Toyo Tires participated in the MME 2009 together with Lammertink Racing & Engineering from Netherland. Check out video and details after the jump.

Part 1

NOTE : Part 2 is coming up on 25th Sep 2009

Merdeka Millennium Endurance Race 2009?MME?held in Sepang F1 Circuit is one fo the most prestigious endurance race in asia which attracts many great teams such as Porshce team, Japanese teams and many more.

Team & Machine
Toyo have chosen Dutch famous Porsche team “Lammertink Racing & Engineering” which have cooperative relations with Toyo in tire development testing. The team, running Porsche service dealers in the Netherlands, participate in Dutch GT, FIA-GT and other endurance races.

Race Tire
Proxes RS1?Dry?/RR1?Wet?
Front?245/640R18?Rear?285/680R18?

Drivers

Tom Coronel
He participated in Japan F3 in 1996-1997 and got championship in 1997.
He stepped up to Formula Nippon in 1998 and got championship in 1999.
He also participated in Japan GT in the Team owned by Mr. Satoru Nakajima, the Japanese first full-time F1 driver.
He participated in FIA-GT in 2001, ETCC in 2002-2004 and WTCC in 2005-2008.

Takayuki Kinoshita
He participated in N-1 and Gr.A as Nissan works driver.
He is a famous Japanese driver with the largest number of participation and with the fasted speed record in Nurburgring 24 Hour.

Hank Hahn
He is now participating in Dutch GT, FIA-GT3 and other endurance races.
He is one of Dutch veteran drivers.

To my disappointment, there is no sight of any team from the states or from the land of the rising sun. Majority of the driver are made up of drivers from Malaysia, with a handful from Thailand, Singapore, and Hong Kong.

I love the crowd with some samba entertainment from the organiser, but I was a little too bore with the drift performance by participants. None of the Singaporeans qualify including Singapore Star drifter, Ivan Lim who spun off both the qualifying rounds.

Most of the veteran driver from Malaysia namely DJan, Nazrul Afifi, Lim Zee King, Ariff, Tan Tat Wei, Ivan Low made it through with ease. However, unfortunate for Lim Kim Wan who did not qualify even though his drift was one of the best in and with the only one Mazda RX7 FD packed with 650 horses under the hood. Reason untold and I do believe he is one of the scapegoat who are made to sacrifice to allow some to climb up. Politics in sports and that sucks!

Check out the videos after the jump.

Part 1 of 3

Part 2 of 3

Part 3 of 3