1967 Toyota-Shelby 2000GT sells for $2.5M

[JohnK]

Fascinating history on this cool car.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/04/business/toyota-shelby-2000gt/index.html

[J R Jones]

John, There is more history here, Shelby's Toyota program failed, partly due to fateful management decisions.
The Toyota contract was for more than a $million. Despite that windfall, Shelby fired Pete Brock and John Morton.

Not taking that laying down, Brock put together his own SCCA CP program with Nissan and John Morton driving; the famous BRE racing team.

https://bre2.net/the-racing/datsun/

Brock/Morton beat Shelby at his own game throughout the West Coast Division. Shelby's "plan B" sent the Toyota team into the midwest to aquire points in other divisions.
A spiteful Brock got wind of the plan and sent his team to vanquish the Toyotas where ever they raced. Morton/Brock won the National title.

In the seventies we were racing a Celica in the SCCA Central Division with dealer backing and subtle help from Toyota in CA. We proposed a 24 hour Daytona car to Toyota for the next season.
The plan was eventually rejected by upper management still bitter from spending $3M (not sure about the number) with Shelby and getting no ROI.
jim

[JohnK]

Wow - fascinating history! Thanks Jim.

[JohnK]

Jim, I was intrigued by your story as I'd never heard this before so I did a little googling and came across this article. Someone getting the best of ol' Carroll Shelby is not something you hear about very often.

https://www.lacar.com/reports/how-peter-brock-and-john-morton-connected-with-datsun

[J R Jones]

John, Thanks, more detail than I was aware of. I liked John M. in the 2.5 ltr Trans Am series, the "three box sedans" were fast and entertaining.
There is often heros and drama in an organization that is not apparent to the public. The charismatic guys get all the attention.

You may have seen this attached to the Low Volume Manufacturers thread:
https://www.thedrive.com/news/43994/this-japanese-shop-is-building-2jz-powered-toyota-2000gt-replicas

jim

[JohnK]

Thanks for that Jim. I read the article linked in the low volume thread but didn't catch that. I have a growing appreciation for the JDM cars. There was some pretty cool stuff going on in that era that has seemingly gone largely ignored in the US. It wasn't until I started watching the "JDM Legends" series on Motortrend TV that I started to appreciate some of those quirky-cool cars.

[KDubU]

I saw this Toyota a couple days ago at the event on the island. When I first saw it from a distance I thought it was a coupe.