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| The beginning of the Mustang era. In 2005 JR made the jump to this Falken Mustang, the car he is most closely associated with. We think JR has probably sold thousands of Mustangs for Ford and really helped the Ford brand’s acceptance by domestic hating youths. Ford if you read this, give JR a raise. JR give me a kickback! |
MK- We have felt in the past that you have always been a pedal to the metal, never lift, throw it in hard, clutch kicking, super aggressive, crowd pleasing driver. Finesse was never your thing. We saw Chris Forsberg as the opposite of you. He is precise, smooth and consistent. In 2010 something happened, at Long Beach we saw a whole different Vaughn Gittin Jr. All of a sudden you seemed to turn into the competition’s worst nightmare, you kept the aggression and showmanship but added smoothness, precision, control and consistency. It was almost like you got a transplant with the good parts of Forsberg’s brain. How did you completely change your driving style in such a short time? How did you develop such intense focus that has made you nearly unbeatable in 2010?
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| An early shot of the Mustang in action, I think this is at Evergreen in Washington. |
JR- HAHAH you nailed it! Back at the Drift Alliance lab we always do these sort of Frankenstein experiments and our head scientist nailed it this year. Must be the high quality scotch that’s smooooothing me out!. In all seriousness, I’ve just gotten smarter with how hard I push. I have a great team in ASD that I can communicate with no matter where we are to get a consistent car to match my driving style. I have learned a lot about my competitors and who I can go 110% against and who I need to keep an eye on during battles. I’ve learned about the “marathon” vs. the “sprint” essentially and it seems to be working. As far as the focus part, focus has been a challenge my entire life and has taken years and a lot of criticizing myself and studying what has been going wrong to fix. How I make it work for me unfortunately I can’t share.
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| A later iteration of the Mustang built by ASD. This car is now driven for Falken by Justin Pawlak. |
