There is a form of an extreme sport in Ireland that has quite a large following, but yet is still relatively unknown. Drifting is a driving technique where the driver over steers, causing the rear tyres to loose traction with the road surface through turns, maintaining vehicle control while driving at high speeds. As a sport, professional drifting competitions are held worldwide.
The Irish Drifting competition is known as Prodrift, and Jay Rockett tried his hand at the Amateur Championship. Jay self funded himself through his first year and competed in 4 out of 5 rounds, finishing first in the Amateur Championship. “I never taught I would have a chance of winning the championship, I just wanted to compete, get the first year out of the way and have some fun”
Jay was always interested in cars, before he knew what drifting was, he found it exciting driving go karts and making them slide around corners, “You have more craic when your sliding a car rather than trying to grip around a corner, so naturally when it developed into a sport, I got hooked”.
Jay bought a Nissan 180sx to use for the 2010 season. He had planned to use his Nissan S14 road car and build it into a full spec competition drift car for the following year, but lack of time and space meant that the S14 needed to be sold. “I was reluctant to sell it but I used the engine and all the parts in the 180sx and bought all new adjustable arms and coilovers from Driftworks”
The first round was in Fermoy Co. Cork so with the help of his friend Mark Willis he set about the challenge of building a competition spec drift car, however they missed their deadline and finished the car at 4am the night before round 2 in Punchestown.
It was the first time Jay had drove the car and finished in 1st place, “I came out of round 2 feeling completely different than I had going into it. I really didn’t think I was going to win. My only expectations were to get around the track and hopefully the car would last, it did and it was great that I won” He knew that he needed to concentrate more, that the car was very reliable and also said “I had a lot more confidence for the next round”
Round 3 took place in Citywest Co. Dublin where Jay had a large impact with the barrier which caused quite a lot of damage to the car. He was warned about the first corner and was told by Barry Leonard to drive the course first before attempting to slide it, “that was my plan but halfway around the first bend I taught ‘this is grand’ I went for it and then bang into the barrier” damaging the rear quarter panel and destroying two brand new wheels. This put a huge dent in Jay’s confidence which also resulted in him loosing out on practice session’s while the car was being repaired.
After the car was repaired he took time to get used to the track, “It was a difficult, difficult course, no doubt about it. But it was also one of the most enjoyable as it was fast and then got very technical” and once he got used the course he could push himself the extra bit to get ahead. During the twin battles Jay could see his name was creeping up on the score board, it was that point reality set in when he taught “I could have a shot at winning this” after finishing 1st again.
Mondello hosted round 4, car wasn’t set up for the surface as it rained heavily all weekend and the car had just been repaired from its collision in the previous round so Jay didn’t push too hard. His main competition was against his friend Ciaran Gem Synnott who finished in 1stand Jay had to settle for 3rd.
Entering round 5 back in Fermoy, Jay was leading by 1 point ahead of Mark Keane who finished 1st in round 1 and who was second in the amateur championship. The track surface was hot and during the practice Jay was using a lot of tyres, “It was all or nothing” and he finished 3rd ahead of Mark Keane and that was enough to win the overall championship with 60 points, quite an achievement for someone who missed the first round.
‪Jay Rockett Prodrift Round 5 Fermoy 2010‬‏ - YouTube
When the season had finished Jay unloaded the 180sx off the trailer for the last time. “I taught to myself that it kind of feels a shame to get rid of the car at this” but the original plan was to build a S14. Jay openly admits that he would feel more confident in this as he would feel more comfortable, “It’s a personal thing, I prefer S14’s and I know ill be more competitive as I know what needs to be changed from the 180sx”. Jay has proved that he has what it takes to compete, and is a much more developed driver entering the 2011 season.
Jay Rockett would like to thank Mark Willis, the DriftIreland crew and Dave at Japanese Performance for all their help and support during the 2010 season.
