Ron Kantowski spends an evening taking in the latest import from Japan and finds that the roaring engines and screaming tires have a contagious excitement all their own

Tuesday, July 18, 2006 | 8:47 a.m.

Off in the distance at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, back where they tune up the winged sprint cars when the World of Outlaws are in town, the cars weave back and forth, warming up their tires.

From the temporary grandstands lining a temporary skid pad consisting of a few alternating left- and righthand turns - think of a giant section of twisty slot car track that hasn't been coupled with the straight pieces - they don't look like cars at all. All you can see is their headlights, but you can hear them rumbling, like nocturnal creatures about to make a late-night food run.

The rpms build as the cars speed back to where the people are. If you've got a trained ear or watch "Monster Garage" on TV, there's no mistaking the 650 ponies under the hood of an American muscle car that are drowning out the high-pitched wail of a Japanese import with its rubber band wound tight.

You still can't see the cars. But man, can you ever hear them. Getting closer ... closer ... closer now ... until the hair on your neck is standing up like it does right before the monster makes his fi rst appearance in a scary movie.

Yeah, that's it, you think as you feel the ground shake and catch a whiff of exhaust fume. It's like King Kong vs. Godzilla. Only on wheels.

Then it happens. The cars come roaring into view around the retaining walls and their drivers saw on the steering wheels, sending them into long, looping synchronized spins that border on car control and lack of it. The tires scream, the sound $400 widetrack Yokohamas make a split second before they begin to smoke like a nervous Frenchman.

It's all so visceral. The vinyl decals on the cars are fl ashing under the bright lights and the engines are wailing and the tires are screeching and big plumes of light blue tire smoke are fi lling the air and the acrid smell of burning rubber burns your nostrils like serious bathroom cleaner.

And even though you don't exactly know what it is you're watching, you yell and raise a clenched fi st because this just might be the coolest thing you've seen in a while, and because everyone else in the jammed-packed grandstands and lined up three-deep in the standing areas is doing the same thing.

You glance to where the three judges sit and doggone if they aren't standing and yelling and raising their fi sts, too. Then they scribble a number on their score sheets and the track announcer, who is still cheering, announces the winner.

The fans continue to roar as the Japanese driver, who apparently has won, hurls little plastic oranges into the crowd. I think it has something to do with his sponsor, a mobile telephone operator and Internet service provider based in France that is also called Orange.

A couple of fans hurl them right back. Not because they are upset with the scoring, because with the exception of the three judges and the two guys driving the cars, they don't know what they've just seen. The reason they throw the little plastic oranges on the track is because it's hotter than hell; it's going on midnight and they've been drinking beer out of bulbous plastic bottles; and the girls have been strutting around in their too-short shorts and their tootight tops. Throwing something just seemed like the thing to do.

And maybe, just maybe, it's because the guy driving the factory-backed Mustang has just fl exed so much American muscle that he has to open his door to let out the smoke so he can breathe, like Jeff Spicoli and his pals tumbling out of the stoner van before Mr. Hand's fifth-period history class at Ridgemont High.

That, in a nutshell, is drifting, an outlaw sport that began in the mountain roads of Japan, and based on the overfl ow crowd that turned out for the inaugural D1 Grand Prix All-Star Exhibition on a sultry Saturday night at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, may soon surpass high-defi nition television sets as Japan's top export to America. It's hot and it's loud and it's fast and with the exception of a fl at-black 1969 Camaro void of decals that Ryan Hampton of Chandler, Ariz., had the audacity to qualify for the Round of 16, it's sexy.

In other words, it just might work here.

Ron Kantowski can be reached at 259-4088 or at ron@lasvegassun.