- What's going on guys?
It's Alex from Fitment Industries
and today we're talking about Turd.
(laughing)
Hey guys, what's going on,
it's Alex from Fitment Industries,
and today we're talking about Turd.
Depending on how you,
how many vowels you'd like to pronounce it,
or consonants if that's your thing,
that's what we're here to do today.
And by the way we're doing a wheel giveaway with Klutch.
I'm waiting for Dakota to jump out behind me,
and there he is.
So if you wanna have a chance to get entered in to win,
you just pick up one of these sick T-shirts.
Look at how happy Dakota is.
He's happy, I'm happy,
now you're happy.
So let's talk about Turd.
Since we've covered Mugen,
we decided to cover another OEMish brand,
which is the Turd.
So Turd is Toyota's in house Motorsport preparation
and road car tuning department.
Say that five times fast.
(sped up voice)
Born in 1976, its roots go all the way back
to what 20 years previous when Toyota
made their entry into competitive Motorsport.
I bet you didn't actually know
that Toyota was the first Japanese car manufacturer
to compete in Motorsport.
It's literally just a bunch of Toyotas.
Just them, nobody else.
Don't even invite anybody else.
Knowledge.
- Knowledge.
- It all started around Australia in 1957
right smack dab in the middle of the recovery
of the recession due to World War II.
They were only exporting a few hundred vehicles at the time
and most of those in Japan couldn't afford
to buy them anyway.
So one could say that Motorsport
wasn't really in Japan's top priority at the time.
Couple things happening around that time frame.
But Toyota was like, you know what,
let's just send it, you know?
Japanese consulate in Australia made the request
before a ministry of Japanese auto manufacturers
to compete and Shotaro Kamiya,
who was the president of Toyota at the time,
was like yeah.
I mean he actually said something
way more wisdomy like,
like there will be no progress if you feel failure.
Which is way, just philosophical right there.
Under the umbrella of Toyota Technocraft,
Toyota's new bodywork department,
their new Motorsport branch,
Toyota Sports Corner, or TOSCO,
which is not to be mistaken with COSTCO,
made its way into the world.
And their first task was to prepare production
Toyopet Crown Deluxe model for a 19 day endurance contest
in the good ol' Australia.
Australia mate.
I don't even know how to do an Australian accent.
Does anybody over here know how to do an Australian accent?
Nobody?
(camera flash)
Now the TOSCO had dug their feet in
actually started to gain some traction
and they decided to start preparing cars
for the inaugural Japanese Grand Prix in 1963.
Not only was Toyota excited about their successes,
but Motorsports started to become more popular around Japan
and 150000 people ended up showing up for the Grand Prix.
The event consisted of 11 races
from touring cars to GT cars
and they were all divided into categories
based on their engine sizes
and all of that sort of really good exciting stuff.
And guess what?
Both of the Toyotas that were entered in,
they won.
TOSCO then began to construct the legendary TOYOTA 2000 GT
by Yamaha Motor Company, which was a subsidiary
that was underneath their name.
They entered that car into the 1966 Japanese Grand Prix
and came out in third place.
That actually didn't stop them from competing,
but apparently I can't get placed third
without being told that basketball isn't for me.
From there the 2000 GT gained popularity
when they developed two convertible versions
for a James Bond film You Only Live Twice.
Meanwhile, other 2000 GTs were prepared
for many endurance races
throughout the 66 and 67 year timeline
and one of them set three new speed records.
The car averaged 128 miles an hour
while it was running for 78 consecutive hours.
After all the success the 2000 GT,
TOSCO and Yamaha ended up teaming up once again
to build their first race car together, the Toyota 7.
Now before we go any further into history,
I just want you guys to know what like the Toyota 7
looked like, bam!
Boom.
Look at it.
This wing is the size of Texas.
It's awesome.
Although it was quite powerful at the time,
it just didn't have quite enough
to compete with Porsche and Chevrolet powered cars.
So the next year, they pretty much were like
you know what, we're gonna, we're just gonna YEET it,
we're gonna YEET the old engine out
and we're slap a five O V8 in there
and hell yeah brother.
You know, they learned from the boys
over across the pond there what to do.
The Toyota 7 then placed third in the 69 Grand Prix,
but that was still not enough for TOSCO.
They then again ripped the five O out of the car in 1970
and slapped a big old Twin Turbskies engine in there,
which ended up securing a place in histories
as the world's first turbo engine racing car words.
But there is a twist in the story,
because the emissions policies
and changing specifications for the Grand Prix.
Racing meant that the latest Toyota 7
never actually got to race competitively.
1973 has now rolled around
and you know what came with it?
The international oil crisis.
Seriously, great time.
It was a really good time for cars.
Because of this, many manufacturers
suspended all Motorsport activities,
because of the oil crisis.
But with Toyota being Toyota
and doing Toyota things,
they decided to just keep going,
but focus on development in the touring car field,
instead just the Motorsports stuff,
which actually ended up bringing them huge success
in the Fuji 1000 kilometer race
with the Celica Turbo.
This crisis was actually instrumental
in the decision to produce official performance parts
for the road car market.
Because they opened up this new sales avenue,
they wanted to appeal to a larger market.
So they renamed COSTCO,
I mean TOSCO,
to Toyota Racing Development,
which is what we all know and love,
for the most part, today.
However their intentions and mission remain the same.
They just wanted to expand Toyota's Motorsport activities
across the world and develop
and sell Motorsport derived performance accessories.
One of their key strategies
was to make a second base in the good ol' North America.
Thus, TRD USA was born in 1979.
It was actually set up as a division
that would operate almost autonomously
with full engine design development.
Alright, now that we've made our way
to the 80s, Walkmans were all the rage,
kids were sleeping with those slap braces things
on their wrists
and brains were melting from the difficulty
of the Rubix Cube.
It was just a tough time.
Lots of other R-rated things were happening around there,
but we prefer monetization.
Most of TRD's support in the 80s came
from private teams and club racers.
It wasn't long after that that Toyota started popping up
in everything from Group B Rally, Group C Sports Cars,
Group A Touring Cars as well,
the Super Turbo was super successful with Group A,
while Corollas and Celicas weren't doing too bad
in the World Rally Championships.
Pretty much Toyota was all over the place.
They were just YEETing and sending it,
they were doing all the cool trendy words
that you would want to hear,
because we are trendy.
We are, we know the words.
Actually, everyday Eric teaches me a new word of the day.
Eric, Eric, Eric, what's the word of the day?
- Whoa, whoa, whoa, it's boppin season, bop.
- Before they knew it, it was the 90s,
which was lucky for TRD,
it was their golden age, you know?
The TRD Japan, the Toyota Racing entered
into Group C1 Endurance Racing,
which they entered in the Toyota 90C
slash V a carbon fiber racer with like a three two V8 heart.
It was a very interesting thing
and many 90C-Vs took part in a ton of races across Japan
Across the pond in the good ol' US of A,
Toyota decided to sponsor the Atlantic Championship,
which was a Formula Racing series
in the open wheel category.
TRD supplied their high end performance 1.6 liter,
four cylinder, kit engine, 16 valve cylinder heads
for the series specifically.
There is so much knowledge happening right now.
This sponsorship actually lasted through 2005
and now the engines that they were supplied
are in hugely high demand.
Throughout the 2000s, TRD continued to participate
in race after race and, along with winning many of them,
they produced a few different race cars
that had the basis of a Supra or an MR2.
TRD actually offered some of these race car kits
as factory options for those that purchased
the car just right off the lot.
And now they're probably some of the most rare
and some of the most expensive JDM vehicles
out on the market today.
And if you're going out on Google
or Ebay right now to find it out,
they're really only offered in Japan.
So if you wanna get your hands on one, good luck.
While TRD Japan had been doing
incredibly well for themselves,
TRD USA wasn't really having the same luck.
However they also started to see some growthish in the 90s,
which was really crucial for them
to kind of stay afloat.
This was when you started seeing those V8 Tundras
and V8 Camrys in the NASCAR series
and they won the Indy 500 in 2000.
So that was pretty neat.
From there, they continued to dig
into more races and continued
to do pretty well for themselves,
which pushed the production on the TRD badges
all over the US,
which is still happening today.
You can and could pretty much get a TRD version
of any of their performance vehicles
or most popular vehicles.
Lately, we've been seeing a lot of TRD trucks
and SUVs like the Forerunner and Tundra,
because Toyota hasn't had really
a performance production car for quite a long time.
That is, until the new Supra came out
and then the whole world almost came crashing down.
So what's the future for TRD?
Well we're not really sure.
Yet we've been seeing some bits
and pieces already come from the Supra from TRD,
which is pretty exciting to see.
Like some fancy wheels,
some carbon fiber aero pieces.
Well, I mean, at least just for the Japanese market.
So who knows.
Maybe TRD will get their paws on the new Supra
and make their own addition,
because that would be pretty exciting.
If you've managed to make it this far
and you didn't get upset at me
saying TRD turd a couple times,
well I'm sorry there bud.
It just sometimes it just happens.
Anyway, I'm Alex from Fitment Industries
and if you guys are looking to win a free set
of wheels, all you need to do
is check out the description link below.
I'm waiting for Dakota to sprint back out here
so he can show you the sweet shirt
that you have to pick up.
Anime running.
See it's pink.
It's very cool, you can pick up a T-shirt
description link below,
get your chance entered in to win free set of Klutch wheels.
Wow, I'm Alex from Fitment Industries,
let us know in the comment section below
what you want to see us cover next guys.
We hope you enjoyed this video.
We will see you later, peace.