Luke Finkf – Drift Australia
Hometown – LPoint Cook
Car – Nissan S14

Luke Fink grew up in country south Australia, brought up by his father glen fink a single parent.
Luke quickly grew up and moved away from his life in south Australia at the age of 14, where he moved to the city to acquire work.

It was in the city that Luke stumbled onto bmx through friends from school, in which he started riding for fun.
This quickly turned into competition riding and after doing extremely well in the Australian scene Luke moved his riding to overseas competitions and entered the 2003 world bmx street championships, after a successful competition Luke won the world championship.

He spent another year traveling the world competing in other competitions such as x-games in the USA.
Upon returning to Australia at the age of 21 Luke got his license and started driving for transport to go out bmx riding, just by chance a group of friends were into drifting and Luke saw this and he seemed quite interested.
This led to Luke giving it a go for himself, after around 6 months of practice in a Holden VL commodore he brought an import (Nissan sil80) and entered his first competition and ended up placing in the top 4 on his first time in competition.
After a few more competitions holford motors owner Dominic saw Luke drive and decided to give him a seat for a drive at round 4 of the Drift Australia Toyo tires drift series 2006 in the holford motors s14, which he won on debut and threw Luke into the Australian drifting spotlight.

Luke then secured a drive with Holford motors for the entire 2007 and 2008 Drift Australia series.

Tim Marshall – EDC
Hometown – Leicestershire England
Car – Nissan Skyline R33 with small block Chevy V8 race engine

I’ve been a race instructor for ten years and have been involved with racing from a young age starting as everyone does in karts. I became interested in drifting having seen a few clips on the internet of the Japanese guys on the streets and in competition. Having always been fascinated with driving cars sideways I was desperate to find out how to get involved. It was lucky for me that when I was working on the Nissan 350Z face lift launch in 2006 they had none other than Yasayuki Kazama giving passenger rides to members of the press. I managed to get a ride with him and in return he wanted to sit in and watch me drive. After his in car ride with me Kazama suggested to Andy Barnes, team manager of Sumo Power, that I drive his car in the 2006 D1GB championship. I did so and finished 5th in my first year of drifting.

For 2007 I would change teams and started my relationship with Apex Performance and their R33 Skyline. It was to be a development year for the team and a good job too as we now have a grave yard of RB25 engines. We managed 10th in the championship that year having attended only two of the rounds. Reliability with the RB was a big problem as we were pushing big power, 592bhp at one point.

2008 saw big changes. Gone was the RB25, replaced with a small block Chevy V8 race engine giving me the torque and reliability that I’ve always wanted. With the V8 we managed 3 wins and a third to finish 2nd in the championship, not bad for a developing year with a completely new engine. I’m now looking forward to the 2008 Red Bull World Championships in California.

Ben Broke-Smith – EDC
Hometown – Solihull, Birmingham, UK
Car – 1990 Toyota Chaser JZX81, 1JZ Single Turbo

Right from an early age I’ve been obsessed with cars and driving, spending my entire childhood waiting for the day I could get my driving license. As soon as I could drive, the first priority was RWD, going straight out and buying a BMW 5 series. All I wanted to do was to be able to drive RWD cars with the natural ability of drivers like Tiff Needel, people I’d watched on TV as a kid. After only having my license for a year I attended a BMW day at Rockingham circuit, and met a now-good friend of mine and pillar of the UK drifting scene, Julian Smith, as soon as I saw him drifting his E30 M3 around the circuit I was instantly hooked. From then on I attended drift days in my bone stock BMW E28 525i, eventually getting the diff welded. From that step on, I gradually got more and more cars, tearing them apart and turning them into drift machines, gradually moving on to more and more powerful machines, but always BMWs. After blowing up an E36 M3 more times than I’d like to remember a couple of years ago, I decided to go JDM, and purchased an R32 Skyline GTS-T. This was 2006, the first year I really took things seriously. In my first year of competition I finished 5th overall, in a very home-brew car, spending most of the year battling it out with only 240bhp, a set of coilovers and a welded diff. This was the first year Driftworks sponsored me, Phil & James had been friends for a while, but this year I’d get to know them better and occupy more space in their workshop, creating mess wherever I went!!…. 2007 saw me in a JZX81 Toyota Chaser, probably not the most sensible car to buy, but it matched my pre 2006 image of different cars, a big 4 door but now JDM. I had a good year, but some poor design decisions on the Chaser meant that I had troubles with reliability all year, constantly breaking things and making my life difficult. 2008 saw me develop the car and my skills to the point where I could put in a reliable, consistent performance. The Chaser was now on Federal tyres, running 560bhp and reliable, a winning combination!!!! The combination of continued support from Driftworks and consistently using the same tyres helped me take the championship, something I’d worked hard for over the last few years!!

Outside of drifting seems to always be filled with cars, constantly working on the drift car to get it ready for the next event. Work life is at Driftworks, where I’m the sales manager, using all my skills and knowledge to help advise everybody on which parts they need. I get to work with my friends, Phil, James and Mel. When I’m not driving cars, fixing cars or at work talking to people about their cars, you’ll find me spending time with Laura (my girlfriend) and with my friends and family, generally doing normal things like normal people!!!!

October 8, 2008

Red Bull Drifting World Championship Tickets On-Sale Now;
Featuring an All Reserved Seating Layout

Long Beach, Calif. – October 8, 2008 – Tickets for the Red Bull Drifting World Championship are now available online for the November 15-16, 2008 event at the Port of Long Beach in Long Beach, CA and will feature an all reserved seating layout.

Red Bull Drifting World Championship tickets are available online at www.formuladrift.com and start at $35 for a 2-day pass. VIP tickets are also available online and will include: 2-Day reserved seating in a covered sky box, food & beverage, on-site parking, and a discount coupon for the Formula DRIFT merchandise tent. Formula DRIFT has taken care of the service charges for all online ticket purchases and there will be absolutely no service charge for online transactions.

“Online ticket purchases are very much encouraged as they provide the lowest possible price and guaranteed admission into the event,” says Ryan Sage, V.P of marketing of Formula DRIFT. “Formula DRIFT and Red Bull want to provide the fans with the best consumer experience and make purchasing tickets as easy as possible.”

Tickets will also be available on event days, November 15 & 16, at the Long Beach Convention Center, which will serve as the official event hub for the Red Bull Drifting World Championship. Fans will be able to park, purchase tickets, and take a courtesy shuttle to the secret event venue from this location.

CLICK TO PURCHASE TICKETS