Mad Mike: Life close to the edge

'Mad' Mike Whiddett (Newshub)
'Mad' Mike Whiddett (Newshub)

If you were asked to name New Zealand's most famous sportsman, you probably wouldn't say Mike Whiddett.

But the Kiwi drift racer is a global sensation, with more Facebook followers than any Kiwi in sport.

Whiddett is better known as 'Mad Mike' and for a good reason, as his new film The Mad Life makes very clear. It offers a glimpse into the high-octane thrills of drift racing and the dangers of skirting so close to the edge.

The Formula Drift racer has suffered a lot for the sport, which he describes as the consequence of "pushing hard". 

"And I've hurt myself a lot, from 2002 being told I was paralysed for life, compressed and fractured four vertebrae in my back," he says.

"But that's... I live for adrenaline, you know?"

Whiddett placed third in the World Championship at the sport's highest level, Formula Drift. In doing so he won at Ebisu in Japan, the country where the sport of drifting was born. 

He describes that as his "biggest moment". 

"And there's no better place to have won a world championship round - the home of drifting, and then the heart of it is Ebisu."

But the film also reminds viewers that The Mad Life is lived just seconds from disaster.

Just before this year's racing season Whiddett crashed his brand new car at Cromwell, racing at more than 200 kilometres an hour.

"I was knocked out, crushed liver, there was urine, there was blood. It was a scary, scary moment," he says.

Mike Whiddett's documentary The Mad Life will premiere on CRC Motorsport on TV3 this Sunday at 3pm. 

Newshub.