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Posted
Nov 17 2009, 12:59 PM
by
Carl Jarrett
with 42 comment(s)
Its been too long since I posted that teaser, but check it out! I'm pretty stoked to be able to see a glimpse of what my project will look like when its done (next year). Here's where the nerd in me comes out, I mocked up this shot of the car in a windtunnel, not that it'll ever see one I'm sure, but a cool image regardless. There is a good chance I'll be doing some CFD tests with this car though, testing out various diffuser, canard, and wing set-ups. For the sake of these concept...
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Posted
Nov 06 2009, 03:19 PM
by
Mike Garrett
with 30 comment(s)
I was browsing one of my favorite forums, ClubRoadster.net the other day when I found a thread about an LS1-powered Mazda Miata drag car out of Mississippi. Now any time you combine a light weight rear-drive car with a powerful V8 the potential for awesomeness arises, but I noticed something about this car that I don't think the builder intended - it's likeliness to sports car-based drag cars of the '60s....
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Posted
Oct 20 2009, 11:24 AM
by
Mike Garrett
with 22 comment(s)
A couple weeks ago when I was at the Japanese Classic Car Show in Irvine, parked alongside the classic RX7's in Mazda's display I spotted this wild-looking MX-6. The normal MX-6 was a front wheel drive coupe that shared a platform with the Ford Probe, but the IMSA GTU race version was a just a bit different....
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Posted
Oct 06 2009, 02:00 AM
by
Dino Dalle Carbonare
with 20 comment(s)
This is a car I've been meaning to feature for a while now. It was built by my friend Russ, the man behind the RE-Extreme blog, the place to go to for the latest news on anything and everything related to the RX7. Before Russ got rid of this, his second RE-Extreme project car, we met up in the Tokyo Bay ready to immortalize his very unique ride. After much searching we ended up at a Hotel in Tokyo Disneyland, which provided a very nice, yet very un-Japanese backdrop! Before embarking on this...
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Posted
Oct 02 2009, 12:45 PM
by
Mike Garrett
with 20 comment(s)
Well, it's October already. Tomorrow I'll be kicking off the month with a trip down to Orange County for the fifth annual Japanese Classic Car Show - something I've been looking forward to for a while. Before that though, I need to finish up my coverage from last weekend's big event in Orange County, Sevenstock. I posted a lot of sexy RX7's and RX8's in my first Sevenstock post, so this time I'm going to give some love to the more unique cars (and trucks) found at Sevenstock 12....
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Posted
Sep 28 2009, 01:15 PM
by
Mike Garrett
with 21 comment(s)
Now that I'm getting settled at my new place in Torrance, I'm finally in position to take in everything that SoCal's car culture has to offer. What used to require a full day's road trip is now just a short freeway hop away - unless there happens to be a traffic jam. Luckily traffic was light on Saturday when I headed down the 405 freeway to the Mazda USA headquarters in Irvine for Sevenstock 12 - one of the biggest rotary gatherings in the world. It may be BMW month on Speedhunters, but there's never a bad time to enjoy rotaries of both the vintage and modern variety....
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Posted
Sep 26 2009, 10:02 PM
by
Mike Garrett
with 11 comment(s)
While a good part of the Speedhunters team was getting soaked at Road Atlanta this weekend, I was here in sunny Southern California for Sevenstock 12 at the Mazda HQ in Irvine. This was my first time at this event, and it was quite an experience walking around this mecca of the Wankel engine.
Stay tuned for a nice helping of rotary goodness from SoCal!
-Mike Garrett...
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Posted
Sep 14 2009, 04:42 PM
by
Mike Garrett
with 15 comment(s)
With fall fast approaching, that means it's time to once again start looking towards the auto show season and the concept cars that come with it. One of the concepts that's already been revealed is the Mazda MX-5 superlight concept for the Frankfurt Show. As it's name suggests, this car takes the standard MX-5 and strips away "excess" weight , doing away with things like a windshield or top. The resulting car is a unique creation that's one my favorite concept cars in recent memory - the raw spirit of the MX-5 turned up to eleven.
Hopefully it comes with a pair of leather driving gloves and some goggles...
-Mike Garrett...
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Posted
Sep 14 2009, 01:15 PM
by
Mike Garrett
with 26 comment(s)
Every year in the UK, Japanese car enthusiasts get together for the massive Japanese Auto Extravaganza, better known as JAE. The 2009 edition of JAE was held this weekend at Wicksteed Park in Northhampton.
Photographer Rich Sams was kind enough to send us some photos from the event....
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Posted
Sep 11 2009, 02:00 AM
by
Carl Jarrett
with 25 comment(s)
You might remember my blog post in July finding the car to start my newest project, a road race/time attack/hill climb/who knows 1988 Mazda RX7, as promised here's the official part 1 of my EPIC (please note my pretentious and humorous tone here) RX7 race car build! Over my break from work and after my eyes healed up from laser eye surgery I finally had some free time to get started on my new adventure. Step 1 is the messiest and dirtiest but pretty damn fun at times, the tear down... The tear...
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Posted
Aug 31 2009, 11:19 AM
by
Mike Garrett
with 21 comment(s)
Here's a quick photo that Mad Mike Whiddett just sent over from the third round of the NZ Drift Series at Taupo Motorsport Park. After earning second and third place finishes earlier in the season, Mad Mike defeated Carl Ruiterman this weekend to take his first victory of 2009. So far It's been an exciting for year for Mike, who's been competing in both New Zealand and in D1GP Japan.
Hopefully we'll have the chance to see him in the USA again soon!
-Mike Garrett...
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Posted
Aug 26 2009, 04:49 PM
by
Mike Garrett
with 25 comment(s)
As I was walking back to my car last Thursday at FD Sonoma, I caught this crazy looking NA Miata sitting the parking lot. As a fellow Roadster owner, I couldn't help feeling that the 7.5 inch wide wheels on my own car are pretty whimpy compared to these. As you can see, this NA has had some heavy fender work to fit these wheels (Centerlines by the looks of them) and the finished product is pretty tough looking.
I also LOL'd at the sticker on the windshield.
-Mike Garrett...
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Posted
Aug 19 2009, 03:36 PM
by
Rod Chong
with 30 comment(s)
As we got ready to start the Speedhunters coverage of Bonneville Speed Week I was silently hoping there was going to be a Japanese campaign at the event. The legendary Japanese tuning shop Jun Auto's Bonneville runs are now the stuff of legends, and I was praying we'd be able to find something similar to document at Speed Week. However, when I looked at the Bonneville entry list there were no Japanese teams listed... the closest thing to an Asian based team was an entry lodged from Singapore...
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Posted
Aug 18 2009, 11:10 AM
by
Rod Chong
with 11 comment(s)
You know, I get the sense the Bonneville car builders are all closet inventors; each with their own home brewed speed secrets learned from many years or even decades of running on the salt. For these constructors there are no boundaries... the only limit to a build is their own imagination... At Bonneville it often seems like the crazier the design and the more outlandish a engine transplant, the better. So whenever I came across a rear wheel drive Japanese car at Bonneville, I was usually expecting...
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Posted
Aug 13 2009, 11:01 AM
by
Mike Garrett
with 10 comment(s)
As you've seen in the Speedhunters '09 Speed Week coverage, there's an incredible variety of machines that come out to Bonneville to run on the hallowed salt. From streamliners to motorcycles to pickup trucks, if it has wheels chances are you'll find it out there. Japanese tuners have long had an addiction to the salt, with cars like the JUN Z and Dandy RX7 making appearances over the years. However, some of the most famous Japanese cars to run at Bonneville weren't tuned in Japan, but right here in the USA by the guys at Racing Beat. As part of Speed month, we thought a quick look at these historic salt-going rotaries was in order....
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Posted
Jul 28 2009, 07:05 PM
by
Rod Chong
with 22 comment(s)
Sorry I thought this was pretty funny.... Found in the Reader's Rides thread on the Speedhunters Forum. :R
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Posted
Jul 17 2009, 04:04 PM
by
Mike Garrett
with 9 comment(s)
When they weren't building rotary engines and lightweight sports cars, Mazda also ventured into the AWD turbo side of things with their Mazda 323 GT-X and GT-R (also known as the Familia in Japan). The car never became as popular as the Mitsubishis and Subarus, but it still was still used by rally racers across the planet. This photo was taken in Norway showing a '93 model Group A 323 GT-R tearing up a snow bank at a rally event.
Mazda would later return with a new AWD turbo car, the Mazdaspeed6 which only lasted for a couple years.
-Mike Garrett...
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Posted
May 27 2009, 03:06 PM
by
Mike Garrett
with 6 comment(s)
Perhaps I'm a bit biased as an MX-5 owner myself, but I thought this was pretty cool. As part of the car's 20th anniversary, Mazda is hosting a birthday gathering for European MX-5 owners next month at the 24 Hours of LeMans. 200 owners and enthusiasts from around Europe will be invited to a special gathering and car show alongside the famous racing circuit. Most of all, I really liked the press photo that Mazda has supplied for the event, showing a new NC model sitting on the track alongside an original NA with a Mazda prototype racer lurking in the background.
Now if I could just find a way to get my little Roadster across the atlantic for this......
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Posted
May 19 2009, 01:05 PM
by
Mike Garrett
with 9 comment(s)
Earlier this month when I was at the Bug-In event at Autoclub Speedway, I found myself spending a lot of time wandering through the staging lanes looking over all the cars that came out to for the drags. As you saw during my Bug-In event coverage, there was a wide variety of VW's there, ranging from lightly modified daily drivers to VW-powered rail dragsters.
With that said, there was one car I saw that really threw me off. ...
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Posted
May 18 2009, 03:35 PM
by
Jeroen Willemsen
with 27 comment(s)
After checking the RE-Extreme blog I came across this picture. I have seen this same FD numerous times before on pictures when it was going through its paces on Tsukuba, even Mike has captured this car before. I never realized that it was a street legal car. That in itself makes this car even cooler than it already was. Can you imagine driving a car like this to and from Tsukuba on any given Sunday and compete in a Time Attack event? The thought alone... -Jeroen Willemsen
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