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Datsun/Nissan has one of the most extensive racing heritages in the world. Consider the four IMSA GTP titles lead off by Geoff Brabham; the fabulous Peter Brock/John Morton titles in Trans-Am in the Datsun 510; and Bob Sharp’s successes in Datsun Roadsters. Real fans of the marque will also list the very cool-looking Prince R380s that dominated Group 7 in the 1960s. And just last week, the No. 22 Tequila Patron Nissan won the Continental Tire Road Race Showcase as part of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship round at Road America.

Nissan’s Infiniti division hasn’t been around as long as the Datsun nameplate, but that didn’t stop designers from wondering what it might have been, say, in the 1940s? And what if an open-wheel single seater had been made, and raced, under the Infiniti name and with something of the Infiniti design language? What would that look like? How about Prototype 9?

“(Prototype 9) started as a discussion,” said Alfonso Albaisa, senior vice president, Global Design. “What if Infiniti had created a race car in the 1940s? If one were to imagine an open-wheeled Infiniti racer on the famous circuits of the era, such as Japan’s Tamagawa Speedway, what would that look like? The sketches were stunning and the idea so compelling that we had to produce a prototype. As other departments became aware of this, they volunteered their time to create a working vehicle.”

1936 Datsun Midget Racer

1936 Datsun Midget Racer

Infiniti’s parent company Nissan, under its Datsun name, did create an open-wheel single-seat race car that ran at Tamagawa in 1936, and it didn’t look anything like the sleek, modern expression of speed you see here. It was far more conventional, with a more or less typical-of-the-time bulbous round nose and bulbous, round rear end. We found a photo on www.datsunhistory.com.

Which is not to take away from the idea expressed by the designers of the beautiful retro-new racing roadster you see here and which you can see, alongside a real Prince R380, at the Pebble Beach Concours in a few days’ time. While this car looks to the past for design inspiration, with hand-hammered steel panels beaten into shape by teams of master artisans known as Takumi, it is powered by a futuristic electric drivetrain from Nissan’s Advanced Powertrain Department. The prototype electric motor makes 120 kW, or 148 hp, and 236 lb-ft of torque, which can launch the 1,962-pound car to 62 mph in 5.5 seconds and to a top speed of 106 mph. The lithium-ion battery is 30 kWh, good for 20 minutes of heavy track use. It looks like it would be a blast to drive.

So the only question left to us is: Can we drive it?