5 Race Cars that never raced

Race Cars, as the name suggests are meant to be going racing, whether it’s going bonkers fast around rally stages or in wheel-to-wheel battles against other race cars. Manufacturers spend a lot of time and money developing race cars for them to be competitive, sometimes they are but sometimes they are not, but the saddest fate for a race car is one that never actually got race. Here are a few unfortunate race cars that never got to prove themselves on the track

Ferrari F50 GT

The F50 GT was built to compete in the BPR Global GT Series the F50 GT was meant to go up against the likes of the McLaren F1 GTR. It was developed with Dallara and Michelotto and had the 4.7 liter V12 derived from the road car and made 750 hp revving up to an amazing 10,500RPM and only weighed 909kg. The F50 GT lapped Fiorano faster than Ferrari’s 333 SP, so far the F50 GT was shaping up to be quite an incredible race car.

Unfortunately the BPR Global GT Series folded before the car ever had the chance to compete and Ferrari decided to stop the project there and then, only 3 of the 6 planned chassis were built and chassis 02 and 03 were sold with the body, the remaining three tubs were destroyed.

Toyota MR2 (222D) Group S

In 1984 when the FISA announced the possible replacement of Group B with a Group S class, Toyota saw this as an opportunity and they started the project known as 222D. The Group S prototype heavily resembled the MR2 but looks are the only things these 2 cars shared. The 222D was much wider than the MR2 and also didn’t have the pop-up headlights instead having a more conventional set of headlights accompanied by some extra rally lights. A RWD version of the car was developed for tarmac rallies and an AWD for off road rallies. The car was apparently tested with 2 different types of engines; a 2140cc engine and a 2090cc engine which was used in Toyota’s Group B Celica. Power was said to be around 600 to 750hp and the car only weighed 750Kg.

Unfortunately the Group S catergory never happened and the 222D never had a chance to race. Of the prototypes built, many were reportedly destroyed in crash tests and only 2 remain to this day.

Alfa Romeo 164 Procar

Perhaps one of the silliest and craziest race cars ever built is the Alfa Romeo 164 Procar. Aesthetically it looks just like a slightly lowered Alfa 164 with a wing on the back but it’s anything but a normal Alfa 164. This car had a mid mounted V10 which is the only Alfa badged V10 in exsistence. This was built with the help of Brabham who were partnered with Alfa in F1 at that time. The car produced 600hp and had a top speed of 211mph while weighing just 751kg. The reason for all this craziness was because Alfa liked the idea of the single make series that BMW ran with the M1 Procar, which was a support series with F1.

The procar series had stopped with BMW, the reason why Alfa had built this car was to be able to revive the Procar series. But the way that BMW ran the series was by having the M1 procars being run by various different teams. Unfortunately Alfa couldn’t get many teams to join and the car never raced.

Dome F105

As far as an unknown and failed race car goes its tough to beat the Dome F105. When Dome began testing their own F1 car in 1996, suspicions arised as it featured a Mugen-Honda engine, many thought that this was Honda’s return to F1 after leaving in 1992. Goodyear were reluctant to supply the team tires despite having reached an agreement with Dome. This was because Goodyear thought that Dome were working with Japanese company Bridgestone to acquire information about its tires. The F105 had a carbon fibre monocoque and double wishbone suspension.

The car made its testing debut with Marco Apicella and Shinji Nakano in 1996. Unfortunately the only car caught fire at Suzuka, the driver escaped unharmed but the car was destroyed. With lack of funds to be able to build a replacement, Dome’s F1 dreams also went up in flames.

1968 Shelby Turbine Indy Car

In 1968 Carroll Shelby and Ken Wallis, who had previously designed turbine cars for the Indy 500 (and almost won!) came to an agreement to design a turbine powered car to enter the Indy 500 in 1968. The turbine was a GE T-58 Shaft Drive Turbine which produced a staggering 1,325hp. The turbine was so big that the only place for it to go on the car was the side! This was paired with an advanced all wheel drive system to keep all the power under control. The car held a lot of promise, and they had managed to sign F1 world champion Denny Hulme and also Bruce McLaren. Bruce McLaren made his Indy 500 testing debut with the car.

Unfortunately testing was as far as the car managed to get. There were rule changes which mandated much smaller intakes which would severely limit the turbine powered cars. Because of this the Wallis resorted to cheating by having variable air intakes at the front of the car but when Shelby’s engineer found out about this he quit, fearing his reputation and not risking his career. So Shelby decided to pull out the 2 cars from the race and they were never to race again.