Photos by Joe Glockner and Andrew Kolstad/ Words by Andrew Kolstad

On Sunday March 25, Northwest Nissans held Nissan Fest at Evergreen Speedway in Monroe, Washington. This event was the first of its kind for both entities and it was without a doubt a success. The event replaced a meet NWN had held in previous years at another location where turnout exceeded capacity. The track handled the drifting event with NWN help and NWmotiv.com handled the car show aspect. Did I mention the whole event was FREE to spectators?

Some amazing cars turned out for the showcase and the winners are listed below:
Best Bike – Thuc Nguyen – 2008 Ducati 848
Best Domestic – Trevor Pape – 2001 Pontiac Firebird
Best Toyota/Scion/Lexus – Kenji Nishimura – 1999 Lexus GS300
Best Euro – Drew Staudacher – 2002 BMW M3
Best Honda/Acura – Terry Suvonnarith – 2001 Acura Integra
Best Mitsubishi – TJ Phompanya – 2006 Mitsubishi Evo
Best Other – Marcus Estill – 2004 Hyundai Tiburon
Best Subaru – Erich Breitkreutz – 2004 Subaru Impreza
Best Infiniti – Andrew Le – 2006 Infiniti G35
Best 4dr Nissan – Nate Jellen – 2006 Nissan Armada
Best 2dr Nissan – Andrew Hohagen – 1992 Nissan Sentra
Best 240 Nissan – Cassie Tresl – 1990 Nissan 240SX
Editors Choice – Randy Olivarez – 2007 Honda S2000
Best of Show – Felix Yuen – 2007 Honda Fit

Drifting was quite a site and a number of cars succumbed to the rigors of the track. More importantly, a lot of cars didn’t have any trouble and they were keeping all eyes glued to the track until 430 that afternoon. Up and coming local drifters Mike Phillips and Rob Primo were selected to represent our area in Long Beach at Formula D. Drifting results:

Pro Driver – Mike Phillips
Pro-Am Driver – Rob Primo
Best Tandem Drift – Joseph Lin & Chris Uhl
Best Single Drift – Matt Vankirk

Even though the event was called NissanFest there was plenty of stuff represented from other brands. Thanks to Northwest Nissans for inviting us to cover this event. We will see you again next year.

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An awesome video of the event brought to you by Loren Haleston.

Photos by Vinnie Nguyen. Words by Zach Taiji and Vinnie Nguyen.

One of our missions here at nw-built is to provide the Pacific Northwest with an outlet where cars and people of all different types and color can join together in one place – in essence, bringing to light the diversity of our region. Last year we took it upon ourselves to fulfill that mission by hosting an event at Golden Gardens in Seattle, WA. It was a huge success being our first big event, and welcomed over 400 cars. Most importantly it showed that people and cars of all types can get together without all of the e-thuggery/flaming, to have a great time and enjoy the Pacific Northwest automotive scene & atmosphere.

This year was no different – on March 10th, 2012, we teamed together with StanceWars and NOS Energy Drink to provide the masses with a second annual event at Golden Gardens. The event went fully viral in the weeks leading up to it, as our Facebook event had over 1,000 RSVP’s.

Cars poured into the lots as the weather held up, with everything from imports, domestics, euros, and even exotics. An estimated 1600+ cars and 2600+ people attended the meet, and NOS Energy Drink went through 40 cases! Our official photographer Vinnie Nguyen shares his firsthand experience:

 I had the pleasure of attending and staffing the event along with other NW-Built staff members and Mike Tolliver of StanceWars. The first thing I want to say is that I was blown away by the amount of attendees! Me and some of the other guys were there around 10am and there were already cars showing up at 10:30am. I know that we wanted people to get there at 11am, but I understand why they did come early. It was a fun experience directing all the cars and telling them where to park since it was my first time staffing a meet like this.

With the help of James Queen and my friend Johnathan Lon, directing everyone went nice and smoothly. Mike and his gang were busy doing their thing by selling products. I’m happy to say that there were no cars giving us a hard time – everyone was pretty much cool. As the day went on, there were TONS of cars showing up. It got to the point where we filled up all of the available parking lots and we had to start telling people to park on the side, and lining up as close to the curb as they can. I had help from one of the attendees there – his name was Skyler Jenkins and he was a big help to me. He pretty much helped me tell cars where to park and whatnot.

By 1pm, all you can see was cars and people. Around this time I believe was when Ravi Kumar of Umbrella Auto Design came down with his crew of awesome cars. There was an R35, an Audi R8, some s2000′s and a bunch of NSX’s. Ravi himself was rolling up in his new Lamborghini Gallardo. Overall, I must say that besides Wekfest, this was one of my biggest events so far. The turnout was absolutely great. I would personally like to thank Mike for working with us to put together this event. Also, I would like to thank NOS Energy Drink for sending out a couple of the NOS girls to help give out drinks for this event! They were a big part of this event as well.

Who I would like to thank most is all of you guys. Without you, events like this wouldn’t exist. The scene here in the NW is big and it’s only going to get bigger! It makes me proud to live in the NW and again, a big thank you goes out to all of you guys.

Check out our gallery of over 120 photos here

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Photos and Words by William Tanna.

Shooting and featuring a Honda is always a dangerous field to get in to. People usually look right past or have to make slanderous remarks of the car because of what it is. As car enthusiasts we should really learn to get over that wall, and really appreciate a car for how it is built and maintained. Jesse Nunley owns this Honda, and he has put probably more time into his car than most people. If you have built up your car as much as Jesse has, then you would understand the amount of time and hard work it takes to build a Honda like this. This was probably the most difficult shoot I did because of the color of the car and the time of day we shot at, but overall I had a lot of fun and it was great to meet Jesse.

What got you into cars?

Before I was able to drive, i had always wanted a fast car. Like most kids, i liked all kinds of super cars and what not and dreamed of owning and driving them one day. Between that and playing racing games, i knew that when i was able to drive, i would want something fast. Well when i finally got my first car, i realized that I wasnt going to be able to just go out and buy a super fast car. Too expensive and insurance etc, just wasnt realistic. So i figured i would do what a lot of others did – buy something cheap and make it fast [like the super cars]. I figured since i spend so much time of our lives in our cars, might as well make it as fun of an experience as possible. It’s too fun to drive and i’d hate to put so much money into a car, and let it sit in a garage except for meets/trackdays/cruises etc. Might as well get my use out of it!

When did you get your car?

Bought the car in summer of 07 as a bare shell, i was 17 and it was my 2nd car coming from a stock d series 97 civic coupe.

What have you done to it since you got it?

Saved up parts for about a year to initially do the k24 swap. Once i finished the swap i drove it N/A for a year with basic bolt ons making 230whp/190wtp. I decided i wanted more power so i had ASP build the motor, bought a turbo kit from Stefan (owner of ASP) and he tuned it. Drove the car for another year running 10lbs making 400whp/286wtq on dyno jet. In winter of 10′ I had the car repainted since the entire front end wasn’t. Throughout 2011 I decided to start dressing up the exterior/interior of the car a bit, and also had the car retuned by Stefan at ASP at 16lbs on 92 pump gas making 455/350 on a dyno dynamics which is a very low reading dyno. Took the car to the track late in 2011 stripped the teeth off 2nd gear on the way there doing a small pull and put a ppg straight cut gear set in the car to solve those problems.

What did you want your car to be after you were done building it?

A fast, fun, reliable daily driver that could throw down some good times at the track.

What is your overall horsepower and torque numbers?

455/350 16lbs pump gas on dyno dynamics

Engine/Drivetrain
K24a2 swap
Blueprint turbo rods
CP 87.5mm 9.0 c/r pistons
ARP headstuds
Precision 1000cc injectors
Walbro 255 fuel pump
RBC intake manifold
ASP turbo kit with GT35R turbo
Tial 44mm wastegate
Tial 50mm BOV
ASP catch can kit
ASP 3″ custom exhaust
Hondata boost solenoid
Hondata Kpro
EP3 5spd trans with 4.38 fd and ppg 1-2 straight cut gearset

Suspension/Wheels/Brakes
AMR Engineering Coilovers
Function 7 rear LCA’s
Function 7 lower subfram brace
Full Race Traction bar
Enkei RPF1 16×8 +35 wheels
Toyo R1R 225/45/16 front / Nexus N3000 225/45/16 rear
Power Slot front rotors
Stoptech brake pads

Interior
Black Recaros
08 Civic si 4dr rear seats
Takata 4pt harnesses
Harness bar
UKDM cluster

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Words and photos by Vinnie Nguyen

So this past weekend on the 19th, I had the pleasure of attending Wekfest down in San Francisco, California. On the morning of the event, a group of guys and I started waiting in line at 4am even though the event didn’t start until 1pm. We wanted to beat the crowd because we heard that there usually is a big turnout which causes people to wait for a ridiculous amount of time.

Anyways, we were the first ones there. As time passed, people started showing up and there were some cars showing up around 7am and 8am for their time slots. I was so excited to see how the scene was down in California and seeing each car rolling in fed my excitement. It wasn’t until 11am was when they moved the line into a pre-designated area for event goers. By this time, there were tons of cars already showing up and there were people inside the event. (Those people were VIP and media I believe.)

As I was standing in line, I saw a couple familiar faces, Mike Toilover of StanceWars and Paul Bruney of StanceWorks!

It was nice to see other local guys reppin’ it out in San Fran for the Northwest. I got to say hi to them and talk to them after I got into the event. Once I got in, I was pumped. There were cars and people everywhere!

I haven’t seen so many people enthused by such an event, but everywhere left and right I saw people taking pictures and admiring the cars! There were people of every age, young and old. I even saw an old lady swagged out on a fixie.

That was pretty dope. As the day went on, there was still a huge line to get in and of course there was still a lot of people walking around. I found myself getting stuck at one point trying to get out of one of the buildings but it was fun nonetheless. I met a lot of new friends and had a great experience.

Just getting to walk around and seeing Cali’s take on the car scene made me feel good about the scene that we have here. It’s very much alike and so we aren’t behind. There were a lot of clean and well executed cars and it made me think of cars around here in Washington that would’ve been worthy to be in the show. The guys at Weksos Industries really know how to put on a good show and I can’t wait for the LA one!

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