It was the end of the Second World War. The Japanese war machine was dismantled and the country was in ruins after the atomic bombs were dropped.
The Japanese economy needed to recover so factories which were dedicated to producing weapons of war turned to manufacturing farm equipment trucks and cars.
One such company was the Tachikawa Aircraft Company which during the war manufactured the infamous Zero fighter. After the war ended the company went into manufacturing automobiles and in 1952 changed its name to The Prince Motor Company.
Prince turned out many successful designs but little did anyone know that it would be the beginning of a legend.
The prince motor company in 1957 introduced a midsized luxury sedan known as the Skyline.
In 1966 The Prince Motor Company merged with Nissan-Datsun and in 1969 The Nissan Skyline GTR was born.
February 4th 1969 was a historic day for it marked the release of the Nissan PGC 10 Skyline GTR.
It was based of a luxury sedan but under the hood it had a 2L 160hp power plant.
Known commonly as the hakosuka(hako is box and suka is short for skyline in Japanese) for its boxy four door design.
By the time the C-10 reached retirement, it had 33 victories under its belt in a period of less than 18 months.
With the release of the coupe this number reached 52 by 1972. Out of which 49 were consecutive wins.
This was the first Japanese car to truly defeat its European counterparts and come close to outperforming the legendary Porsche 911.
The next iteration of the GTR, the c110 came out in 1972 and was not much different than its predecessor and had the same engine. In fact it is rumoured that it was only produced to get rid of the leftover engines from the previous model.
Nissan never raced this model and 1973 was the last year of its production.
The world would not see a new skyline GTR for nearly 16 years.
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