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On a balmy summer season’s evening within the foothills of Mt. Fuji, I stood at the hours of darkness, on the sting of a forest at a bus cease – lengthy after the final bus for the day had departed – my digicam bag weighing me down and my thumb out within the hope of getting a carry to the closest practice station.
As I anticipated, each automobile drove previous with out as a lot as a toot. I had come from an occasion at Fuji Speedway, so there was a hope that somebody would possibly pity a fellow automobile fanatic and cease to ask the place I used to be headed. After half-hour, I began coming to the realisation that I’d want to begin making the 20km stroll to civilisation, however my pondering was interrupted by the sharp beep of a horn and the glow from the rear brake lights of a GD sequence Subaru Impreza wagon.
I hurried in direction of the automobile in disbelief and jumped in. It turned out that the driving force, was not solely a fellow photographer, however had been on the wheel of a few of the basic Mazda race automobiles I had been taking pictures all day. Fortunately he recognised me; it could have been a protracted stroll in any other case.
As we chatted about automobiles, he requested if I knew of Tommykaira. ‘Sure, in fact,’ I replied, to which he casually introduced whereas gesturing to the passenger seat: “That is Kaira-san.”
I wasn’t certain if he was joking till, out of the darkness, the mysterious entrance seat passenger handed me his enterprise card. Within the blink of a watch my dire scenario had turn into an unforgetable life second.
We exchanged LINE particulars throughout the drive, after which mentioned our farewells on the practice station. However this opportunity encounter wasn’t going to be our final.
Over the following few months I organized to go to with each Kaira-san – and the second half of the outfit- Tomita-san on their residence turf in Kyoto. When that day lastly got here, we met on the Tommykaira showroom.
What struck me in a short time throughout our first assembly, is that these two previous mates have a chemistry which may be very a lot The Odd Couple in dynamic. Kikuo Kaira (carrying eye glasses) is softly spoken, deadpan and witty. Yoshikazu Tomita, Kaira-san’s enterprise associate and pal of just about 40 years, is a typical Kansai native – vibrant, enthusiastic and by no means removed from a joke.
However regardless of their variations, the pair have been mates for 48 years and colleagues since 1984 – across the time Kaira-san joined Tomita Auto as an engineer.
There are such a lot of trade connections and threads which type the historical past of this story, however to maintain it easy, it went a little bit one thing like this: Within the late-Seventies and early ’80s, Tomita Auto was a dealership and distributor of varied European sports activities automobiles from Mercedes-Benz and BMW, in addition to the primary Hartge supplier in Japan.
Having established a popularity as an excellent engineer and designer within the UK with Tom Walkinshaw’s Formulation 2 automobile, a podium end within the Japanese Grand Prix and not least being the chief designer of the Toyota DOME 84C Le Mans automobile, Kaira-san started work with Kojima Racing in Kyoto to develop their new F1 automobile – the KE007 for the 1976 Japanese GP. Kyoto isn’t a big metropolis, and it didn’t take lengthy for Kaira-san to pay a go to to Tomita Auto.
Maybe the 2 younger males recognised one another’s strengths, however regardless of the purpose, a friendship was fashioned and finally a plan was hatched to develop tuning merchandise for the well-liked efficiency automobiles of the day. And thus the model we now know as Tommykaira was born.
With technical steerage from the good Kaira-san, Tommykaira didn’t cease at tuning components, finally creating full, particular version automobiles based mostly on the GT-R, Subaru Impreza and Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution platforms. They have been even accountable for a Hartge-tuned Skyline GTS.
As if producing what have now turn into extremely collectable particular editions of halo automobiles from the golden period of tuning wasn’t sufficient, Tomita-san and Kaira-san set their sights on creating a light-weight, exhilarating sports activities automobile that might match the efficiency of supercars of the day, the results of which was the Tommykaira ZZ and ZZII. However that’s a narrative for one more day. Belief me although, it’s price ready for…
The superb factor is, this pair shouldn’t be fairly completed but. Kaira-san is designing high-end garden mowers for golf golf equipment across the globe, and Tomita-san is negotiating with sponsors to get the ZZII into manufacturing.
Having met Kaira-san whereas primarily hitch mountain climbing, his quiet, light method made it straightforward to neglect the genius he’s. The identical goes for Tomita-san; he’s a good man with actual standing within the Japanese automotive trade.
It actually was an honour to fulfill two of the best and loveliest personalities in automobile tradition.
Toby Thyer
Instagram _tobinsta_
tobythyer.co.uk
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