“Kei” or “lightweight” cars are ubiquitous in Japan. Everywhere you go there’s at least a hundred of them scattered around the place either in small truck form doing deliveries or little vans and hatchbacks getting from A to B. It’s not often you seem them modified past a new set of lowered springs, an exhaust and a set of wheels. Maybe even a body kit if the owner is feeling adventurous. 

Head to the circuit though and you get to see some real modifications! I tried not to expect very much when venturing out to Central Circuit this time, it was my first ever Kei car event and I’ll be honest with you… Kei cars are just a tad too cute for my liking. I’m quite open minded though and I’ll give all the time in the world to Japanese car enthusiasts in  order to see exactly what is so special to them about Kei cars. This event in particular, the Kansai area round of the K-Car Special magazine sponsored 3 hour endurance race and “super battle”, had a huge variety of cars from fully modified race cars to fully modified trucks!

As it turned out I was late for the Super Battle event and due to a minor emergency at home, had to leave just after the 3 hour endurance race started! There were a few cars entered into the Super Battle class which were running full slicks and lots of downforce which looked almost like overkill on the tiny Cappuccinos and Copens. The Super Battle is an eight lap time attack race and open to Kei cars with unlimited modifications and slick tires. Garage Takeoff’s EA11R Cappuccino is somewhat of a legend in this class having dominated the event over the last 5 years… but more on that in another article.

The Super Battle was won by Take Off once again after securing pole position during qualifying. All twelve cars in the field completed the 8 laps in around the 12 minute mark with the Take Off Cappuccino finishing with a 12?02.2. The fastest lap in qualifying was a 1?28.072… to put that into perspective, the AKBAL HCR32 Skyline race car’s best lap at Central Circuit is a 1?24.3. So these Kei cars aren’t exactly slow! The competition between drivers is also very fierce with most of them willing to swap paint during aggressive overtaking maneuvers at the last hairpin before the main straight. As mentioned I missed the majority of the 3 hour endurance race so I don’t know who won but I can say that the field was huge with over 30 cars and the first few laps were very entertaining with the field staying bunched up and plenty of overtaking happening… it was almost comical at some points! 

So with what turned out to be a day cut short, it was still an enjoyable event with the guys from Take Off and their race queens “Ecchan” (???) and “Amigo” (???). Yoshida-san from Take Off was very curious as to why a foreigner would be interested in Kei cars if there weren’t any available in overseas markets other than SE Asia. I informed him that the Daihatsu Copen was sold in Australia as far as I knew and that it’s possible (although uncommon) to see used imports like the Suzuki Alto Works getting around. Still he was happy to see some international interest in their Kei cars and even sent one of their drivers over to pose with one of the girls. Ecchan even posted a photo of myself and friend Jeremy posing with them on her blog! They were so friendly I hope we can meet up with them again sometime.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 22nd, 2009 at 6:51 am and is filed under Kei. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.