Originally Posted by MWF

Standard procedure is to join up on a few drift sites asking loads of questions and getting loads of new ideas.

Then strip the car out, take a few pics and give it a project name, something like project DRIFT STORM or something else equally gay. For added effect people like to form a 'team' with their friends under a name like BOOST SLIDEZ and get stickers made up.

It's important that at this point you still haven't actually gone out and tried any drifting.

It's quite common to feel you've done enough here, you have a stripped out car with no MOT that you can't drive, a project name and a cool team name. Many are happy to do this and just sit on the net commenting on the driving techniques all drift videos that are posted up.

Stage-2 is to start asking questions about what the D1 drifters do to their cars, probably by geaning info from Steve (Stavros). After being told countless times that it's nothing to do with power and that drifting is totally different fish tailing up the local a-road powerslidingt, most decide they -need- fully adjustable coil over suspension, split rims, 500+bhp and mirrored decals.

People on stage-2 often have their own cult language which is hard to understand but these beginers words can help get you involved.
"I was totally sideways" - The back end twitched and I shat myself
"I held the drift longer" - I sat frozen at the wheel
"I applied opposite lock" - I frantically paddled at the wheel in desperation

Once you have mastered the language you are a proper Net Nomura.

Many don't reach stage-3 which is the pinnacle of being a drift wannabie and that is scrapping your undriven project (usually consisiting of a stripped out rwd car with bucket seats and a missing diff) and buying a 200sx with all the drift bits on. You can then apply stickers to this and turn up to all the D1 events to mince around watching from the sidelines, when asked if you want to take part just say you would but you're concerned the tracks so tight your ball bearing turbo may suffer oil starvation, but assure the organisers that if it were a 'proper drift circuit' you'd be out there pulling 100mph+ sideways antics that would be amazing, just like the one you did pulling out of McDonalds the night before.

Some have reached stage-4 by sheer lunacy and actually (sometimes unintentionally) tried to drift their cars by getting carried away at the likes of Ace Cafe or similar. This tends to promote them instantly onto Stage-5 aka "Smashing your nice drift style 200sx into a lamp post".

There are alternative routes out there like doing a search through the countless posts out there detailing everything, welding up your diff and getting out there practising in a car you don't care about but clearly that would be madness.