The winner of the All-American Women's Sports Car race, driving a Datsun Fairlady SP213.
The first hint that Nissan Motor Corporation in the USA were interested in American racing was
back in 1962 when they allowed a mechanic at one of their West Coast Datsun dealerships a limited
amount of funding to race the first Fairlady Roadster, the SPL212.
This mechanic, Jean LePlant, was one of the first to take a US Datsun past the checkered flag,
with a win at the Palm Springs airport 1963. Le Plant and Benny Ackermann modified a SPL212
roadster with a 1300 cc engine for the race, took it to the track, and ran it by themselves
without the benefit of a pit crew. They continued to do this for several years, with a
succession of different cars.
1967 was also the year that Mr. K and Nissan Exec Lee Wylie recruited Dick Roberts, a Porsche
racer and mechanical engineer from Colorado, to head up their official competition department.
Roberts had spent 1966 towing his Datsun racecar 70,000 miles to compete in 34 different events.
Dick Roberts and 5 other employees, became the competition department. Roberts decided that
Datsuns competition department was going to make it easy for the average guy to race his Datsun.
He wanted owners to be able to walk into any Datsun dealership, or make a phone call, and have
all the parts they needed off the shelf, or as soon as possible. And it wasn't just about
parts; anyone could call the competition department and get top rate technical advice.
Roberts philosophy, and that of Nissan USA, was that while it was great if the factory team
won, it was just as great if the privateer racer won in a Datsun. You let the little guys have
the parts and knowledge, and you'll have Datsuns winning everywhere, not just at the big factory
marquee events. At its peak, the department was taking over 100 phone calls a day, many of them
handled by Dick Roberts himself.
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Left to right Lee Wylie, Dick Roberts, and Tom O'Connor of Nissan's competition department
Other than supporting the roadster cause, one of their first projects was the new 510 sedan
with its new overhead cam L series engine. They imported SSS heads and other parts from Japan,
and used their considerable combined racing and engineering experience to come up with innovative
modifications. The parts developed early on would be put to use with much success later on in
the early Z cars.
"The Roadster Cause"
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Beginning of the American Datsun racing era