Despite having an area about 1/10th the size of Rhode Island, Barbados has a strong car culture and the Barbados Auto Racing League hosts some truly insane race machines. Rotaries, Toyota Starlets, and Nissans B310s are apparently quite popular. JNC reader sickbugs recently showed us some photos from his homeland.
This insanely flared and massively bewinged Mazda RX-3 appears to be the standard style for circuit racers and drift machines alike.
We’ll just let sickbugs take it away. “How much flare can you put on a Starlet yet still manage to fill it? this particular car was running a 4AGE, bit of controversy as to wether it was gas or methanol fueled at the time (meth was technically legal, but a bit of a grey zone). But what an amazing build, I literally have never seen a car that handled quite like this, until the owner put it in storage and bought a tube framed Suzuki SX4 (Alfa Romeo V6 mid-engined).
Sayeth sickbugs, “Take your standard B310, lengthen the chassis by a bit (not sure how much), oh and convert it to two-door while you’re at it (it started life as a 4 door car from what ive been told), SR20DET running somewhere around 12.8:1 compression, and a fairly nicely sized turbo will give you 20+ psi at as low as 2000 rpm, and ballpark 400 bhp. Basically, free from annoying turbo lag. This really was a beautiful car. Sadly the guy who owns it now doesnt care much about looks, and has left bits of bodywork on other peoples cars. It doesnt look nowhere near as good as it used to, doesn’t move as nicely either. Sad, but hopefully he will sell it to someone who will care for it.
And just for good measure, a drifting Datsun.
[Images: JustBajan]
That Datsun pic is money.
A GT bodied, flared Starlet & the RX-3 is unrecognizable !!
It looks like a Porsche! But my gut says Miata! I’m soo confused!
wow i didnt even think you could get parts like that these cars?!
woah i made it to the blog, sweet ! the yellow datsun is actually a rally car, but it fills the drift niche quite well (drifting has not kicked off in barbados yet officially, but should do so in the near future) and thanks to justbajan.com for the pics 🙂 Himal (photographer) has been a true asset to covering local motorsports over the years.
madfaber – of course you can, it just depends on how creative you want to be in your pursuit for speed and handling, our track lays a big focus on handling, short and twisty, and very bumpy.
bert – its a 13b powered tube frame chassis i think based on a rx7. naturally aspirated, the sound is heavenly.
Thanks sickbugs! We’re always interested in the wide variety of ways that old Japanese cars can be enjoyed. 🙂
Wicked stuff, sickbugs and JNC, cheers! Always interesting to see what different local scenes are like.