Smokey Nagata & MR GTR at Daikoku
The night wasn’t over yet; we decided, since we were on the outskirts of Tokyo, we would head towards Daikoku. It was a Wednesday night. Still, we had nothing else to do; Thursday was our only day to drop the parts off at the Japanese JDM Distro warehouse, so we had to stick around the greater Tokyo area.
We decided to head into the city and spin about and see how things go. The tolls can get quite expensive around this area. Its lottery numbers to a foreigner as you never quite know the price for each toll road. All three of us were in Japan before, so we weren’t shocked whenever they pulled numbers at us at the toll stations. It could be 60 dollars, and it could be 100.
We spotted this little beauty on a pitstop to get some snacks for the drive into the city.
It’s hard to grasp the size of Tokyo until you start driving into the centre. Urban sprawl for 80k and more, we were going through civilization for over two hours, spinning around various tunnels and roads to see what we could find. We eventually headed across the Yokohama bay bridge, which led directly down into Daikoku,
We missed this before we made sure we didn’t mess it up on this trip. As it’s an expensive mistake, you end up having to pay the toll twice. What we were about to witness would end up being another incredible tale from our trip. If we didn’t document it, people would never believe us.
It was a quiet night at Daikoku, but there was a particular gathering of Skylines right in front of us that caught our attention. It didn’t take long for us to realize that Smokey Nagata and his friends all parked up having a chat. Insanity! What were the chances?
Smokey brought his VR35 powered Skyline from Auto Salon the year previous. My inner teenage fanboy was screaming to come out.
Smokey was the first Japanese automotive celebrity I heard about through old tuning magazines back in the day. His notorious high speed runs in Germany, and the UK were the stuff of legends. Smokey was the first proper famous guy from Japan long before the internet showed us anyone else. And here he was, actually hanging out at Daikoku having a conversation with us. This night was too good to be true.
What made it even funnier is that Smokey showed us his friend Hiroshi Tamura in a Nissan GTR book, telling us how he’s not the one we should be talking to, and pointed over at Hiroshi san. Hiroshi is the main man with the Nissan GTR project, Tamura, one of the founding members of Midnight Club. He’s the top guy for the entire GTR program for the last twenty or so years.
Reuben and the lads having a bit of fun with the camera.
Hiroshi had brought the brand new GTR in Wangan/Bayside blue down to Daikoku. It wasn’t even released yet. Convenient that the Omori Nissan GTR factory is right across the bridge!
Dino from Speedhunters had arranged this meeting for an American media company that was here to shoot a video piece for the new gran Turismo, or so we believed, and we just got fortunate with our timing. There were no other foreigners around, just us and them and the American film crew. Meeting one of our childhood heroes and one of the essential guys at Nissan/Nismo/GTR at the same time, fuck what can I say, the stuff of dreams!
I can’t tell who the rest of the guys were, but I’m sure they were important people, they brought their GTRS too, there was one from every generation all lined up, mates out hanging about in the night chatting about cars, something we can all relate too regardless of age.
This 180sx was lurking at the further end of the car park. The light looked fantastic cast along the side; it was the reflection from the Lawson store they’ve since added to Daikoku.
Across from the 180sx was this insanely good looking Crown Royal Saloon.
What struck me was the fact a young couple was driving it; they had stopped into Daikoku to park up and have a smoke and get some grub.
I wonder if the guy’s dad passed the car onto his son, you rarely see younger kids enjoying this look with their cars.
Every angle was a cool photo; the Focus racing wheels were a nice touch, even if they are replicas.
I bet this Quattro is a rare sight in Japan.
I wish I brought a tripod; there were endless photo opportunities. Daikoku is quite a dark spot.
Tamura san was genuine and approachable, with excellent English, he told us how the bayside blue colour was supposed to be called wangan blue, but they changed the name for the export market. He was hoping to get it back to being called wangan value for the new GTR launch. Man looking back, this was such an experience to be surrounded by these two legends. What did we deserve to get a night like this?
They poked around each other cars for an hour or two while the camera crew drove away with Tamura san in Smokeys car.
We couldn’t get enough of this VR32, the puffed rear arches, the wheels, the sticker placement. Part of me wishes it was gold just because!
Other exciting machines drove in and out of the car park throughout the night. This PA is ground zero for spotting cool cars in the Tokyo area. It never ends.
This island out in the bay, surrounded by roads, is one of the leading export hubs for Japanese cars and a central spot to nurturing the car community around Tokyo, its pretty insane! Traffic buzzed overhead as we had to pinch ourselves numerous times, hoping we didn’t wake up.
As smokey left, he gave us the nod cruising away in the GTR, and that was that. After a pretty insane day of car stuff, the Smokey experience had us depleted. For once, all of us were sweating with excitement! Tamura san hung about for another bit with a few GTR people taking photos.
We had a good chat with Hiroshi about how expensive it is to own a GTR in Ireland. He had noticed no sales out that direction and was asking us why this is the case. We explained our expensive import laws on new cars, which ruins any chance of having something like that on the road.
This Midnight Club Porsche rolled into the PA, the owner checked his tyre pressure and grabbed a drink. I didn’t want to take too many photos, but I grabbed a few before he headed back out onto the highway.
An RX8 date at Daikoku, what a nice backdrop for a night out.
We were on a high. We spent the next hour walking around Daikoku, taking in the sights before deciding it was too late to go anywhere else for the night. We made the call and roughed it in the Alphard at Daikoku, so we would be close to the main roads in the morning to drop off the bonnet and magazines at JDM Distro.
There was endless entertainment at Daikokuya. Anything is liable to come down the offramp, from lowriders to midnight club 911s to completely stock 86’s. Daikoku is a magical place. What a crazy night!