The last time I was over at Amuse I saw, probably for the last time, one of the most legendary cars that the late Tanabe-san had every built, the Carbon-R. Tanabe-san wanted to create the ultimate time attack R34 GT-R by taking inspiration from the Super GT R34 GT-Rs. This meant a very responsive and torquey engine and a lot of weigh loss which was achieved through the full dry carbon body and the conversion to rear-wheel-drive. I only saw the Carbon-R in action once at Fuji when Tanabe-san took it out during an Option Magazine track session in 2004. I was always supposed to do a proper shoot on this car but Tanabe-san asked me to wait until he had time to finish it and achieve the times he believed the car was capable of. Other projects ended up taking a lot of his time and the Carbon-R was left on display inside the Amuse shop for years. The Carbon-R has now been sold off to Europe where I'm pretty sure it will end up being properly used. A great car and idea from one of the greatest men in the tuning world.
-Dino Dalle Carbonare