The basic proportions of contemporary race cars are every designer’s dream,” enthused von Holzhausen. “Furai is less than 40-inches high but nearly 80-inches wide. (Photo: Marshall Pruett) » More Photos

He continued, "Furai achieves this by purposely blurring boundaries that have traditionally distinguished the street from the track. Historically, there has been a gap between single-purpose racecars and street-legal models - commonly called supercars - that emulate the real racers on the road."

Track cars are, by their competitive nature, ill-suited for practical highway use, as well as generally far from road-legal. Some supercars visit the track on occasion, but they are primarily road cars not properly equipped for racing. The aim of Furai is to bridge this gap.

That said, Mazda neither intends to race Furai, nor is it a supercar the company plans to build and sell in the near future. Rather, Furai is a design study that lives between those extremes. Without the restrictions imposed by serial production models, and with the freedom of an autoshow environment, Mazda is using the opportunity to evolve the company's Nagare design theme one more step closer to reality.

Instead of mimicking racecar components and design elements in a road car – the strategy preferred by supercar manufacturers – the "Mazda way" was to begin this project with the real McCoy: a Courage C65 chassis that earned its stripes during two seasons of LMP-2 endurance racing in the American Le Mans Series (ALMS). This sports car was successfully campaigned under the MAZDASPEED Motorsports Development banner by B-K Motorsports during the 2005 and 2006 seasons. Drivers Jamie Bach, Guy Cosmo, Elliott Forbes-Robinson, and Raphael Matos piloted the car to one victory and a total of nine podium finishes in 15 ALMS events. B-K finished third in championship standings both years; Bach and Cosmo were co-Rookies of the Year in 2005.

"Anticipating future rules changes in the ALMS, we created a new closed cockpit which would be more appropriate for a future production model," said von Holzhausen. "The major element we did not change is the 450-horsepower RENESIS-based R20B three-rotor rotary engine that provides Furai ample Zoom-Zoom. The ultimate Mazda in our minds is rotary powered; as a company, we have no intention of abandoning that valuable asset. When people think of the very best sports cars in the world, the rotary powered Mazda RX-7 is always on that list."



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