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Daigo Saito
斎藤太吾
Daigo Saito; 斎藤太吾
Nationality	Japan
Born	7 March 1980 (age 44); Saitama
D1 Grand Prix career
Debut season	2004
Current team	Fat Five Racing
Car number	87
Former teams	TMAR, Team 22 Nino/Fnatz Professional Garage
Wins	20
Best finish	1st in 2008 2016
Previous series
2006; 2012-13,2015; 2018-2019, 2021	D1 Street Legal; Formula Drift; Russian Drift Series

Daigo Saito (斎藤太吾, Saitō Daigo, 7 March 1980, Saitama) is a Japanese professional drifting driver, currently competing in the D1 Grand Prix series and Formula Drift Japan. He formerly competed in Formula DRIFT USA and World Championship series for Achilles Radial. He was the first driver to win the two drifting majors, D1GP in 2008 and Formula D in 2012.

Biography

From an early age, Saito gained an appreciation for motorbikes, and motorbike racing, a hobby and sport his Father had exposed him to. Saito then gained his motorcycle license at the age of 16. One evening, when Saito was going for a ride on his motorbike with his friends, he stumbled upon a drift car meeting in the hills of Karuizawa. There he saw a white Mercedes-Benz saloon drifting. From then on he wanted to take part in drifting, and drift a saloon-style car. Upon turning 18, he gained his drivers license, though his father did not want him to take part in drifting. His Father bought him a Mini Cooper as his first car, a vehicle that is generally not capable of performing the high-speed maneuvers required for drifting. Saito attempted to drift the vehicle anyways and ended up getting it written off in an accident. He then bought a Nissan Silvia S13 without asking for permission from his parents. Saito immediately began practicing. His first practice session lasted 36 straight hours, with Saito only stopping for food and fuel. Saito began to develop his skills in the vehicle, but crashed it only a few weeks later. In 2005, Saito won the title for privateers.

Saito started competing in the D1 Grand Prix in the third round of the 2004 season in his Toyota Mark II JZX90. Following his crash with Kawabata in Fuji 2007 he replaced the JZX90 with JZX100 Mark II. The following year he kept improving at a steady pace and won the championship for the first time. At around this time Daigo worked at his parents' Pre-school as the driver.

In 2011 he became D1GP first ever solo run champion. The following year due to his participation in Formula Drift in USA he missed several D1GP rounds, but he was still a contender for the championship until the last round where he lost the title to Nobushige Kumakubo.

In 2013 his participation is the same like the previous year, he started his own shop called Fat Five Racing but before the final round of the season his garage where he kept his car burned down and force him to borrow his staff car for the final round.

In 2014 he used Lexus IS for D1GP as he built a JZX100 Mark II and Chaser at a garage in his own house replacing the one that caught fire in 2013. In Ebisu he finally debut the Mark II.

In 2015, he worked on the first Drift specification Lamborghini Murcielago. He also started to be sponsored by Monster Energy.

In 2016 Saito now with Wanli as tire supplier. The combination worked very well as Daigo won the first two opening rounds of the season beating the defending champion Masato Kawabata on both occasions. However due to how his Mark II was built, the car is banned forcing him to switch to more docile JZX100 Chaser, however, this didn't slow him down as he win 3 more rounds and sealed the championship with a round to spare; his 5 wins in a single season is a record that only Masanori Kohashi has been able to equal in 2021.

In 2017 for the first time he would be driving a non-Japanese car in form of a Corvette C6 GT3 powered with a LS engine. in only its third outing he managed to get the car to the final and grab a win later in Ebisu in what would be his only win with the Corvette.

In 2018 he won the rear-wheel drive class at the Gymkhana Grid.^[1] He also compete in Russian Drift Series with his JZX100 Mark II and finished the season as runner-up^[2] due to his participation in Russia he's unable to compete full season in D1GP

Since 2019, he drives Toyota GR Supra in D1GP. He planned to enter Eurofighter BMW E92 but he was contacted by Toyota to use the newly released GR Supra and grabbed his first win with the chassis in 2021 in the third GR Supra he make.

In 2022 he alongside his teammate Hokuto Matsuyama compete in Formula Drift Japan with an identical GR86 and change tire supplier to Yokohama while continue his D1GP campaign with GR Supra. However at the end of 2022, TMAR is disbanded.

At 2023 Tokyo Auto Salon, it's announced that he will be using Toyo Tires for D1GP. However the deal is aborted due to unknown reason and he participate with Goodride on first two round before using Shibatire for the rest of the season.

Formula Drift (USA)

In 2012, Saito joined the Formula Drift series in the Achilles Radial Lexus SC430 powered by a Toyota 2JZ engine. He achieved his first podium finish in his first event of the series at Long Beach. He followed this win up with a 3rd-place finish in Round 2 at Atlanta, and then a 1st-place finish at Round 3 in Palm Beach and a 4th-place finish in Round 4 at Wall Speedway. He won the championship and was rookie of the year after winning 1st place at Irwindale, in Round 7.^[3]

As part of the Achilles Radial Drift Team, his car is maintained and transported by Bridges Racing.^{[citation needed]}

Saito finished in third place during his second season in Formula DRIFT USA. He won three rounds (Atlanta, New Jersey & Irwindale) and second place at West Palm Beach. A crash during practice at Seattle and vehicle issues in Texas effectively removed him from the chance of winning back-to-back championships.^{[citation needed]}

Saito debuted a 1,200 hp Nissan GTR in April 2015 at the Formula DRIFT Streets of Long Beach event, and campaigned the car for the 2015 Formula DRIFT USA season.^{[citation needed]}

Saito did not participate in Formula Drift 2016, concentrating (and winning) on D1 Grand Prix series instead. He did the same in 2017.^{[citation needed]}

He planned to return to Formula Drift in 2020 and even already completed and shipped a 2JZ-powered Toyota GT86 to USA to be used in competition but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Daigo had to abort the plan and sending back the car to Japan the following year.^{[citation needed]}

Complete drifting results

Colour	Result
Gold	Winner
Silver	2nd place
Bronze	3rd place
Green	Last 4 [Semi-final]
Blue	Last 8 [Quarter-final]
Purple	Last 16 (16) [1st Tsuiou Round OR Tandem Battle] (Numbers are given to indicate Top 10 finish)
Black	Disqualified (DSQ) (Given to indicate that the driver has been stripped of their position through disqualification)
White	First Round (TAN) [Tansou OR Qualifying Single Runs]
Red	Did not qualify (DNQ)

When driver's position are highlighted in blue, this indicates either the driver earned 100pt or 100pt tansou (solo run) bonus has been awarded, with the latter being in use for Pre-2005.

D1 Grand Prix

Year	Entrant	Car	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	Position	Points
2004		Toyota Mark II JZX90	IRW	SGO	EBS TAN	APS TAN	ODB DNQ	EBS DNQ	TKB 16		-	0
2005		Toyota Mark II JZX90	IRW	ODB DNQ	SGO TAN	APS DNQ	EBS DNQ	FUJ DNQ	TKB 16		32	1
2006		Toyota Mark II JZX90	IRW	SGO 5	FUJ 16	APS 16	EBS 16	SUZ 16	FUJ TAN		14	24
2006		Toyota Chaser JZX100								IRW 9	14	24
2007		Toyota Mark II JZX90	EBS 15	FUJ 7	SUZ TAN						7	41
2007		Toyota Mark II JZX100				SGO TAN	EBS 6	APS 6	FUJ 6		7	41
2008	Team 22	Toyota Mark II JZX100	EBS 14	FUJ 2	SUZ 4	OKY 4	APS 1	EBS 7	FUJ 4		1	114
2009	週刊コミックバンチ　DRIFTプロジェクト	Toyota Mark II JZX100	EBS 3	APS 7	OKY 1	OKY 12	EBS 10	EBS 11	FUJ 15	FUJ 9	8	82
2010	フナッツ	Toyota Mark II JZX100	ODB TAN	APS 2	FUJ 7	OKY TAN	EBS 4	EBS 7	FUJ 3		6	79
2011	プレミアムジャパン with ダイゴ	Toyota Mark II JZX100	ODB 3	ODB 9	APS 2	SUZ 1	OKY 2	EBS 4	EBS 1	FUJ 6	2	207
2012	ダイゴ	Toyota Mark II JZX100	ODB 1	SUZ 2				CEN 1
2019	FAT FIVE RACING	Toyota GR Supra A90	TKB	TKB	TKC	TKC	EBS	EBS	APS		14	41
2020	FAT FIVE RACING	Toyota GR Supra A90	16	EBS 2	EBS 13	APS	APS	EBS 13	TKB	TKB	9	64
2021	FAT FIVE RACING	Toyota GR Supra A90									12	66

D1 Street Legal

Year	Entrant	Car	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	Position	Points
2006		Toyota Chaser JZX100	SEK	EBS TSU	SGO 8	FUJ 5	APS 6	EBS TSU	SEK	10	31

Formula Drift

Year	Entrant	Car	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	Position	Points
2012	Bridges Racing/Achilles Radial	Lexus SC430 UZZ40	FDLB 3	FDATL 3	FDPB 1	FDNJ 4	FDNW Top 8	FDLV Top 8	FDIRW 1	1	548.50
2013	Bridges Racing/Achilles Radial	Lexus SC430 UZZ40	FDLB Top 16	FDATL 1	FDPB 2	FDNJ 1	FDNW Top 32	FDTX Top 32	FDIRW 1	3	510.50
2014	Bridges Racing/Achilles Radial	Lexus SC430 UZZ40	FDLB Top 32	FDATL Top 8	FDMIA DNQ	FDNJ Top 32	FDNW DNQ	FDTX Top 16	FDIRW 1	14	224.00

Russian Drift Series GP

Year	Entrant	Car	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	Position	Points
2018		Toyota Mark II JZX100	MRW 3	ATR	NRING 3	SOC 4	SOC 3	RRING 4	PRM 2	2	1021
2019	AIMOL RACING RUSSIA	Toyota Altezza	MRW 9	ATR 6	NRING 6	ADM 16	RRING 14	SOC 5		8	718
2021	AIMOL RACING RUSSIA	Toyota GR Supra A90	MRW 27	NRING DNQ	IGORA	ATR	RRING	ADM	SOC		41