Originally Posted by grassrootsracer
I guess you could say it's the automotive equivalent of ice skating. That's not to say that it doesn't take skill, I'm sure it does. It doesn't seem to be akin to all other motorsports, i.e. high-performance and tuned chassis/engine combinations with the purpose of traversing from Point A to Point B faster than your competitor, while maintaining endurance and reliability of the entire car. Once again, that doesn't mean that there are not any incredibly fast and nimble cars in drift events either. And the results seem to be subjective to me, more of a style event than one based on speed, acceleration, and braking.
That and the crowd that follows drifting (from the events I've seen here in the US) seems to be the boy racer/ricer crowd that is more concerned with ostentatious stereos (I prefer the sound of the engine anyhow), loud and annoying bee-sounding exhausts, and expensive paint jobs. At least that's the impression I get.
To each, his/her own.