Nobushige Kumakubo

Nobushige Kumakubo
Nationality	Japan
Born	February 10, 1970 Fukushima Prefecture
D1 Grand Prix career
Debut season	2001
Current team	Team Orange
Wins	4
Championship titles
2006 2012	2

Nobushige Kumakubo (熊久保信重 Kumakubo Nobushige, born February 10, 1970, Fukushima Prefecture) is a drifting driver from Japan who competes in the D1 Grand Prix series and racetrack and land owner. Nicknamed Kuma, he is commonly referred to as one of the pioneers of drifting.

Born to a wealthy family who owned a large portion of land in the Fukushima countryside, with the easy accessibility of the family plot, Kumakubo was able to use some of it to build and develop the Ebisu Circuit.^[1]

Kumakubo also used the circuit to host numerous drifting events as well as various motorsport events. As the lead driver of Team Orange, as his car has always been orange, he started at the D1GP series in a Nissan Silvia, in 2005, whilst stumbling through the numerous rallying magazines in his office and considering that the Subaru Impreza was the car to have as many rear wheel drive cars were considered not suitable for drifting or in need of development to be considered suitable, also in a way to bring Impreza owners to his track, Kumakubo commissioned tuning company JUN Auto to build an Impreza WRX STI Impreza, significantly with a radiator on the rear passenger side.^[1]

The car debuted at the Odaiba round, unlike others who switched to newer models, his performance would pay off when he was runner up at the Silverstone exhibition round and for the 2006 season, he had beaten Ken Nomura by just 1 point. Midway through the 2007 D1 series Kumakubo switched from the Impreza to an Evo 9 (built also by JUN Auto) during round 5 at Ebisu.

He has also built a Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution X in the Team Orange livery which was on show at Tokyo Auto Saloon.

He also runs the Big X the invitation only outdoor show that combines drifting, FMX, supermoto, car stunts and other extreme sports featuring the experts from each field.

Big X's drifting squad is called DriftXtreme, which the well known drivers of the D1GP are invited to join including team mate Kazuhiro Tanaka and Naoto Suenaga.

Kumakubo is currently competing in the European Drift Championship ^[2] in his Subaru Impreza WRX STI. His Team Orange teammate Kazuhiro Tanaka is also competing.

Complete Drifting Results

(key)

D1 Grand Prix

Year	Entrant	Car	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	Position	Points
2001		Nissan Skyline HCR32	EBS DNQ	NIK DNQ	BHH							0
		Toyota Chaser JZX100				EBS TAN	NIK
2002	Team Orange	Nissan Silvia S15	BHH 4	EBS TAN	EBS 5	SGO 9	TKB 6	SEK 4	NIK 10		4	56
2003	Team Orange	Nissan Silvia S15	TKB 1	BHH TAN	SGO 1	FUJ TAN	EBS 5	SEK 5	TKB 4		2	78
2004	Team Orange / Ebisu Circuit	Nissan Silvia S15	IRW 4	SGO 5	EBS 5	APS 16	ODB 16	EBS 9	TKB 2		6	60
2005	Team Orange / Yuke's	Nissan Silvia S15	IRW 4								4	55
		Subaru Impreza GDB		ODB TAN	SGO 10	APS 6	EBS 11	FUJ 5	TKB 3
2006	Team Orange / Yuke's	Subaru Impreza GDB	IRW 2	SGO 8	FUJ 3	APS 2	EBS 1	SUZ TAN	FUJ 4	IRW 4	1	110
2007	Team Orange / Yuke's	Subaru Impreza GDB	EBS 1	FUJ 3	SUZ 4	SGO 2					2	99
		Mitsubishi Lancer Evo IX CT9A					EBS 8	APS 8	FUJ 3
2008	Team Orange / Yuke's	Mitsubishi Lancer Evo IX CT9A	EBS 12	FUJ TAN	SUZ 8	OKY 16	APS 8	EBS	FUJ		13	28
		Mitsubishi Lancer Evo X

References

1. Nobushige Kumakubo » Driver Profile » Drift Japan
2. Japanese Drifter Kumakubo to enter EDC2008!

External links

• Yuke's D1 Project Blog (Nobushige Kumakubo)
• D1 Supporter profile