Nitto Tire U.S.A. Inc. is excited to announce that Team Nitto driver Vaughn Gittin Jr. has once again claimed victory at Formula Drift’s “Road to the Championship” at Road Atlanta. This marks the first time that Gittin has completed a “perfect weekend,” sweeping both qualifying and the race, in his career.

 The second race of the 2016 Formula Drift season was held at the track where the series first began 13 years ago – Road Atlanta. A favorite among drivers and spectators, Road Atlanta offers one of the most dynamic and challenging courses of the series combining high speed entries with decreasing radius corners and fast transitions that test the drivers, the cars, and their tires. At this year’s event, Vaughn Gittin Jr. laid down…

On April 9th, 2016, World Champion drifter and Professional Fun-Haver, Vaughn Gittin Jr, will debut his new 2016 Competition-Spec Monster Energy Nitto Tire Ford Mustang RTR at the first round of the Formula Drift Championship in Long Beach, California. Vaughn had this to say about the 2016 season, “I cannot wait to battle it out with the world’s best at Formula Drift with my brand new competition-spec 2016 Ford Mustang RTR. The new Ford Mustang is so much fun to drive in its stock form and with only 1 year of development in the new car, my team has really turned it up to 11 by making this the most exciting car I have ever been behind the wheel of. This Mustang RTR is a 900…

Nitto Tire U.S.A. Inc., a leading manufacturer of off-road and street performance tires, announced its 2016 Formula Drift lineup today. Returning for 2016 are Formula DRIFT champion Vaughn Gittin Jr. and international drift celebrity “Mad Mike” Whiddett who are both debuting new rides this year. Alongside these Team Nitto veterans is Alex Heilbrunn, one of the biggest up-and-coming drivers in the sport. Not only will Nitto will be providing these drivers with NT05 tires throughout the season, but they will also be giving them on-site technical support to make sure their cars are always performing at their best. “We are really excited for what the 2016 Formula DRIFT season holds,” said Harry Kong, Nitto Tire U.S.A.’s Events and Motorsports Manager. “Team Nitto now has three…

Cypress, Calif., Feb. 18, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Nitto Tire U.S.A., a leading manufacturer of off-road and street performance tires, is excited to announce that Team Nitto driver Bailey Campbell has become the first female diver to ever complete the King of the Hammers race, and did so with a Top 5 finish on February 5th, 2016 in Johnson Valley, California. There are few off-road races in the world that can compare to what the King of the Hammers race puts its drivers through.  One moment drivers are screaming across the desert at nearly 100 mph and the next they are picking their way through technical rock crawls with names like “Boulderdash,” “Wrecking Ball,” and “Chocolate Thunder.”  This year’s race marked the 10thrunning of the…

KOH WEEK 2016 Qualifying – Tuesday February 2nd We didn’t do quite as well in qualifying as we had hoped. We encountered a few on course issues which gave us a time of 2:26.75 and put us in 27th position for Friday’s race. Not where we had hoped to be, but very motivating.  KOH UTV Race – Wednesday February 3rd We started 31st which was somewhere in the middle of the pack. Our plan was to run conservative through the desert so we could really push it in the rocks. We were bridging the gap between us and the leaders when we had a few mechanical issues that had us limping to the pits. After a 4 minute pit stop courtesy of our top notch pit crew, we were…

Nitto Tire U.S.A., a leading manufacturer of off-road and street performance tires, is proud to announce that Team Nitto driver Erik Miller has won the 2016 King of the Hammer race.  Miller took home the win alongside Nitto teammates Jason Scherer, Shannon Campbell, and Bailey Campbell at Friday’s race where the team’s Nitto Trail Grappler tires provided them with the reliability and durability they needed to achieve victory. The annual King of the Hammers off-road race held in Johnson Valley, California is one of the most prestigious and difficult off-road races in the world, requiring drivers to tackle large rock obstacles and race at high speeds across the open desert.  This year, Team Nitto drivers Erik Miller, Jason Scherer, Shannon Campbell, and Bailey Campbell dominated…

Nitto Tire swept the podium at the Ultra4 National Championships on October 17, 2015 at the Wild West Motorsports Park in Reno, Nevada. Team Nitto drivers Loren Healey, Jason Scherer, and Eric Miller dominated the field of 60 cars in the 4400 Unlimited class race and Derek West and Wayland Campbell secured their second and third place finishes in the series. In the final event of the 2015 season, defending series champion and 2015 Trail Gear Ultra4 Western Regional champion Loren Healy jumped out to an early lead and remained at the head of the pack throughout the race to take home the win, his 4th consecutive victory. In second place was Nitto Tire teammate Jason Scherer, who managed to keep the past champion in…

There are few things that mean more to an athlete than to be honored and immortalized by the sport they love. In the world of off-road racing, this means being inducted into the Off-Road Motorsports Hall of Fame (ORMHOF) alongside such greats as Parnelli Jones, Steve McQueen, and James Garner. Today Nitto Tire U.S.A. Inc., a leading manufacturer of off-road and street performance tires, is proud to announce that Team Nitto driver Shannon Campbell has been chosen to be inducted into this prestigious group and has the distinction of being the first-ever rocksports competitor to be inducted into it.

 ORMHOF was created by NORRA/Mexican 1000 founder Ed Pearlman in 1978 to honor athletes that have more than 15 years of significant contributions to off-road motorsports…

Friday, the day slated for pre-running was a day full of torrential rains which is exactly what all the teams did not want.  The #20 Jimmy’s team spent most of the day just preparing for the tough conditions ahead of them.   Everything worked out well as race day the weather was perfect and the spectators had a great day to enjoy the show.  Derek and team had a great day qualifying first and keeping the lead during the entire race lapping the field of racers.  “Things just went our way, we had a great plan that we followed and at the end we took the checkered flag.  I am super excited for our team and all of our partners that help us get here!”,…

Cypress, Calif. (May 14, 2015) – Nitto Tire U.S.A. Inc., a leading manufacturer of off-road and street performance tires, is proud to support one of the most eclectic groups of drivers in the racing world. From drag to drift to off-road, these drivers each bring a unique skill, personality, and style to their respective sports and give Nitto valuable feedback on its entire product line. This past weekend, Team Nitto drivers in two different series wowed the crowds and earned top honors at their events using the same high performance passenger car and light truck tires that are available to the public. 
 “Nitto Tire is constantly working to make sure that our tires offer the best combination of durability and driver control, and there…

Nitto Tire Bolsters its 2015 Formula DRIFT roster with the return of a past champion and international talent. Fast Facts: Nitto drivers include Vaughn Gittin Jr., Tanner Foust, Mike “Mad Mike” Whiddett and Odi Bakchis 2015 marks a decade of Nitto competing in Formula DRIFT Competition All drivers will compete on Nitto NT05 performance tires for their predictability at any speed Formula Drift Round One takes place on the Streets of Long Beach, April 11-12 Nitto Tire U.S.A. Inc., a leading manufacturer of off-road and street performance tires, announced today that it is uniting two past series champions with an international all-star and one of the drift scene’s most charismatic up-and-comers on its roster for the 2015 Formula Drift season. In addition to returning drivers…

The team got the car all back together after KOH and decided to go do a little testing and go see what this new car could do on a woods racing course. Derek was a little worried that the extra width could be an issue when negotiating tight woods trails at speed. This proved to be a non issue and the new car can still split the trees at speed just as Derek has done in the past. “I was really itching to get out and continue testing and tweaking on this new car. While we had a good finish at KOH we had enough issues before the race that we just didn’t have the test time in that we wanted. Braking and horsepower were…

With a race as grueling as Ultra4’s 2015 Nitto King of The Hammers presented by 4 Wheel Parts, the story is far bigger than any short update can cover. In fact, each and every team has an epic story about how their cards played out on race day and what they fought to overcome. Erik Miller is a racer we’ve followed closely here on DrivingLine and gotten to know well since he showed what he was made of with his never-give-up attitude during last year’s KOH. While his 2nd place finish didn’t gain him his second title of King (he won the race in 2012) it stands as an amazing day of racing and a great effort by Erik and the rest of Miller Motorsports….

As I’m sitting in the worst traffic jam I have ever been a part of trying to get off the lake bed I have time to write up a 2015 King of the Hammers recap.
We got on the lake bed early and got a lot of pre running in, everything went well and I felt like we were ready for race day. Qualifying didn’t go as well, right off the line I lost 1st gear in the transmission and it got worse when I broke the lower A arm but still managed a 13th out of 130 so It could have been worse I guess. I was able to talk Randy Slawson into letting some of the Wild West team members into breaking into his…

Derek was waiting to get the call from Randy Rodd of Jimmy’s 4×4 that his chassis was ready.  That call came late in December and Derek and his crew chief Travis Brake headed to Cortez, CO on Christmas day.  From that day forward the team would spend every waking hour building the new car so it would be ready for race day on Feb. 6 in Johnson Valley, CA.  Everything was on schedule until a transmission gremlin appeared, taking out the thrust bearing in the new Sho-Me Speed, Edelbrock supercharged LS-3 engine.  After a local rebuilder could not remedy the issue the call was made to head to the city known as “Hammertown” and swap in a new Jimmy’s TH-400 transmission.  Once on the lakebed the new…