Racecar Livery, the Function Behind the Form

Personally, my goal is to build the cars that those other guys “hunt.” The greater the strength of a racecar's visual appeal combined with the significance of its accomplishments, the more exposure it will get. The more exposure that the racecar receives, the more exposure our partners receive. This is the kind of win-win relationship I’m looking for.

In this game, only Dave Coleman can have an all primered car and make it look good. The rest of us mere mortals have to try harder.

This is an example of how not to represent your partners well. I swore I would never be the guy who showed up in a flat black, primered out car like we did at Speed Week last year. The only thing that is worse though, is not showing up at all. Ugly, yet proven fast is still better than just plain ugly.

Project 240 LSR was in pretty rough shape when we first brought her home. Our friend, Omar Cornejo, did most of the prep work before we had it painted.

Admittedly, a paint job combined with the addition of livery can cost a pretty penny. Though, my hypothesis is that both paint and livery should be viewed as a marketing expense or a means to an end. In other words, if properly leveraged, paint and livery should pay for themselves. In the case of Project Land Speed Racer, it clearly has.

Once painted Imola red, the installation of Project 240SX Land Speed Racer’s livery was professionally executed by 270X and Garage Graphics in Huntington Beach, California.

From the extensive “roll call” of companies listed on Project 240SX Land Speed Racer 240SX, we've obviously been busy securing some pretty strong partners. As a result, we have a pretty cool list of parts to feature in upcoming months. Perhaps my hypothesis can now be considered a theory since it has been successfully demonstrated? Regardless, we have some exciting things coming up this year.

Sharing the same name as the racing circuit in Italy where Ayrton Senna met a tragic end, BMW ”Imola” red has some interesting ties with motorsport's history.

Amongst some of the upcoming build features, will be a new turbo system featuring components from Borg Warner, Turbo Smart, and Full Race Motorsports. We’ll also be covering the build of a trick, rather unorthodox engine designed by yours truly and brought to fruition by Nick Hunter of 5523 Motorsports.

Before all that though, we are going to play a quick game of catch up and fill you in on the “Hail Mary” build story behind last year’s adventure to Bonneville.