Homeland Security didn’t want this Freightliner Gymkhana-style video to happen

By Joe Mahan March 28, 2014

ever tried drifting semi truck banks super turbo pikes peak freightliner — Image used with permission by copyright holder

Shipping yards are not really on the forefront of exciting places to go.

Containers move from dock to ship – and vice versa – all day long. It’s a wonder how those crane operators stay awake … I guess getting paid the big bucks to play a life-size version of “The Claw” has its advantages.

Imagine how exciting a shipping yard gets, though, when a Nissan 240sx bursts out of a shipping container, followed by a drifting Freightliner Semi-Truck.

That’s right. Someone made a semi truck Gymkhana video.

The video, led by Pikes Peak extraordinaire Mike Ryan, is indeed a sequel to Size Matters. Drifting a semi-truck is just something the human brain has difficulty comprehending, but, this example in particular, isn’t exactly stock.

You might think this one might have hard time actually pulling a trailer. It doesn’t, though. The last truck Ryan drove packed 1,950 horsepower and 3,400 pound-feet of torque. You can thank Banks for those numbers … and Castrol for being a proud sponsor.

Banks took a Detroit Diesel engine and ingeniously twin-charged it. That means a supercharger and turbocharger are used to boost the engine into a tire-eating monster. Straight-Shot methanol is another power boosting feature used to cool down that smoke-belching diesel. A performance semi is extremely hard to build, but, boy, did it pay off.

Usually semi-trucks fly off cliffs but this one will take a ramp with no problem. There is indeed no better way to end a crazy, semi-truck drifting, Ken Block-killing Gymkhana video than flying over a row of Smart Fortwo mini-cars.

“Between Homeland Security and the insurance company, we almost didn’t get to do the jump,” Banks admitted.

Yeah, I can see why.

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Former Digital Trends Contributor

Joe Mahan is an intern at Digital Trends working in the Cars section. He is currently a Junior at the University of Portland…

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