First off, sorry for not getting this posted yesterday. I had a long day yesterday and ended up falling asleep on the sofa while editing these pictures. So here they are today. Hopefully it still counts!
Now, on to the post itself. For today’s car, I honestly did not think I was ever going to open it. But I saw something that made me do it, and I’ll get to that in a minute. Starting with the car itself, what’s more ‘80s than a car named 86?! The iconic little Japanese hatchback that turned everyone who got behind the wheel into Takumi Fujiwara, and every road became Akina Pass. The 86 is an icon in car culture these days. The underdog. The little hachi that could. No crazy power output. No turbos. No super-advance AWD system. Just an economical 4 cylinder engine with a standard manual transmission and RWD. But it was light. And that meant it slid reeeaaallll easy. It became the darling of the drift world with the likes of the Nissan Silvia variations.
This car would go on to become the personal car of choice for everyone’s favorite drifter. No, not that tofu delivery boy Takumi. I’m talking his real life counterpart; the man on which he was based. The Drift King himself: Keiichi Tsuchiya. I’m sure many of you know I’m a big Lewis Hamilton fan, and Senna fan, and Jeff Gordon fan. But of all the drivers I revere the most in this world, Keiichi Tsuchiya is number one.
What you see below is a somewhat rare (from what I can tell) Tomica Limited model of Tsuchiya’s Sprinter Trueno AE86 drivin in the Fuji Freshman Series back in 1984. It’s where Tsuchiya really made a name for himself, taking home 6 wins in this car that season. The car was piloted for Advan Carrot Flashpoint racing, and I’m sure those of you with a keen eye for JDM liveries spotted the Advan A on the hood right away. Now, that’s enough blabbering from me. You didn’t come here to read all my cool factoids. You came here to see pictures of the car. Without further ado, here is Tsuchiya’s AE86 race car.
