- This ex–SpeedSource/Mazda Lola B12/80 competed in the IMSA prototype class from 2014 to 2016, and now it’s up for auction on Bring a Trailer.
- Important detail: It doesn’t come with an engine.
- Bidding is currently at $52,888, and the auction ends on Monday, February 14.
This 2014 Lola/Mazda IMSA prototype racer, our pick of the day from the auction site Bring a Trailer—which, like Car and Driver, is part of Hearst Autos—is most intriguing for what it doesn’t have: an engine. But it has pretty much everything else you need to go racing, including pushrod-actuated Multimatic DSSV dampers, carbon-carbon brakes with AP Racing calipers, and an XTrac 1059 sequential gearbox. But as it sits, it’s just a human-scale Pinewood Derby racer. And that’s part of the fun—daydreaming about what kind of powerplant you’d stuff into the space between the cabin and the rear wheels.
That XTrac gearbox is rated for 590 pound-feet of torque, which means there are lots of possibilities as to what you might bolt to it. A Mazda rotary would be appropriate, of course. Or how about an LS7? Or maybe something like this. You probably won’t use an engine of the sort that originally powered the car at the 2014 24 Hours of Daytona—a four-cylinder diesel. That was back when Mazda was promoting its Skyactiv diesels as the future, a future that never quite materialized. This car spent two seasons as a diesel before racing a final season with a turbocharged gas four-cylinder. We’d also guess that whoever wins this car won’t install a turbo four. Unlike Mazda, we don’t have to think on-brand, here. “Siri, will a Lamborghini V-10 fit in a Lola B12/80 chassis?”
This car, chassis MM07, never finished better than fourth place in any given race (that was with the gas engine). But you’ll definitely win your local track day if you show up with this monster, turn the key, and unleash the ragged blat of a Metzger air-cooled Porsche flat-six. Or an Alfa Romeo 2.9-liter turbo V-6. Or . . . Okay, you get the idea. But we’re just saying that if you’re already shelling out the money for this delectable assemblage of road-course-slaying hardware, you may as well spend another $40,000 for a 10,000-rpm, 600-hp naturally aspirated four-rotor rotary. That is all.
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Source: Motor - aranddriver.com
