There are hundreds of cars on the floor of the 2016 LA Auto Show for consumers to admire with the hope of perhaps buying and driving them home one day. That will not be an option with the latest reveal from Mazda.
With a name like a Star Wars droid and an outline looking just as futuristic, the new RT24-P greeted the racing world in Los Angeles before heading out to challenge on the track. While it’s on its way to the world of professional competition, you can see echoes of Mazda’s consumer design language in the racing machine.
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Some automakers are known for serviceable, affordable cars. Others are known for high-priced luxury makes or hard-ratcheted sport performance machines. Mazda’s identity resides in stylized consumer cars dedicated to the fun of driving.
A huge part of their aesthetic is KODO Design (“Soul of Motion”). Its marked by sweeping lines and muscular haunches and fenders. You can see some of those very lines in the RT24-P along with the recognizable five-point Mazda grille on its nose.
The two-car Mazda RT24-P Prototype factory race team will be managed by the Florida-based SpeedSource Race Engineering group. The car will make its debut in that very state at the Rolex 24 – the day-long endurance race at Daytona International Speedway in January.
The RT24-P uses a Riley Mk. 30 chassis and will be powered by the Mazda MZ-2.0T engine. That 2.0 liter, inline four-cylinder turbocharged power plant puts out about 600-horsepower.
The Mazda RT24-P name takes its names from the Mazda Road to 24, a driver development program that “provides scholarships to help championship-winning drivers progress from grassroots into the upper categories of professional sports car racing.” The “24” represents the two-liter, four-cylinder race engine, while the “P” is for Prototype.
The car will remain on the floor of the L.A. Auto Show all week.
