GRIDLIFE South Carolina ignites series’ 2025 season

Engines roared, rubber burned and the Carolina air buzzed with electricity during the GRIDLIFE South Carolina Festival April 11-13. From sun-soaked afternoons to a floodlit showdown after dark, a record-breaking crowd packed the Carolina Motorsports Park paddock as more than 30 hours of GRIDLIFE drifting tore through two courses day and night.

Building on the momentum of a successful 2024 season, the GRIDLIFE South Carolina Festival launched the 2025 calendar with unmatched energy, a stacked lineup and something to prove.

GRIDLIFE’s new three-day fusion of motorsport, music and unapologetic car culture wasn’t just an evolution — it was a declaration: This is how we do it now.

Everything about the weekend was bigger. The grids were bigger with more than 200 participants. The racing and drifting was bigger, spread across three days on two different track configurations and more than 30 hours of drifting day and night. The crowd was the biggest it’s ever been in the event’s three-year history. The streaming production, the celebrity names on the guest list, the amount of track time — bigger, louder and more immersive.

“The 2025 season is off to a hell of a start,” said GRIDLIFE President Chris Stewart. “The energy, the format, the crowd — we wanted to evolve, and this weekend proved we’re on the right track.”

The scene Saturday night was pure theater: headlights slicing through mist, engines revving to redline and smoke curling into the darkness as GRIDLIFE Night Drift made its official debut on the .7-mile karting track. After a full day drifting on the big track, under glowing track lights, a lineup of all-stars including Grant Anderson, Cole Richards, Hert and Lee Yearwood tore through the night with calculated chaos.

Phones in hand, fans captured a drifting spectacle that immediately blew up on social media. It was a first for GRIDLIFE at Kershaw and an instant entry into the culture’s highlight reel.

While the track thundered with racing across the Eibach GRIDLIFE Touring Cup, RUSH Series and GRIDLIFE TrackBattle Time Attack, the infield pulsed to a different rhythm.

DJ Xcape, Jake Panda and Emo Nite with a special Grave Rave Set soundtracked the paddock late into Friday and Saturday night, turning tents and trailers into pop-up clubs. The result? An environment where race teams, fans and artists blurred into one community.

The new three-day festival format offered everything from pro-level driving to casual show-and-shine hangouts, there was no such thing as downtime.

“The South Carolina Festival wasn’t just an opener — it was a line in the sand,” said Stewart. “A signal to fans, drivers and anyone watching that GRIDLIFE isn’t here to repeat seasons. It’s here to build on the legacy with something bigger, louder and more immersive.

“The 2025 GRIDLIFE season has officially begun, and if Carolina was the kickoff, the rest of the tour might just rewrite the playbook.”

The next stop on the GRIDLIFE calendar is GRIDLIFE Special Stage Atlanta at Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta May 9-10, where Formula DRIFT and GRIDLIFE will join forces for a first-of-its-kind collaborative event. In an unprecedented partnership between a track owner and two sanctioning bodies, the weekend will feature Formula DRIFT’s PRO and PROSPEC Championships alongside GRIDLIFE’s signature TrackBattle Time Attack, GLTC Touring Cup and GRIDLIFE RUSH Series. Highlighting the action is the highly anticipated return of GRIDLIFE Full Course Drift, where top-tier drivers — already on-site for Formula DRIFT — will take on the entire 2.54-mile circuit in a spectacle set to redefine Southeast drift culture