Holden Torana GTR-X

I don't exactly understand why I'm so interested in vehicles that didn't make it, but I feel it has something to do with hindsight.

And feeling correct, which is terrifically easy with the benefit of hindsight.

In period, the decision to not produce this svelte Holden Torana GTR-X coupe was probably cut-and-dried. General Motors and its subsidiaries ran the numbers, looked at the car and market, and decided that it wouldn't enter production. I'm sure a fair number of people were gutted with that decision, enjoyed a comforting steak dinner with their consoling families, and moved on.

“If they had given it a chance!” people will say…with the benefit of hindsight.

In the case of the Holden Torana GTR-X, try to contain your hindsight bias when considering how perfect this car was (and remains) as a unicorn.

Here in the nosebleed seats and two oceans away, it seems like Australian carmakers (past tense) preferred to copy trends from Asia before looking toward Europe or the U.S.

Whether or not a warning shot across the bow of Japan’s burgeoning sports car scene (or a Euro runaway stuck in Brisbane barista limbo), the Torana GTR-X looks to me most like the love child between a Maserati Ghibli and Toyota 2000GT, complete with a pair of boomerang tail lights that I hope was in tribute to Aboriginal Australians.

The Torana GTR-X wasn't a muscle car, owing to its straight-6 engine. And it wasn't European, because by then, all of the serious swoopy Eurosleds were mid or rear-engined. 

You may think that the front view of the car looks similar to that of a Lancia Stratos, Maserati Khamsin, or first generation Mazda RX-7, but the Holden appeared three years before the production Stratos, four before the Khamsin, and eight before the RX-7.