NEZ Drifting Working Group is proud to announce host countries for the Season 2013. We made a questionnaire for our drivers this autumn and regarding answers for that as well as our own plans for the future we have made a decision to have a four round series of NEZ Drifting North European Championship in the season 2013. Countries to host the competitions are Sweden, Finland, Estonia and Latvia.

Swedish competition will be run in newly rebuilt Tierp Arena in the end of May (date to be confirmed). Tierp Arena has great facilities with grand stands for almost 20.000 spectators. Tierp is conveniently located just a bit over 100km from Stockholm so it's easily accessible from Finland and Baltics as well as from Norway.

Finnish competition is still pending of organizer, location and date but it will most likely to be made in southern Finland in early or mid-June. We will announce more information about this as soon as we know some.

Estonian competition will be run in Pärnu Ring which will open after it's renovation only weeks before our race on 16th and 17th of August. Pärnu Ring is said to be the fastest Drifting track in the Northern Europe where entry speeds will be well over 160km/h.

Final competition will be held in Bikernieki Race Track in Riga, Latvia in 6 th and 7th of September as in the earlier years. Bikernieki offers great configuration for Drifting competition with big grand stands and convenient location from only 5km from heart of Riga. This means the track is easily accessible by ship from Scandinvia and by car from Baltics.

The reason we needed to withhold information until this date was that we were negotiating with Gatebil for making a race in Rudskogen Race Track, Norway within the Gatebil main event. This would have given our series a huge media impact as well as tens of thousands of spectators on-site for the race. Unfortunately this was not possible because by on-going construction work of the new pit area there were now possibility to host up to 80 more cars and teams in their already crowded pit area. However we are now in good position at negotiating about having a competition there in the season 2014.

Price pool is still to be confirmed but we are working to have 2000 euros combined price for the best 3 of each competition as well as 8000 euros combined price for the best 3 of the whole season. We are also working hard for the visibility of the series to help our drivers to gather sponsors. We currently have an ongoing negotiations with international TV channel about airing our whole season in multiple countries of Europe.

Please like and share our Facebook page to help us with the visibility and partner negotiations: www.facebook.com/NEZdrift

On Saturday, 8. September, The biggest drift competition ever in Latvia took place in Bikernieki racetrack -NEZ PRO drift championship round 2. Start grid consisted 63 drivers from 7 country's, which pleased the fans with never before seen show, all day long. The best of them, turned out to be Jānis Eglīte, after taking the Latvian and Eastern European title now he became the best in Northern Europe.



Competition started with qualification, total qualification run count was 189 runs. That counted for several hours of swirls of smoke and engine growls for the fans and the drivers could watch and evaluate there competitors. The organizers have taken in account the huge driver count, so the qualification and the finals went through in a good tempo and without any unnecessary breaks.

Out of 63 drivers applied, only 32 could get a chance to battle in the tandem runs – Latvia has never seen such a competition, even the best drivers had to put everything on the line to get to the final battles. Latvians had an extra motivation because Latvian Drift Championship's round 4 results were clear after the qualification. Ivo Cīrulis came first, Jānis Eglīte second and Gatis Lapāns third.



In the main Northern Europen cup, these drivers got in between the locals after the qualification, Finn Henri Hanpaa as second, Finn Teemu Peltola forth, Russian driver Felix Chitipahovjan fifth and Estonian Taavi Toomara as sixth. Without Cīrulis, Eglīte and Lapāns, these local drivers qualified too: Edgars Jenčs, Ervīs Ērglis, Edmunds Ērglis, Vents Pečaks, Elvijs Ķēzis, Kristaps Blušs and Jānis Lamberts.

During the qualification and first tandem battles the weather pleased us with sunny and dry weather, but later the clouds dominated the sky and heavy rain started. I't didn't interrupt the event tho and everything went on without a hitch, but the speed of the drivers dropped significantly and the smoke was never seen since.



The condition required a lot of adaptation form Latvian and the quest drivers, because most of the practice session and qualification were held in dry and grippy conditions. But the rain turned everything upside-down because of the huge amount of rubber leftovers on the track is turned in to a skating rink. Some handled this with ease, but others not do good, thus three-sixties and off track driving were seen.

The best driver in these difficult conditions was Latvian proud and glory, the most titular drifter – two time Latvian Champion and last year's Eastern European drift champion Jānis Eglīte. He shortened his distance from the lead drivers with every run, thus earning the crowd cheers. ¼Final results proved that this is a very high level competition, only 3 latvian drivers got in to top8, Blušs, Pečaks, Eglīte and quest drivers – Trigvi Trigvason, Johan Halvarson, Andreas Janson, Daniel Bjork and Hari Kosunen.



In clouse call battles, advantidge went to Pečaks, Halvarson, Janson and Eglīte. They had a chance to take it to the finals. In Pečaks vs Halvarson battle, Pečaks ran over a clipping point cone, so he was left with a chance to battle it out for third step of the podium, but Eglīte demonstrated incredible driving and left Janson no hopes.

In the battle for third place, in his lead run - sweed Janson took the second turn too wide and slowed down dramaticaly but Pečaks showed good reaction and maintained drift to the end of the course. After this hard battle Pečaks who drives 850 horsepower BMW 357iTT came third, wich is this driver's best achievement in carrier. In the final Eglite showed mindbogglingly short distance again, witch guarantied his win and a money price of 3000 euro. Second place winner Johan Halvarson got 2000 euro and Vents Pečaks 1000 euro respectively.



After award ceremony fireworks were shot, to mark the finish of the great NEZ Drift championship and thank the drivers, supporters and fans for taking part in this grandiose motor-sport celebration. After such a huge participant activity and very good reviews, there is no doubt that next year's NEZ PRO drift championship event will have as awesome driver lineup as this year.

Now after 2 rounds of Northern European Zone PRO drift Championship we know who is the first champion, so:
1st place Daniel Björk 220 points
2nd place Fredrik Myhre 205 points
3rd place Jānis Eglïte 200 points
4th place Johan Halvarsson 180 points



It should be mentioned that on Friday, 7 September, at Bikernieki racetrack a Guinness record attempt was held, "Drawing Donuts" or sliding the car around it's front axle in 360 degrees. It was attended by competition drivers and enthusiasts from the street, counting for more than 120 cars. Last record belongs to Germans 76 cars, meaning that in theory the record has fallen. At this moment we have to wait for the official approval.

All recent information about and around the competition, pictures, video etc: http://www.facebook.com/pages/NEZdrift/260580113970067?ref=hl

Ģenerālsponsors Midland Oil. Atbalsta: Lāčplēsis, Fazer, R1, Red Bull, Oficiālais radio Capital FM, Oficiālais auto pārstāvis Inchcape BM AUTO, Ātruma Cilts, Optisports, Automazgātuve Genarts, prodrift.lv BMWpower.lv, balticrace.lv, ss.lv, informatīvais uzziņu dienests 1188, www.decalfx.lv, Black Daddy klubs, Degviela, Crocs, Tipogrāfija Poligrama, sportacentrs.lv LNT, Vējstikli, Tavs Auto, City Fitness, Peltor, Tomo Hotel, B/N Kurši un Apsardze "BERKUTS" un paldies rekorda uzstādīšanas mēģinājumā Biķernieku kompleksajai sporta bāzei un CSDD