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1,000 HP Toyota Celica Loses a Wheel While Drag Racing

The world of project cars sometimes likes to show us that you can teach an old dog new tricks, especially if you take it down the restomod route. Case in point, the Toyota Celica in the video below, which has become a drag strip monster.
1,000 HP Toyota Celica Loses a Wheel While Drag Racing 1 photo
Photo: YouTube screenshot
The 1975 Celica has learned a thing or two from the fourth-generation Supra, with the first getting the latter's infamous 2JZ heart. Packing forged pistons and a monstrous turbo, the straight-six delivers around 1,000 hp, just about enough power to put on a massive show during the 1,320 feet stunts.

This Celica got its shakedown straight at the TX2K16 drag racing event in Texas, but such brutal introductions are not without their risks. In this case, it meant the Toyota lost one of its rear wheels during a violent take-off.

The piece of footage below allows us to see the lug nuts flying off as if they were pieces of carrot sliced by a famous chef - speaking of action, the driver of this Toyota does have quite an effort to make, as the machine packs a six-speed manual.

Nevertheless, the Toyota melange managed to showcase its potential before its unfortunate three-wheeler transformation. The clip shows the Toyota duking it out with a heavily tuned Nissan GT-R and showing an Audi R8 who's boss, among others.

In case you're wondering about the quarter mile performance, so far the machine pulled a 10.21s run, but the start of the respective run could've been better, so we can expect the beast to reach the 9s arena once the issue mentioned above is fixed and the driver gets to know the car better, being able to perform that perfect launch all clutch users lust for.

We're looking forward to seeing this contraption returning to the drag strip soon and we have a feeling we won't be kept waiting for too long.

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About the author: Andrei Tutu
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In his quest to bring you the most impressive automotive creations, Andrei relies on learning as a superpower. There's quite a bit of room in the garage that is this aficionado's heart, so factory-condition classics and widebody contraptions with turbos poking through the hood can peacefully coexist.
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