The Smoking Tire recently made a trip to the beautiful island country of New Zealand to see if they could dig up a bit of car culture for our entertainment. In between cruising the epic scenery and dodging herds of sheep, TST got the chance to pilot some bonafide custom race cars on a rain-soaked track. These cars are hand built and privately run, the very essence of enthusiast weekend warriors. And unfortunately, one of them gets stuffed.
Taking the dubious honor of first crash on film for TST is host Matt Farah in Matt Rule's EG6 Honda Civic hatchback. The car was made for hill climbs and street sprints, and has a B18C motor transplant, Koni suspension components, and one-off, home-fabricated fiberglass and carbon fiber pieces that keep curb weight down to just 2,161 pounds. Watching Farah accidentaly understeer off-track and into the tire wall is painful, but thankfully, the damage was only cosmetic.
Rattled but still on the clock, Farah's next assignment was to not crash behind the wheel of an EVO/Mirage Frankenstein. Owned by Daniel Picard, the Mitsubishi coupe started life as a FWD automatic, but received a total track-day transformation over the course of five years. Built in a shed, the car has a complete EVO drivetrain, 355 horsepower, and one badass flat-black paint scheme. The AWD clearly helped in the wet, and luckily, Farah was done with off-track excursions for the day.
Hit play and see a brief slice of the brilliance behind Kiwi-style motorsport passion.