It’s not Friday yet but in honor of known motorfan Akio Toyoda’s ascension to the top spot at Toyota, here’s a two-part video about the company’s motorsports history. Based on the intro with WRC ST185 and Ironman Stewart pickups, it looks like this video was made in the early 90s. But soon it delves into a brief history of the automobile itself, starting with the Benz trike and the 1907 Takuri.
From there goes on to talk about motorsports with early footage from Indianapolis, Daytona Beach and a 1936 Japanese auto race that even gives a shout out to then-18-year-old Soichiro Honda and his first race car.
From there, we get to see the Toyota AA racing a steam engine, a 1956 Toyopet Crown on a London-to-Tokyo 50,000km drive, and some fantastic footage of a 1957 Crown on the Mobilgas Rally around the Australian continent.
Part 2 after the jump.
Part 2 starts with the Japan Grand Prix of the early 60s and a battalion of Publicas and RT20 Coronas defending Toyota’s honor. Our favorite is the C-6 Class race, which pits the S40 Crown up against Nissan Cedrics, Prince Glorias, Isuzu Bellels and Ford Taunuses. From there it’s the swingin’ Sixties where the focus is the Sports 800, but you can still see Honda S800s, Isuzu Bellets (not in the same class, obviously), Prince Skylines, Fairlady Roadsters and a lot more cool stuff.
Let’s hope Mr. Toyoda can add some more chapters to this story, eh?
I’m at a loss for words… SWEET! 🙂
Diggin the GT races and the short traffic scene at 2:44
Ha, I knew you’d like this one, TG 🙂
I just wish there were English subtitles. I heard “nostalgic hero” in there somewhere. I wonder if it was produced by the same people that put out the mag.
Not 100% sure on this, but I think some of the footage like of the red Sports 800 driving on the test track were filmed by Nostalgic Hero in modern times.