Funny how these things happen. I was just discussing Vintage Motorsport “cover cars” with RACER Marketing & Media’s Nick Lish (who wears so many hats, I can’t keep track, but I’m an especially big fan of his large-format photography) because my Valentine’s Day/Memorial Day/July 4th/Labor Day wish for a red Italian race car from the 1950s on the VM was granted — finally! — this Christmas via the striking Lancia D50 gracing the Jan/Feb 2022 issue’s Lancia D50.

Thankyouthankyouthankyou, D. Randy Riggs and Art Director Paul Laguette!

… When out of the blue popped this video highlighting a sports racing machine that’s neither Italian nor red, but which was a prototype I marveled at and actually got to see raced in anger unlike the Lancias, Maseratis or Ferraris I so revere.

There are several great videos on the late Kas Kastner’s YouTube channel, but the one that Lish shared this week was the video record of the Nissan GTP ZX’s debut and subsequent domination (eight straight wins!) of the 1988 IMSA season, carrying popular Geoff Brabham to the first of four consecutive IMSA Drivers Championships.

A later (1992) version of the red, white and blue Nissan did rock a VM cover in 2013, celebrated like its predecessors as an especially potent challenge to its German (Porsche) and British (Jaguar) prototype rivals in North America’s toughest sports car series.

Lish and I think you will enjoy this video — Happy New Year!