Two doors, 2+2 seating, boxy styling, all-wheel drive, and a turbocharged tower of power under the hood. Does GT-R ownership get any better than this? If you’re Italdesign, the answer is yes. And that answer comes in the form of the 710-hp GT-R50.
Unveiled online prior to its real-life debut at the 2018 Goodwood Festival of Speed, the custom-bodied Godzilla won’t be a one-off for too long according to Nissan. A release published by the Japanese automaker suggests the GT-R50 “could become the blueprint for an extremely limited run of hand-built production vehicles.” How many, you might wonder? No more than 50 units, starting at “about €900,000.”
Based on the GT-R Nismo and created to commemorate the 50th anniversaries of the GT-R and Italdesign, the one-of-a-kind supercar is “a celebration of design, performance, a little indulgence, and a lot of love of historic and future automotive creativity” according to Alfonso Albaisa. The senior vice president of global design at Nissan does mention the prototype and on-road car will differ in the slightest, but then again, what did you expect based on the current regulations?
“The Goodwood Festival of Speed is the ideal setting to showcase the Nissan GT-R50 by Italdesign,” he concluded without saying if the bite-the-back-of-your-hand beautiful Godzilla will drive up that hill(climb) located on Lord March’s domain. Putting on sensible pants on for a second, chances are the ultra-limited supercar with twin-turbo V6 propulsion won’t show what it can do at wide-open throttle.
The GT-R Nismo is rated at 600 PS (592 horsepower) and 481 pound-feet (652 Nm) of torque, and with all due respect to Nissan, even McLaren’s Sports Series is capable of that output in this day and age. The next generation of the GT-R won’t have it easy considering how far supercars have gone thanks to the latest advancements in powertrain technology, but don’t write off the R36 because the R35 is showing its age.
Some people claim 2020 while other go with 2021 as the year of the R36. Depending on who you ask, there are multiple versions of what hides under the skin, though the consensus is that Nissan will go hybrid for the next-generation model.
Another theory that originates from the rumor mill is that the GT-R50 stands in as a preview for a concept that will turn into the R36. With Nissan celebrating the 50th birthday of the GT-R in 2019, it wouldn’t come as a surprise if the concept would be revealed sometime next year.
After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well. Full profile
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