Back at the height of the sport compact car scene, Chris Rado’s front-wing Scion tC World Time Attack racer was it, chief. It was an unorthodox way to make a front-drive car stick around the track, and while the wing was a bit gimmicky, it did actually function. This was a fast car, perhaps aided more by its 1200 horsepower turbocharged four-cylinder and crazy light weight than its pair of wings, but fast all the same.
Something of the opposite effect as the MoPar NASCAR “wing cars”, the Fwing tC stuck its wing up and in clean air, while maintaining forward visibility for the driver. It worked, as the car set multiple FWD track records, and got column mentions measured in feet rather than inches. This car was everywhere about a decade ago. Today, hell, even Scion is dead.
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The scene, along with the magazines that supported it, has faltered and fallen by the wayside. Nobody seems to care about the SpoCom scene these days. For a long time since, this car has been sitting in obscurity. Its time in the lime light has gone, and it’s been relegated to the dark corner of a shop in Torrance, California. The fire-spitting Toyota race engine is long gone, and the car’s engine bay is now an empty hole where it once was.
So, the car’s body is 100% carbon kevlar, and the wings remain intact. Also still functional are the ridiculously expensive, and likely extensively developed Penske racing shocks, a full Motec system exhaust [just kidding, it’s a chassis and engine harness], and crazy Brembo 8-piston calipers at all four corners. Everything is there to make a badass race car. You know, except the engine, transmission, seat, steering wheel, shifter, front spoiler…
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This car is going to need quite a bit of work to get back to its good old racing days, but it might be worth it to someone as nostalgic as I am, but perhaps with a bit more liquid assets. This was a record-breaking, barrier-breaking monster of a car in 2009, and it deserves to be remembered as such.
If you’re in a buying mood, you can pick up this car for a scant $16,500 on eBay right now. If you ask me, that seems like an incredibly good deal. If some goober on GoFundMe can get $16 million for a dumbass wall, surely we can find a way to get me into the drivers seat of this Good Car.
One thing I know for sure, this car will be the talk of the party at Litwood.
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