Merdeka Auto Carnival MBKS Kuching – 16~17 Sept 2017

MAC is back once again and this would be my 3rd MAC event participating with my trusty Charmant, although there wasn’t any big convoy like 2016’s MAC, but the hype was still pretty big as SAS claimed that this might be the LAST MAC event, mainly due to sponsorship and venue constraints.

Anyhow, this time I’m accompanied by my Sidewayz Squad teammate Yap in his 4AGE 20v KE70, also the 2 of us just recently got in a sponsorship deal with Apollo tyres and Touchoil lubricants, apart from getting some good quality lubricants for our cars we also got great tyres support from Apollo, which is pretty awesome to say the least.

The event this time was held at MBKS, the exact same place which Kuching held their annual Kuching Food Festival, it’s a decent venue at town center but limited space for the Gymkhana Kone Attack, overall you can barely get into 2nd gear and with little to no run off areas before you either faced with concrete walls, gutters or dividers.

Both me and Yap competed in the Kone Attack, due to some organizing issues and poor weather, the event programs was greatly delayed with not much going on throughout the day.

My performance in the Kone Attack this time wasn’t very good as I only got 5th in RWD category and 6th in Open category, my stock 1.5 way LSD was giving up so I was struggling with donut turns, I was actually confident I could be in the podium but unfortunately the LSD gave up on me, however, I still managed to squeeze myself into the 1-1 battle, but by that time I was already losing focus and I wrong course, my opponent was Obiwan, even though I made a perfect run, I still wouldn’t beat him anyways, so no big deal, haha.

Then came the evening where the organizer asked for my help to coordinate the ‘Drift Parking’ mini tournament, I was caught by surprise, but seeing that we’ve been good friends and all I said yes, the overall event went well but not without complains by 1-2 drivers, in the end I didn’t manage to compete myself due to the last minute responsibilities, and to add on with the disappointment, the supposedly planned Car Park Drift event was cancelled due to scheduling delays, saaaad….

All the factors I’ve mentioned earlier has made this the least exciting MAC for me, my LSD problem, the tiny venue for Gymkhana, unable to compete in Drift Parking, and no more Car Park Drift, and the constant rain for 2 days…. I just wasn’t having a good time.

Being the 4th Kone Attack series I’ve participated, I actually had higher expectations for myself, but I was wrong, apparently both me and my car were not properly readied as the competition had gotten better as well.

After the event, I’ve made up my mind…. time to weld this piece of shit LSD for good!

MAC Sibu Roadshow Gymkhana and Drift – 23 July 2017

I’ve been an avid MAC fan ever since I first joined in 2015 at Icom Square, Kuching.  After getting acquainted with the fun and sporting SAS friends, we’ve been collaborating the Sibu Bike Week drift matsuri, and now this, the first ever out of Kuching roadshow for MAC, held at Sibu Old Airport, it’s a 2-days event with the first being a Drift Clinic taught by Yoong and the Gymkhana and Drift competition on the following day, the drift judges for the next day were Yoong and famed KK pro drifter ‘Mah Lao’.

As mentioned in the previous post, I was occupied with the SMC Sarawak Day convoy at Sarikei so I missed the Drift Clinic, but for the main event day, I was there at full force in my trusty Daihatsu Charmant.  Being the first official Gymkhana and Drift competition ever to be held in Sibu, it was once again an historical moment for Sarawak motorsport, needless to say many of us were super excited and hyped for the event, we had many participants from Kuching, Sri Aman, Mukah and also BIntulu joining.  Even attracted friends from KK like the Aki Speed gang led by Gui Foo Sing.

The overall event was sponsored by William Kong’s REXXO, event started early morning with Gymkhana first, then followed by Drift competition in late afternoon.  I competed in both the Gymkhana and Drift, for Gymkhana, I made a slight mistake and in the end I only got 4th place in the RWD category.

For the drift competition, where many of us are most anticipated for, comprise of a simple R layout setup by Yoong and Mahlao, it’s a simple 2nd gear speed layout and majority of the competitors were still struggling to complete with a clean run, this was nothing surprising as the overall Sarawak drift scene is still at its infancy stage.  There were more than 20 drivers and due to the overall low skill set by majority of the field, judges decided to only included Top 4 tandems, the qualified drivers were me, Ngo from Bintulu, Ah Bui and Bernard from Kuching.

Long story short, I managed to fought my way to the final battling Bernard in his KE70, however, I was struggling with lack of torque in my 16v 4AGE NA so I was clutch kicking way too much than I should be, in the end when me and Bernard went for a OMT, my clutch started to slip real bad and I just couldn’t maintain drift anymore, thus handing over the win to Bernard, it was a great battle nonetheless!

Here’re some of the photos from the event and some video clips as well from YouTube:

Kuching Gymkhana Workshop – 12 June 2017

The SAS Kone Attack gang organized a 1-day Gymkhana workshop training, led by Mr. Ee Yoong Cherng all the way from KL, according to SAS, this was their 2nd official Gymkhana workshop ever, and with a super affordable entry fee, this was something I just couldn’t miss.

Again I drove all the way from Sibu to Kuching and I was provided to stay in the same hotel room with Sifu Yoong, the guy doesn’t age and he still looks like a school boy, WTF!

Anyways, the actual workshop itself was AWESOME and all of us LEARNT a ton that day, we were taught with some basic Gymkhana car handling fundamentals, up to intermediate and advance level techniques, the day ended with a mini competition in which I failed miserably due to failing E-brake, time to have it properly fixed once I return Sibu.

Such an awesome time getting to hang out with the SAS, Kone Attack and the rest of the Kuching guys again!