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Written by:
Bill Wood
RACER Magazine http://www.racer.com
RACER Magazine http://www.racer.com
03/12/2008 - 03:33 PM
Los Angeles, California
Drifting a rally car is difficult in a drift context but Verdier is pulling it off. (Bill Wood photo) ยป More Photos
One thing you need to know about Stephan Verdier: He doesn’t fit any demo anywhere in the unique Tuner motorsports world but that’s where he’s battling his way into the spotlight anyway. First, he’s 37. He’s from Nice in the South of France on the Mediterranean coast. For the unaware, Nice is a place you go to drift the time away. It’s not a place where you come from to drift the tires away.
Verdier spent three weeks in the French military – to begin his compulsory one-year service -- before they realized he had a screw in his knee from a childhood injury and was sent home.
He came to the U.S. in 1991 and learned to fly helicopters. But before he began that career he went to the Jim Russell School, where he launched a semi-successful open-wheel career which included a full -season scholarship running Formula 2000 cars in Canada.
After bumping around Europe trying to get that career off the ground, he returned to Southern California and ended up roadside at a Rim of the World Rally where the lure of the dirt and roar of the turbo bit him
Currently, Verdier is fourth in the Production GT standings and ninth in the overall Rally America championship after winning his class at the 100 Acre Wood Rally last month, his only event in 2008. He said he finished third in class last year after two wins in New England and Oregon. He’s also moving up the ladder of experience in drifting and in the emerging time attack competition.
“Rallying is pretty much my first love,” Verdier told me. “There’s a lot of drifting in it. In drifting you only drift for 30 or 40 seconds but in rally you pretty much drift all the time.
“That’s why I like drifting a lot, because there’s a lot of rallying to it as well. You put the car sideways and get close to the wall like you get close to the trees. The only thing in drifting, you don’t race against the clock.”
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