The Birth of the Scene
Love import car culture? Thank these guys.
In the worlds of autocross, club racing, and professional circuit competition, the dynamics of Japan's smaller and lighter platforms have proven tough to beat. Just ask the American SCCA racers Nissan first hooked up in the late '60s and early '70s, whose winning rides were among the first to usher in a new age of vehicle modification.
www.datsunhistory.com
By the time Peter Brock founded Brock Racing Enterprises (BRE) in 1966, he had already put in work as a General Motors designer (the Cobra Daytona Coupe was his) and chief driving instructor at famed Ford tuner Carroll Shelby's self-titled school in Riverside, CA. Despite heavy domestic ties, Brock earned BRE its first big win later that year with two Japanese Hino Coupes he and a teammate drove to First- and Second-place finishes in a Times-Mirror event at Riverside Raceway, in front of a six-figure crowd. His performance caught the eye of Nissan North America president Yutaka "Mr. K" Katayama, who partnered Datsun with BRE so Brock could take out Toyota's 2000GT with a pair of modified Nissan 2000 roadsters in their first race. With the help of ace driver John Morton, tuned BRE Datsun Zs and 510s would go on to oust other Toyotas, Porsches, BMWs, and literally every other SCCA class competitor by the late '70s, at which point no one would race against them.
Pete Paraska, www.classiczcars.com
On the East Coast, it was Bob Sharp who no one could topple. After some successful years racing Bugeye Sprites and Lotus kit cars in the SCCA, Sharp picked up a Datsun sponsorship courtesy of East Coast Nissan frontman Mr. Kawasoe, and would continue winning in modified Datsun 1600s and 2000s. Bob Sharp Racing (BSR) became the first team to compete a 240Z in early 1970, when Mr. Kawasoe contributed a damaged New York Auto Show model to the team off the books. It was a risky move, but one that paid off-Sharp himself would go on to win division titles in 1970 and '71, and production champs in '72, '73, and '75 in the 240Z, alongside his and other BSR racers' wins in Datsun 510s. Actor Paul Newman even joined BSR ranks in 1977 and won six of eight races entered in 1979 from behind the wheel of a tuned 280ZX. Newman would become the Northeast champion that year and go on to take the C Production national title.
www.bondurant.com
SoCal ex-Formula 1/Le Mans/NASCAR racer Bob Bondurant gets the nod for having taught Newman, at his world-renowned School of High Performance Driving then in Ontario, CA (now in Phoenix, AZ), beginning in 1972 as Newman researched his role for Winning. Another Carroll Shelby alum, Bondurant opened his school in 1968 in Irvine, CA, with two Datsun 240Zs and a 510 contributed by Mr. K himself (the Z pictured here was modified by BRE). Ford and General Motors have subsequently supported Bondurant's school into the modern day, but at a meeting with Mr. K. in 1995, the racing legend is quoted as saying, 'What I am today, I owe entirely to Mr. K.'