Mishap Leaves Millen Adrift

Rhys Millen, the Sports Car Club of America’s drifting champion and the driver with the highest hopes of defeating Japan’s best drifters in Saturday’s D1 Grand Prix USA vs. Japan competition at Irwindale Speedway, crashed his car Thursday during practice and will miss the event.

“Rhys was on new tires and wasn’t familiar with the new track configuration and went into Turn 1 a little too hot,” said Blair Stopnik, Rhys Millen Racing team manager. “The track was slippery, and he hit the rear end. The impact spun him around and the front end of the car slammed the wall so hard it took the motor out.”

Except for a few bruises, Millen was not injured, but the blue and white No. 1 Pontiac GTO in which he won the SCCA Formula D title at Irwindale last August was totaled.

“If this was a points event, we could work all night and patch it together enough to run, but it’s only an exhibition and it’s the end of the season so we decided to pack it up,” Stopnik said. “Rhys’ dad, Rod, will represent the family.”

Rod Millen, a seven-time winner of the Pikes Peak Hill Climb, is entered in a Mazda RX-8. It will be his first drifting competition of the year.

Saturday’s all-star exhibition is the climax event of the Japanese D1 Grand Prix season. After all-day qualifying today, 32 cars will enter Saturday’s championship round, starting at 2 p.m. The S-shaped course will be on the opposite end of the track from previous events.

Japan’s all-star roster will feature Yasuichi Kazama, newly crowned D1 champion and winner of two previous D1 Grand Prix events at Irwindale. Driving his green Kei Office Silvia, Kazama won both the 2004 and 2005 opening D1 rounds on the local track.

“Kazama owns the bank,” Keiichi Tsuchiya, D1 chief judge, said after the 2005 season opener. Japanese judges will officiate this weekend’s event.

In the D1 Grand Prix final on the Tsukuba circuit in Ibaraki, Japan, two weeks ago, Kazama finished third, enough to edge Masao Suenaga, 97-96, in the season standings. Youichi Imamura, winner of the final D1 event in an Apex Rx7 and third overall for the season, will also be in the Irwindale field.

With Millen out, the USA lineup will include his two main competitors, Samuel Hubinette in a Dodge Viper and Ken Gushi in a Ford Mustang.

Drifting, which combines high-speed driving with a flair for sliding gracefully through corners, was developed in Japan and popularized in the U.S. through video games.

Saturday’s competition will start with solo runs, in which speed and style will be graded, similar to snowboarding or freestyle motocross jumping. When the field is narrowed to 16, competition becomes side-by-side driving, known in Japan as “dog fights.”

Each individual event is judged on execution rather than speed, although entry-level speeds approaching 110 mph are critical to the judging.

Last Laps

Toyota announced Thursday that it would not supply engines for Indy Racing League cars in 2006, pulling out a year earlier than previously announced. Chevrolet has also withdrawn from the IRL, leaving Honda as the sole engine supplier.

In three years of IRL competition, Toyota-powered cars won 17 of 49 races, notably Gil de Ferran’s victory in the 2003 Indianapolis 500. Scott Dixon won the IRL championship the same year with Toyota power. Last season, the Japanese manufacturer won four races and six pole positions.

Dan Wheldon, the English driver who won the Indy 500 and the IRL series title for Andretti Green Racing this year, has been named winner of the Jerry Titus Memorial Trophy as the leading vote getter in American Auto Racing Writers & Broadcasters Assn. All-America balloting -- essentially the MVP award of American motor racing.

Wheldon will drive for Chip Ganassi Racing next season in the IRL.

Susie Arnold, publicist for Kenny Bernstein’s drag racing team, has been named recipient of the Jim Chapman Award for “outstanding achievement in motorsports public relations.” ... Safety innovator Robert Falcon of Temple City received a Pioneer in Racing award from the AARWBA for inventing and developing the “Shoehorn Rapid Extraction” device, used to remove drivers from crashed race cars without aggravating possible spinal injuries.

The street-legal drag racing season closes tonight at Perris Auto Speedway, but the new season begins Jan. 6. ... Seven-time AMA supercross champion Jeremy McGrath, who became a father for the first time last Sunday, will celebrate by riding in the first six AMA supercross events next year. The opener is Jan. 7 at Angel Stadium. Wife Kim gave birth to daughter Rhowan Parker McGrath.