WI Fuji speedway ran counter-clockwise in the 60s?

Continuing my unnatural but understandable man-crush on 60s sports cars, here's a quote from Vic Elford:

"In 1969 I spent two months in Japan doing a test contract for Toyota and their Toyota 7 (5 litre V-8), which along with a big Nissan (6.3 litre V-12), was destined for CanAm. My last testing and then the subsequent Sports Car GP were at Fuji, but the track was run in a clockwise direction. The reason that banking was so horrific, was that at the end of the straight we went over a blind crest at around 190/200 mph and dropped into the banking. At other tracks (Daytona, Monthlery, etc.) you climb up the banking. One of the results was that although there were many brave Japanese drivers there were not too many with great skill and the death toll from that one corner was horrendous. To such an extent that the big Gp 7 cars were then banned in Japan and thus, neither Nissan or Toyota ever made it to CanAm."

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WI the track went the other way? Would there be less fatal crashes, and thus the Toyota 7 and Nissan 381 remain in development/competition and maybe make it out of Japan?

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This is Bob Jane's McLaren M6, fitted with a 5 litre Repco 740; hence the exhausts exiting out the top of the car. Unlike other 'customer' M6s this one wasn't built by Trojan but by McLaren themselves and was shorter than the Trojan car. This particular car raced in Japan in 1971, driven by Peter Harvey.

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This is Frank Matich's SR3 at Riverside Raceway California in 1967. Frank built 2 SR3s and took them to the US, one with an Oldsmobile V8 which he sold to Tony Settember and the other with a 4.4 litre Repco 620 which is one of the earlier versions of the Repco V8. Australia Sports car races were only about 80 miles in duration in the mid 60s, so when faced with the 200 mile Can Am races these cars proved unreliable.

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This is the Matich SR4 with a 5 litre 760 Repco, which differs from the 740 at the top by having quad cams and 4 valves per cylinder. This car was supposed to be for the 1968 Can Am season, following up on the 1967 campaign but was completed too late and missed its 1968 window. After smashing all the competition in the 1969 Sports Car Championship, admittedly a field without much depth, it was retired. It would have been cool to see this car go to Japan.

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Is there any correlation between the direction of race circuits and the handedness of road cars, ie Japan and UK rhd and clockwise, Europe and US lhd and anticlockwise?
 
Most, if not all European road courses run counter-clockwise, while American oval tracks follow the traditional "stand on it and turn left" model.

Burst of stupidity overcame me.. Clockwise, of course.
 
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Australian cars are right hand drive like Britain and Japan and circuits are counter clockwise.

This is one of the Ferrari P4s that were converted into lightweight open top cars for the 1967 Can Am series and then bought to Australia for the 1968 Sports Car season. The spare tyre is one of the often strange CAMS rules.

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Here it is racing one of the 4 Elfin 400s.

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Most, if not all European road courses run counter-clockwise, while American oval tracks follow the traditional "stand on it and turn left" model.

you have this backwards. of the major european circuits, imola is the only counter-clockwise one i can think of.
 
Another nice little niche of the period was the one-off was one of the 4 Elfin 400s fitted with what was called the Cobra V8.

This was a Ford small block fitted with custom made DOHC heads, developed by Kevin Drage of Globe, who made very popular alloy wheels back in the day.

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One hurdle for greater integration between the US, Japanese and Australian sports cars of the period are the CAMS rules which capped Australian Group A sports cars at 5 litres and insisted of carrying a spare tyre. This means the Nissan 831 couldn't race in Australia because of its 6.3 litre V12.
 
Do those two Elfins have slightly different bodywork? The white/red/black one in the color pic looks sleeker.

I think so.


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One had the Ford engine, Bob Jane's had the first customer Repco V8 sold, Frank Matich's had a Traco Olds as did the 4th. These different engines and the option to remove the front 'horns' lead to subtle differences between the cars.

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