Not true. Mountain drifting started because drivers in those runs (called touge) wanted to get around corners faster. They weren't immitating anyone. Rally hasn't been overwhelmly popular in Japan at any time. Time Attack races (technically, races against the clock) are amoung the most popular types of races in most Japanese prefactures. Most of the well known shops such as Top Secret, Yoshio Factory, Spoon, Mugen, and MANY others spend the majority of their race budget on building time attack cars. Obviously there are all types of racing and garages to build cars to do it, but Time Attack is to Japan what NASCAR is to the US. Rally is most popular in European countries.

Seriously, I would recommend that anyone interested in drift and interested in the history, the culture, the lifestyle of it all, get some option videos. Also, try best motoring. Grip video has been running a good series of drift life ever since 99. Slide America is another good DVD to purchase and watch. There's a LOT of misinformation about what drifting is, who does it, and where it came from. And, MOST OF IT is on the Internet. Imagine that, right. Do some digging past google and wikepedia. And PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE don't use 3fast3furious as a reference. Although, out of the F&F series, the 3rd installment is the most accurate, it is still a Hollywood mainstream movie made for a mainstream audience. However, drifting in America, is not at all mainstream yet. It's getting there, but it's not there yet. And, there's a lot of fairytales about it.

I don't mean to come off like a jerk or know-it-all, but I just don't want you guys going out there with misinformation. Cheers.