Drifting is one of the most gratifying forms of driving a car. Being able to ‘hold’ a drift and continue driving sideways while making an arc, be it around a corner or on an open ground, is more than just a visual spectacle. It’s a feeling drivers enjoy immensely (and passengers too!), besides which being able to ‘drift’ – and not just have the tail step out momentarily – is a mark of how skilled the driver behind the wheel of the car going sideways is! But sadly, places where you can practice or learn to drift have been non-existent in our country to say so. Until now, that is!
Niklo Lateral, the new outfit from Niklo Media and Experience has partnered with Dubai-based The Drift Home to bring drifting to India. The biggest challenge with learning to drift is finding a safe place and trainers, but Niklo Lateral seems to have cracked the code. The drift school was launched at the Buddh International Circuit which has a massive parking lot, which is where sessions will be conducted on weekends. Niklo Lateral also has plans to take the drift school places, and have enthusiasts across the country learn to drift. What’s worth noting is that the trainers include some of Dubai’s most famous names from the sport, like Yousef Al-Herais and Fahad Latheef, also the men behind The Drift Home.
The inaugural weekend saw Niklo Lateral set up multiple tracks, including a curated fast track with wide corners for professional drifters to practice on and for Yousef and Fahad to offer taxi rides, besides a simpler track for novice drivers. But while drifting sounds easy, the art requires immense practice and throttle control, not to forget, razor-sharp reflexes. Most importantly, you need a rear-wheel drive car that has been set up to go sideways, which is perhaps the biggest challenge! And that’s where Greater Noida-based Sportech comes into the picture. Sportech has been doing more than servicing, customising and tuning cars, because they have been building cars for drifting – including converting the humble Maruti Suzuki Swift and Baleno sedan to rear-wheel drive drift cars!
Niklo Lateral also has Indian drift stars like Prateek Dalal to teach students, who is a professional himself and has represented India in autocross and other motorsport championships abroad. Prateek recently acquired a Nissan 370Z and has converted it into a drift car. I was keen on trying out the BMWs though – the 3 Series and 5 Series, both of which have been customised and turned into proper drift cars – with the famous ‘e-brake’ or handbrake! The efforts gone into starting a dedicated drift school for enthusiasts and also offer experienced drifters a place to practice safely without breaking the law or be seen as a nuisance are commendable. To be there and get behind the wheel of a drift car with more than rear wheel drive to go sideways, while also learning from professionals made for quite the evening for us!
Prior to this, despite the growing following, we haven’t quite seen anything like this except for one-off events and individuals making it large on their own. But with a full-fledged setup, Niklo Lateral’s initiative feels like the perfect boost to help drifting get recognised as a sport in India. The focus on the setup of the cars, taking care of the cars mid-session to ensure engines don’t heat up, the setup of the track and more was excellent, and the Niklo Lateral crew was working with clockwork precision. The discipline helped, and given the highly-experienced trainers and perfectly tuned cars it was clear this is a thoughtfully curated program for anyone and everyone wanting to learn the art of drifting. The evening gave us ‘Tokyo Drift’ vibes too, given the cars, the track, the sounds – the turbochargers, blowoff whistles and the screeching tyres – and of course, the acrid smell of burning rubber!
Interested? You can sign up for Niklo’s drift school too, because in the automotive sphere, there’s few things more gratifying than being able to go sideways! Level 1 training is priced at ₹80,000 including the drift car, trainer, tyres and fuel, while experienced drivers can opt for Level 2 training which is priced at ₹1.50 lakh. That’s a whole lot more affordable than going in for the same training abroad, be it in Dubai or Thailand, not to mention the cost and efforts to travel abroad. And with experienced drivers and a full-fledged, professional set up, Niklo Lateral really is aiming to bring drifting to India in a way enthusiasts have never seen before!
Words Abhay Verma
Photography Saidatta Naik
