[ShawnS]

Originally Posted by sperry

Who? He must be real famous, since I don't know who he is. What series does he race in?

I'm gonna take a guess that he's a drifter or something... D1GP? A Google search for his name only pulls up body kits and car parts sporting his name, which makes me think he's more of a "famous street racer" than a "famous race car driver".

Either way, my point is you'll never see a Tommi Makanen or a Michael Schumacher or (dare I say it) a Jeff Gordon that came from street racing. There are no household names that learned their skill on the street. To get into the higher eschelons of racing, you need a legitimate competition background. I'm not saying there's no skillful drivers in street racing, I'm saying those people are wasting their skill on the streets because it'll never amount to much more than hustling for cash or pinks.

http://www.rojawheels.com/garage/rj_bio.asp

Not the most intruiging of bio's. I doubt Tommi Makanen or Michael Schumacher are household names. If you want, I can get a list of names that got their careers jump started by learning on the street. Most of todays great drifters learned and honed their skills on the streets of Japan.