Round 1 in 2004 in Irwindale[3][4][5] only beating Masao Suenaga by 1 point.

He is known as Waku Waku Kun or Rodeo Clown due to his reputation as a clown within the series and his being well known for his Rodeo Drift, a form of doughnutting by sitting on the driver's door of the car which he first practiced at the Big-X events, then later at D1GP pre-tsuisou rounds warm-ups in 2004 when he changed the side windows of his car to make it possible to perform the trick. Starting on August 31st, 2005, Kazama had left Kei-Office to start up his own shop[6][7] called Rodextyle, but continued to support Keiichi's company as the sponsor driver until 2007. Kazama is also known in the United Kingdom for his only mainstream TV appearance outside Japan in the BBC2 show Top Gear, in which he teaches Richard Hammond drifting in a stock Vauxhall Monaro VX-R. As with the rising popularity of the drifting scene there, he has made two appearances in both Autocar in April 2006, driving a Caterham Seven and February 2007 issue of the Octane.[8]

Drifting results

(key)

D1 Grand Prix

Year Entrant Car 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Position Points
2001 Nissan Silvia S15 EBS
9		 NIK
3		 BHH
TAN		 EBS
TAN		 NIK
TAN		 11 22
2002[9] Kei Office Nissan Silvia S15 BHH
DNQ		 EBS
2		 SGO
TAN		 TKB
TAN		 EBS
TAN		 SEK
DNQ		 NIK
TAN		 17 18
2003 Kei Office Nissan Silvia S15 TKB
DNQ		 BHH
16		 SGO
10		 FUJ
8		 EBS
2		 SEK
16		 TKB
16		 12 26
2004 Kei Office Nissan Silvia S15 IRW
1		 SGO
1		 EBS
8		 APS
4		 ODB
8		 EBS
16		 TKB
8		 4 72
2005 Kei Office Nissan Silvia S15 IRW
1		 ODB
3		 SGO
1		 APS
5		 EBS
1		 FUJ
16		 TKB
7		 1 97
2006[10] Team M.O.V.E. with DG-5 Nissan Silvia S15 IRW
1		 SGO
16		 FUJ
1		 APS
3		 EBS
16		 SUZ
16		 FUJ
6		 IRW
2		 3 91

References

  1. ↑ http://www.d1gp.co.uk D1GP UK official site
  2. ↑ Max Power (magazine), June 2005
  3. ↑ "Irwindale speedway: Japanese driver claims D1 title. (Sports)". Los Angeles, CA: Daily News. 2004-02-29. Retrieved 2016-09-27.
  4. ↑ Coonce 2010, p. 36.
  5. ↑ He won the title with Nissan Silvia S15. David Bean (2015-02-06). "Nissan Silvia: Fast, furious ... and illegal in the United States?". The Clarion-Ledger. Retrieved 2016-09-27.
  6. ↑ Morton 2006, p. 119.
  7. ↑ Ferrara, Michael (2006). "Formula for a winning D1-spec S15". Dsport - performance + tech magazine. Vol. October 2006 no. 46. photograph by Michael Ferrara. Retrieved 2016-09-27.
  8. ↑ Octane February 2007
  9. ↑ Morton 2006, p. 15.
  10. ↑ "D1 World All-stars". Ziff Davis, LLC. 2006-12-19. Retrieved 2016-09-27.

Bibliography

Preceded by
Ryuji Miki		 D1 Grand Prix Champion
2005 		Succeeded by
Nobushige Kumakubo
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