I got an email today from Brad Lord of NZ Performance Car Magazine, and he gave me the scoop on Mad Mike Whiddett's new drift car. Wait, didn't Mad Mike just debut his new Madbul RX7 a few months ago? Yes, but now he has another new car. This weekend was the final around of the Stil Vodka Drift Series in New Zealand and Mad Mike appeared in his new drift car project, the Mazda RX8 pictured here. His four-rotor RX7 was still in the USA after the Red Bull drift event.
The RX8 was actually used in production-spec racing before Mad Mike gave it new life as a drift car. At this point the car remains essentially stock, but it won't be staying that way for long. Apparently Mike has some big plans for this car, but they are "classified" at the moment. Seeing what he has done in the past, it should be pretty radical.
The stock Renesis engine was down on power ,and Mad Mike was forced to retire during the car's debut competition. I'm sure there will be some serious power thrown into the mix when it's all said and done. As you can see, the car is already sporting Red Bull livery just like his FD.
The eventual plan is that one of the cars will remain in New Zealand, while the other will be used for overseas competition. Sounds like US drifting fans might be seeing a lot of more of Mad Mike and his rotary craziness in the future.
We wil stay tuned for more updates…
Thanks to Brad and NZPC for the photos and the scoop.
-Mike Garrett
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US gets the four rotor FD and NZ gets a stock rx8? this can't be good for international relations.
lol i think it's very good for international relations, just not good for internal relations in NZ ;D
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i hope he puts a 20B into the RX8
Bring one to NFS live
It will be interesting to see what he does with the Renesis as most people have labeled it as a lost cause not worthy of serious tuning R&D, maybe MM will be the first person to come out and show the world that the RX8 can be a competitor.
Luckily the economy is not doing so bad.....
does anyone have information on the suspension setup and wheel/tire specs on that thing?
My bet is Mike will quickly ditch the current motor, no doubt will have a 20b PP in there.
He isnt even that good a drifter, constantly straight lines and has piss poor angle, yet somehow manages to get through?
Well I didn't really expect this to happen so soon. So this makes the 25th car that Mad Mike has owned? What a crazy rotary dude I guess, he does all sorts of amazing things with those Mazdas. Good too see another RX8 in the drifting world......
The wheels on the rx8 are a rim we get over here in NZ, they are 17x9's all round with a +15 offset.
i wonder what mad mikes gonna put in this car. i liked the fd alot more not really into rx8's but we will c how far this car could get him.
hope he puts the 26b pp into it
i wouldn't think Mike would own this one?
looking at his tires, im kinda confused. i know mike has a deal with goodyear.
in the first pic, it looks to me like he's runninng Goodyear F1's...
but in the second pic, it looks like the fronts are advan a048's.
maybe im the only one to notice...and that's probably only cause very often tires are the first things i notice on a car...