I love going to Car Week with The Autopian. It’s this wild, crazy adventure, and we rarely know what’s going to happen or how our silly antics will be taken. A week of checking out the greatest cars in the world with the best of friends. It’s truly incredible, and if we can capture 10% of the fun we have on the site and on social media, I’d consider it a success.
In the first year, we created a bit of a tradition by bringing some mascot cars. We’re now in our fifth year visiting as a site, and we have our biggest surprise yet.
Are you ready for it?
A Tradition Is Born
If you don’t remember, the first year David, Jason and Beau went up with three incredibly rare supercars. The second year, we went to Car Week in Beau’s incredible Coach Door Lincoln Continental. The third year, we brought the amusing Pontiac Aztek. And then last year … the Murano CrossCabriolet. We got so much attention with the CrossCab, and built so much lore, I wasn’t sure we’d be able to come up with something that would be as big. How do you top that?
Well, we’ve got an idea (as members already know). And it involves bringing two cars, actually. You can see a little teaser of one on Instagram (or here):
View this post on Instagram
I think many of you might be able to guess what it is. If you’re going to Car Week, we’ll also have a tentative schedule for where we’ll be this week coming tomorrow. We’ll also have a little game we’re playing for those who are around the Monterey Peninsula next week.
How To Participate In Car Week With #CarWeak
Even if you’re not going to any of the events, one of the best parts of Car Week is just looking at random cars on the street that make you weak in the knees. Cars like this brilliant orange Lexus LFA.
Or, perhaps, this Japanese-import AMG. Maybe it’s too obvious, but I assume everyone will be taking photos of Coda EVS.
We all have our own weird car tastes. Just embrace them!
Here’s how to play along:
- Follow The Autopian on Instagram.
- Take a photo of a cool car.
- Post it and add the hashtag #carweak and (Double points if you find either of the vehicles we’re bringing and tag MazdaUSA as well).
- Let us know if you’re an Autopian member, and we’ll send you a sticker. If you’re not a member, we’ll send you a discount for membership.
Also, if you find us at Pebble Beach, we’ll have stickers in the cars to hand out until we run out.
Top photo: Jason Torchinsky
Is that thumbnail car a RX-7?
Man, if that Lincoln ever comes up as a “Should I Sell It?” it’ll be a tough call. On the one hand, #1 of 80 and Beau’s dad’s (last?) car, on the other the best seat in the house has Torch’s poison ivy all over it.
And also, I don’t have Instagram and have to keep getting reminded to check yours so;
Is Jason judging the Concours d’Lemons again or was that clip of him with the “You Didn’t See Me” sash from last year?I’m surprised David’s engineering mind didn’t see how elegant a solution the “dogleg” hooks on first and third “gears” of that playground thing are to the problem of incorporating a manual “shifter” that’s simple and rugged enough to last years in a playground with zero maintenance.
I have zero doubt that it’ll be that AZ1 with the F40 body kit that y’all were working on a while back.
Judging by the pixelation, it slightly resembles a Japanese model.
With all the good parts obscured!
I’ll only be in town on Saturday and just have enough time to see the Concours d’Lemons, but if anyone sees me in our mascot car, say hi!
Autozam AZ-1 with the Charge/Renown livery used on many Mazda prototypes of the late 1980s and early 1990s, most famously the Le Mans winning 787B in 1991.
This is the Autozam:
https://www.instagram.com/p/CyBEBhFSgM8/?img_index=2
But I don’t think that’s exactly the car in question – The car in the video has a different wing and quad headlamps.
I believe it’s an Autozam in a Liberty Walk F40 kit with Renown livery:
https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2Fautozam-az-1-v0-g0r3bt60b5cc1.jpg%3Fwidth%3D1080%26crop%3Dsmart%26auto%3Dwebp%26s%3D69e4f33590f72be577a2001e8a25c5f5769932ca
This feels less like a guess, and more like “I read the email that told us all this information.”
Also, the actual 787B was just on fire.
I’m being 100% honest here, I missed the email as I just got back from vacation. And thankfully the car that caught fire at the Pre-Historics was a privately owned 767B and not the Le Mans winning 787B that Mazda will have there this weekend. I got this purely because I am The Autopian’s resident rotary nut. I’ve got about every scale version possible of the 787B and others.
That’s what I get for headline skimming.
tbf, the first headline I saw on another site did misidentify it as the 787B and it took me a moment to realize it was a different car.
Bringing the burnt-out hulk of a racing car to Car Week would be the most Autopian thing ever.
Or Tavarish, lol.
That was the 767.
Now that I found the email I missed, I see I didn’t give away the whole game. Still an aspect for people to guess.
Correction: An actual 767B was just on fire. There are more than one, thankfully.
No, it was an earlier 767 which caught fire.
*edit, guess I should refresh the page before responding.
I wonder if the staff held a betting pool on which member would be first to mention the email in the comments of this post.
I was thinking Spec Miata racer but AZ-1 seems to fit better.