R's Meeting 2026! (I think the R33s are starting to be big...)

So friends, apologies for the lack of an update. The usual work excuse, but if you've been following me on LinkedIn and Facebook, you will see that I have been quite busy at NISMO working on expanding our presence overseas.  That's all I will say for now...But meanwhile, the GT-R life continues. As in, this past weekend we had the R's Festival 

Note that they had a photo from last year of me, Craig and Dino on their website this year! (this year, with all the rain I don't think I saw any official looking photographers...)

While it was mostly the same as last year, for some reason it seemed to me that THERE ARE A LOT MORE R33 GT-Rs all of a sudden?

On the way to Fuji Speedway, we stopped off at one of the 7-11s nearby and...

Rare blue one, and the silver one on some classic wheels

Both the blue one and this other silver one were running the R35 brakes!

And then as we pulled into the West Gate at Fuji Speedway:

A LeMans! and a white one in front of it!

As well as this red 400R and this silver one that looks very similar to mine

Once we parked as walked toward the festivities, first we saw this Skyline Japan... wow

And then the transporters used by HKS and Mine's. Note the Mine's transporter license plate has a "33" in it as well...

And then a GT-R democar on a transporter, which was...

yes, another R33 GT-R! 

of course another R33, but this one had an R34 GT-R rear wing. Can't say it looks bad, but I don't think this car ever came off the transporter so maybe Meiku were ashamed of it? :)

First cars on display as we walked from the parking lot was, of course, the Omori Factory cars. Both R33s! Of course the 400R (someday I will drive it!), and the CRS.

And even though I work at Nissan Motorsports & Customizing (NMC - the parent company of NISMO and AUTECH), I swear I had nothing to do with the car selection...

Walking around, I ran into some old friends from Nissan who were passing out flyers for this - 

So these are R35 NISMO prints, as created by Morita-san, the NMC chief designer.  Every NISMO road car - he's the guy behind how those cars look different from the standard car.  Only 35 of these R35 prints will be sold, of course, with a price tag at 230,000 yen, at the upcoming NISMO Festival on December 6.  For each one sold, Morita-san will be on hand to personally sign each print.

Speaking of Morita-san, I found him signing some other artwork at the Kusaka Engineering tent:

A true legend, and consumate gentleman!

I need to get him to autograph something on my Skyline NISMO!

As usual for these kinds of events, there were some talkshows as well - the two I saw featured the actual legends behind the cars, as well as the legendary race car drivers who did battle in the R32, R34 and R35 GT-Rs!

Don't let anyone say they are the father of the R33 or R34 GT-R - here are the real gurus.

This talk show had, left to right, Hiroshi Taguchi (R32 GT-R product specialist); Kozo Watanabe (R33/R34 Chief Engineer); Masatoshi Yoshikawa (R33-R34 chassis/testing chief); Hiroyoshi Kato (Nissan's top test driver); and Motohiro Matsumura (father of the SR20DET engine as well as primary powertrain engineer of the R33/R34 RB26DETT - and ex COO of NISMO - oh and R33 GTR owner).  Just in case you missed it, in my previous post,  I was able to sit down and chat with both Watanabe-san and Matsumura-san.

As for the racing drivers, my buddies Katsura-san and Sunako-san were joined on stage by Keiichi Tsuchiya and Takayuki Kinoshita. I'm sure most of us have seen Kinoshita-san on many, many Best Motoring videos.

I would have to say that Tsuchiya was there just because? But the other 3 did talk about how they used to race the R32, R33 and R34, and how each race car was different. Strangely the background photo for most of the talk was Sunako-san's yellow Prince Tokyo Taikyu race car:

Meanwhile, I was going around meeting with old and new friends:

with Kobayashi-san from MCR (and Ugajin-san from NISMO)

Basically, the 2 guys who built my car - Watanabe-san and Mine's owner Niikura-san!

And then I got to hang out with the race drivers, and was pleasantly surprised to learn that Kinoshita-san is a really, really nice guy!

Connected now, must learn from this guy too.

It was raining pretty hard and I wanted to beat traffic back, so I managed to leave a couple of hours early. But on the way out, I found these:

I know this car...

And then I found this, which was REALLY interesting. Who makes this exhaust?

Close up for research purposes...

Anyway, all this R33-ness got me inspired.  The next day, I picked up my own R33 from the dealer (it seems I might have a faulty G-Sensor? Inconclusive...) and drove home in the rain! (weather has been almost non stop rain these days...)

Super clean here...

And yeah, I am too scared to go fast in the rain when expressway traffic is slowing ahead of me - and I am taking a photo...

So next post?  Don't know but meanwhile here is my car as it is drying off in my garage:

I use a power air dryer thing to fling off most of the water...

Hint - I really need to do something about the mess in the garage. Changes coming soon and I will post here when I can share!

R's Meeting 2025!

So yes folks it has been awhile - sadly no mods to the GT-R really this year, however going to this event DID allow me to meet up with some tuners and shops and yes get some inspiration for at least one project this year.  In additon to a new extra job at Nissan as well as doing most of my driving in the Elgrand, it has been quite a year.

Anyway, some photos...

The banner in front of the stage

My Favorite...

Another angle for you guys.

Then of course I stopped by my friends at Mine's. Only the usual R34 this year.

They were getting ignored so I asked them to open the hood. This attracted a new wave of people!

Can't remember which tuner but those lights are weird.

]

Slightly smaller turbo there

Very clean. A rebuild, I heard.

Have to say very well done.

A 400R is a 400R, Rebuilt or not.

Then it was about time to go. So Dino did his walk in the parking lot, the 34s and 32s were boring so of course I checked out the many R33s there...

Why? Just why???

See what I mean? 34s are boring

Even Dino spent more time with the 33s than usual.

Not sure what was interesting but I guess we will find out on his YouTube video

Rear of that Autech is strange too. I guess being a midnight purple R33 4 Door GT-R didn't attract enough attention?

Not sure if this is a hidden code or something...

Super clean. Super OEM. Super Normal

Saw this red one and then...

...then this one. I prefer this one. More sophisticated red? Burgundy?

Damn this one was barely held together...

this was interesting. The color...

camera does not do it justice. a deep grey but a hint of green?

At Ebina PA

We left early to beat the traffic. On the way back at Ebina PA, saw this yellow thing with a Do-Luck body kit.  Reminded Dino and I to recall that neither of us have seen Ito-san of Do-Luck at any of these GT-R events lately. I guess maybe he's no longer in the GT-R scene?

With no Nismo Festival this year, I guess that was THE event to go to, but it really isn't quite the same. With the Nismo Festival, since there are cars other than GT-Rs there the variety of tuners and people are different, and there is more energy. A shame it got cancelled this year. Hopefully, next year?

In the meantime I am looking for an excuse to drive the GT-R. Maybe soon???