THE MAGIC of the LEGENDARY CAN AM
Was Can Am the Camelot of motorsports? It truly was an age of heroic racing machines, now vanished – until the recent sightings of restored Can Am cars at rare vintage racing events, and now again with the NuArt Can Am. While there were other such eras in motor racing history, Can Am was something special, unlike anything else – a noble experiment in minimal regulation and maximum imaginable performance. At the Can Am series’ peak, the cars were almost entirely unlimited. As long as the design was a “sportscar” (meaning it had bodywork covering the wheels and a cockpit with “extra” space that would fit a passenger in addition to the driver). And, providing that the car met certain (somewhat vague) safety requirements of the time, creators were free to try any bold idea they could muster.
Can Am came to mean “anything goes.” Enthusiasts and press would await every event’s surprising new innovations and spectacular record breaking performance. The big block American engines grew to be the most powerful that road racing had ever seen. Body shapes and aerodynamic appendages were unrestricted. Materials? Wheels and tire sizes? Weight?…Build whatever you want. The results, in the best of cases, were the fastest road racing cars on the planet – faster than Formula 1. No wonder that in today’s modern era, where every conceivable detail of a professional competition vehicle is scrutinized by its governing body, and strict rules / restrictions apply to almost every facet of a car’s performance and design -- many folks feel so nostalgic toward Can Am. It was creative, it was out-of-the-box, it was experimental, it was risky in every way, it was technical but not “trick,” it was unpredictable, it was earthshaking!
Alas, those dearly remembered years of the original Can Am didn’t last long; only from 1966 through 1974, until the extremes of Can Am’s costs and performance exploits came to a crossroads with the larger societal matters of fuel conservation, speed concerns, and safety preoccupations of a politicized public. Yet the flame still burns brightly, and always will! Nu Art Can Am is honored and humbled to "carry the torch" with injected 500 cubic inch engines, massive wings and 18 inch slicks running on the finest tracks in North America !