Uutiset

Bill ”Hachibill” Sherman voitti vuonna 2007 NOPI Drift sarjan suuren rapakon toisella puolella. Kyseessä on siis toinen Ameriikan ammattilaissarjoista, joten Sherman on todistetusti on yksi maailman taitavimmista driftaajista. Bill tulee Suomeen tällä viikolla ja tapaamme hänet yllättäen RADALLE.com tapahtumassa Botniaringillä drifting viikonloppuna 17.-18.5. RADALLE.comin toimitus halusi kuitenkin selvittää etukäteen mikä tämä kaveri on miehiään, joten tässä alle 24h sitten tehty haastattelu luisuttelijasta.


Name: Bill Sherman
Age: 29
Occupation: Mechanic / driver
Place of residence: Tampa, Florida
Single or married: Single
Car: 06 Nissan 350z convertable
Team: Braille auto
What wouldn´t you do at any cost? Sell out my friends or family
What is your motto? Never lift!

•What have you heard about the Finnish drifting scene and the skills of our drivers?
B: I have heard that there are a lot of very talented drivers and that your scene is growing by leaps and bounds.

•Have you ever been here in Finland before?
B: No, I am very excited to visit Finland for the 1st time.

•What do you expect to see here?
B: Lots of hot women!!

•How do you practice? What else do you do than just drive? How do you keep yourself in fit?
B: I ride bicycles to help stay in shape and try to eat healthy (no fast food). I try and practice as much as I can but sometimes money is an issue.

•How long have you been drifting?
B: I have been drifting since 2000.

•Where did it all begin?
B: I had a ae 86 Corolla and it was slow in a straight line so I would just drive like an idiot everywhere and try and get oversteer all the time.

•Is drifting just a job for you or is it a way of life?
B: It is a complete way of life for me. Cars are my lifestyle and it would matter what form of racing I was doing I would always be into cars.

•What else do you do excluding drifting?
B: Mainly anything that has to do with girls and cars, but I do like to go hiking and camping and to the beach. Good weather in Florida means I like to be outside a lot.

•Do you compete somewhere else than in the NOPI Drift series?
B: I compete in both professional drift series in the USA, NOPI Drift and Formula D.

•Your calendar must be quite full. How do you have enough time for all of this?
B: You have to try and make time, which there is never really enough time for it all. But you do the best you can with what you have.

•How do you concentrate on the performance you give on a drifting track?
B: Its kinda funny, I might be a little nervous at the starting line but as soon as I go my mind shuts off and I just drive. Its kinda hard to explain.

•Do you have some kind of a lucky charm or an amulet with you when you go to a competition?
B: Not really, I just try and think and stay positive.

•What is the weirdest place where you have been drifting?
B: Inside a empty warehouse.

•What about the coolest?
B: Every new track I get to drive on is cool to me. I just like to get to drive in as many places as I can.

•What kind of drifting do you value the most? Is it fast, dynamic, exact or something else and why so?
B: I like very technical drifting, speed means you need power, but if you can drift with no power then I think thats better.

•In how many competitions have you been driving in?
B: Over 4 years worth, I lost count.

•What has been your most memorable competition? What was the setup and what happened?
B: That would have to be my 1st pro win at NOPI Denver. That meant lot and took a lot of hard work to get there.

•Have you had serious accidents and which was the worst? What happened?
B: Thankfully no serious accidents yet. Just a couple wall hits, but nothing major. I hit the wall in my very 1st pro drift event in my personal s13 in long beach California and totaled the car, but I was fine.

•You won the NOPI Drift World Finals in 2007. What did it mean to you? You and your team must have been working so hard the whole year, it must have been a dream come true for all of you?
B: It was a dream come true. Me and my team worked very hard all year. With a lot of problems along the way we had to get through. But when you put your mind to go get something the harder it is the better it feels to actually accomplish it in the end.

•What´s the next goal after NOPI Championship? What do you want to achieve next?
B: I would like to go after the Formula D championship.

•What do you want to improve on your driving? Do you have some certain sector that needs to be trained better, or do you already know all the tricks?
B: I always have more to learn, no matter what kind of driving, everytime I drive against someone new I learn something. I would like to get into other forms of racing like grip and rally.

•As an excellent driver as you, do you want to drift as long as you can or would you like to for example train new drivers. Or perhaps after many successful drifting years we´ll find you in the settings working among processing this motorsport. What do you think you´ll be doing ten years from now?
B: I would like to persue a career as a stunt driver for holly wood.

•Are you a reckless driver in common traffic or do you get to perform enough at the drifting tracks to leave the show there?
B: I drive on the street a little too aggressively.

•Do you think its allowable to young incompetent drivers show off in common traffic, although there are lots of places where you get to practice your driving skills legally with a great audience, for example here in Finland our RADALLE.com events?
B: I think everyone should go to a school to learn how to drive correctly.

•You are more than a welcome guest to Europe. Have you had time to get to know European drifting culture? If so, what do you think about it?
B: I need to learn more about European drifting. I do know there are lots of good cars and drivers.

•Can you tell are there any detectable differences in European drifting compared for example to drifting in USA?
B: You guys are better at driving around other drivers on the track at the same time. In America its only 1 or 2 cars at a time.

•Work among young people is popular nowadays in many motorsports. In USA are there any references of junior training regarding drifting? Are the settings ready for prospective young Dori Shermans?
B: Ahhaahahah, not really yet in the US. You can get into the import car scene, but there´s nothing on drifting just yet. Although there are several drift schools you can attend to hone your skills better.

•As a word drifting means like gliding or floating or something like that. Do you have any idea how on earth did this sport get to be named like that? After all there are exact rules you have to follow and the certain driving line you are meant to drive. It´s not that random then the name mistakenly portrays.
B: I have no idea how the sport got its name, but I think its great and very unique.

•Here in Finland drifting is still in its infancy, so the awareness of the motorsport isn´t wide enough at all. We at RADALLE.com are doing one´s part to improve the awareness of drifting and many other directions as well. How do you convince someone who thinks drifting is just silly folks fooling around with left over tires of drifting being a reasonable motorsport? I find it sometimes very difficult.
B: Take them to an actual event and let them go for a ride. I have found that will silence the toughest critic.

•What do you think is the stumbling block of a proper worldwide championship series for drifting doesn´t exist yet? There´s NOPI, D1, Formula D and few others but not an official worldwide champion series?
B: Too much greed, everyone wants a piece of the pie.

•Whitney Houston sings in one of her ballads ”I´m drifting on a lonely sea”. What kind of vehicle do you think Whitney is driving that makes the story possible? Any guesses?
B: Probably a boat. Heheheheh.

•I have to ask you this, I´ve been harassing all my friends with this idea for couple of months. Could it be possible to build a car with what you could drift backwards. I´ve been just wondering because in Finland we have a saying “Someone can do something even backwards” meaning he/she is extremely excellent in something. I´ve heard a lot of objections why no one would ever even think of something like that seriously, but they haven´t said it´s impossible either. So how is it?
B: I have seen this, all you do is put the body of the car on backwards. So it looks like the car is going in reverse.

•Any tips for colt drifting drivers?
B: PRACTICE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Have you heard that in Finland we have much older cars than on average any other welfare state in Europe, thanks to Finnish car taxation? That complicates tuning and improving cars as a young men´s hobby, because solely the car you are trying to improve costs so much the taxes included. We hope we can interview you again after you´ve been here in Finland, and we are also impatient to hear what do you think of all the common cars you´ll see here. Could you commit to your memory some of the “pearls” of past decades you spot here?
B: Absolutely.

Thank you so much for the interview, we are anxiously waiting for you to arrive here. Drive safely and have a nice flight.


Botniaringin tapahtumauutinen