Photo by Lyndsay Johnson
We are super excited to announce Sara Riordan as our newest addition to the Drift Indy Street League production team! Sara’s joining the team as an announcer for this season’s DISL rounds.
Sara has lived and breathed drifting for quite a while now, having bought her first drift car back in 2012. She’s still sliding that same chassis over a decade later, all while working behind the mic and in the pits along the way.
She can wheel, too! Photo by Johnathan Cseh
During the 2018 and 2019 seasons, Sara crewed for an FD ProSpec team as a spotter and as a main crew chief. Her secret technique was spotting from as close to the judges as she could get so that she could see more or less exactly what they were. During one event, one of the announcers overheard her explaining her methods to a small group of other women and offered her the mic.
Turns out people really enjoyed what she had to say!
“I think people enjoy listening to me because I can break things down and make it easy to understand,” she said.
Photo courtesy of AWE/Josh Davis
At an early E-town Gambler, Sara was helping out with the drivers’ meeting and reminded everyone “don’t be a bitch in turn 4.” Chelsea Denofa was in attendance and reportedly told her it was the best drivers’ meeting he’d ever been in.
“That was the best compliment I’ve ever received,” she said.
Anyone first getting into drifting knows just how tough it can be to wade through the relatively complex judging process, making announcers and commentators that are able to simplify things for spectators pretty damn valuable. If they can make it simple and interesting? That’s about the gold standard, and I’d say the DISL team is getting nothing less with Ms. Riordan.
“DISL is infamous for having the most stylish cars. You guys definitely have that cool factor,” she said.
You’ll be able to catch Sara at the commentators’ table for DISL rounds 1, 2 and 3 this season!