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The Neon Glow of Tokyo Modified Car Culture (kottke.org)
Jason Kottke: New Zealand drift racer Mike Whiddett recently travelled to Japan to explore Tokyo's "extraordinary after-dark modified auto scene." He found people making California-style lowriders, Dekotora (my favorite, if only for the sheer spectacle), illegally modified cars, and a man who says with a straight face that "driving an unmodified Lamborghini is boring."
a Jason Kotke blog posted by Jason Kotke
Based on people I have known in California...
Real street racers don't keep the same car for long, or in some cases even have them legally registered.
Having a car that glows is explicitly for show. Either it is a trailer queen or it is rolling probable cause (Neons are illegal in most/all US states and are also illegal in most other parts of the world, especially red, blue, and yellow flashing, which are explicitly intended for emergency vehicles and public utility trucks/contractors who need to operate need the roadway and notify traffic so they can slow down/go around them.)
People who are REALLY into street racing usually go out a few times a month, or run cars that can't be traced back to them and make as much of a game out of the cat and mouse of police involvement as they do the racing itself. Some will go out and bust donuts just to draw police attention, others only operate in the dead of night in abandoned areas of town, many of which are no longer so abandoned between security cameras and beefed up law enforcement presence (many industrial parks now have regular police patrols and beefed up patrol cars as a result of illegal car and bike activity and the risk of damage to property.) Some people regularly flip unregistered cars, or cars in the previous owners paperwork, fixing them up, using bolt-ons/illegal engines for power which they swap out before reselling the vehicle, the engine travelling between vehicles until they move to a different platform/wear them out. A decent number of the poorer indivudals also boost cars, using the joyrides back to the chop shops to try out different cars while getting paid a pittance at the end of the night. Given the criminal laws around street racing nowadays, as well as the risk of having your car crushed, it makes some amount of sense to just add a grand theft auto rap and use stolen cars for it. If they get confiscated/wrecked/chopped it is no skin off your back and nothing directly traces back to you.
However, this activity is becoming increasingly risky. If you carry a cellphone you are providing location data tied to the theft and operation of the car. Combined with video footage and timestamps they can tie the cell phone to you. Combine the above with random passerbys with cell phones, as well as the general lack of thought to concealing one's identity and accidents, near escapes from police, etc leave you with a ticking timer until you're arrested, unless you are lucky enough to be well connected/have paid off the law enforcement for your region. Most of the United States that won't be true. Most of Japan, even if you're Yakuza that is no longer true (Yakuza is 1/3 their size from 20 years ago and more is being cracked down on each day.) Most of Europe and Britain it also isn't true. Anybody with priors will make a conviction stick easily, and most of the street racing/reckless driving laws can see you in jail or prison from 90 days to a few years. I know two different people who did 2+ years in prison over street racing related activities, and there are hundreds to thousands of other examples. Worse yet if someone else dies while participating in a street race you are on the hook at minimum as an accessory to murder and in some jurisdictions as a murderer yourself.