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Chris Watson’s custom made Mazda MX-5 is now a finalist to become a fully fledged Hot Wheels release.
A homebrew, custom built Mazda MX-5 from Northland could soon be coming to a toy aisle near you in pint-size Hot Wheels form.
This wild looking MX-5 – nicknamed The Cyberpunk – has been crowned by the model car giant as its winner of the Australasian leg of the Hot Wheels Legends Tour, qualifying it as a finalist to be this year’s outright Legends Tour winner.
Built in a shed in Northland by Chris Watson, the MX-5 was inspired by a combination of Japanese ‘Kaido Racer’ car culture and the gritty, futuristic open-world video game Cyberpunk.
This year marked the second year that Watson entered his pride and joy into the Legends Tour competition, having previously been a regional finalist in 2021’s iteration of the comp – beaten by the Mazda 616 Capella of Mark Strawbridge.
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The full-width rear light bar is one of Watson’s more recent additions.
Kaido Racer culture, similar in some ways to Japanese ‘Bosozoku’ culture, takes influence from the wide-bodied era of touring car racing known as Group 5, where cars wore enormous and complex body kits and colourful paint schemes.
“Everything on this car has been hand made by me in my shed in rural Northland New Zealand,” said Watson.
“I started out by designing the ‘Kaido Racer’ inspired fender flares along with my own 15x10j turbofan wheels. From here I’ve been constantly evolving it over the years and the latest additions have been the custom fastback and carbon fibre shark fin spoiler and the cyberpunk rear light bar.”
From here, Watson’s MX-5 will face off against other Hot Wheels Legends Tour winners from around the world. The outright winner, judged by a range of Hot Wheels designers and high-profile voices from the car community, will be replicated as a real life Hot Wheels car.
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‘Mad Mike’ Whiddett, pictured with his Lamborghini Huracan drift car (a car that’s already been released as a Hot Wheels car).
Formula Drift Japan champ ‘Mad Mike’ Whiddett, his son Lincoln, Australian Rally Championship title winner Molly Taylor, visual artist Jesse Wright (better known as JESWRI), and Hot Wheels designer Kevin Cao were amongst the judging panel.
“I love it,” said ‘Mad Mike’ Whiddett.
“The fact that the MX-5 is such an attainable car in real life shows the way you can execute things, with the basic tools, in your shed. It just makes it enjoyable and makes people smile.”
“I would definitely pick this off the shelf if it was a Hot Wheels,” added Mad Mike’s son, Lincoln – himself a racer in his own right, and a fellow Hot Wheels ambassador.
“It’s very creative and I’ve never seen anything in that style. We’ve seen this before on Hot Wheels Legends Tour, it’s definitely changed since I saw it, it’s evolved. I really like the Cyberpunk feel.”
“It speaks to a whole new generation of car enthusiasts and drives two audiences: the hardcore car people and the gamers and sci-fi movie fans too,” added Cao.
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Watch the Mazda RX-Vision GT3 in (virtual) action in the PlayStation 4 game Gran Turismo Sport.
Should it go all the way, Watson’s MX-5 won’t be the first MX-5 with local flavour to have made it to Hot Wheels stardom. MX-5s driven by Mad Mike Whiddett and son Lincoln have both already been immortalised in miniature.
Past Legends Tour winners include an English-built Volvo P1800 ‘Gasser’ drag car, a wide bodied 1970 Pontiac Firebird, a Mazda Scrum kei monster truck, and a highly modified Nash Metropolitan called the ‘Nashole’.
Watson already has another project in the pipeline; a wide-body Nissan Stagea wagon with a front-end R35 GT-R conversion.
