YouTuber exposed the insane underground world of illegal drifting in Japan
Someone get Vin Diesel on the phone because it looks like we've got a replacement for the Fast & Furious franchise. To quote Diesel's Dom Toretto, "I don't have friends, I got family."
For those who've kept up with the sprawling automotive franchise, you'll know 2006's The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift is something of a black sheep.
Still, long before the franchise was shooting Tyrese Gibson's Roman and Ludacris' Tej into space, the third entry in the franchise focused on the very real world of illegal street drifting in Japan.
Now, YouTube favorite Yes Theory has taken a leaf out of director Justin Lin's book by diving deep into this underground world themselves.
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Saying how drifting has reached an almost mythological status due to its depiction in movies, anime, and video games, the police cracking down has led to numbers getting smaller and smaller.
Given exclusive access to this world, Yes Theory's Thomas Brag explained how they were going to a 'Daikoku' car meet where people get to show off their unique vehicles.
There was an apparent boom in the car culture in the late 60s, with Nissan and Toyota no longer just building cars for sensible commuters. It's around this time that the Nissan Skyline GTR popped up, which is now a staple of the drifting scene.
By the time we get into the '80s, Tokyo's Shuto Expressway was the unofficial testing track for street racers regularly hitting 300 kph.
The group then headed out into the mountains to experience where the drifting culture was born. It all started when one rebellious teen called Keiichi Tsuchiya headed out in the mountain passes and realized he could put his car into a controlled drift instead of slowing down at the bends like other motorists did.
Now known as the 'Drift King' Tsuchiya moved into the pro scene in 1977 but still went viral back in the day for videos of him careening down the mountains. A local fixer managed to get Brag into the underground community, and as they went into the mountains, he admitted he was nervous.
Speaking to the anonymous members of the community, they said that the police don't tend to bother with mountainside drifting about 90% of the time, although they typically arrive in just 15 minutes if you were to try it in the center of Tokyo.
As well as being legally risky, the video highlights how most have crashed their cars at some point, showing just how dangerous this hobby is. Saying he felt like he was in a Fast movie, Brag noted how all of the men here are between the ages of 25 and 35, proving it's a young man's game.
Being allowed to go in a drifting car himself, Brag was shocked at how fast they went, as well as the car in front completely burning through one of its tires.
While Brag agreed drifting might not be for him, he was impressed with the sense of community these people had, although stating that it felt like a borderline obsession for some. Either way, the legacy of Tsuchiya and those early days of drifting down the mountains lives on.