HomeNews and EventsOpel goes from dirt track relic to Hot Wheels finalist

Opel goes from dirt track relic to Hot Wheels finalist

Young couple from Michigan did the restoration work themselves

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A former dirt-track race car has been converted into a show car that took honors recently this at the 2021 Hot Wheels Legends Tour stop in Detroit.

The car, a 1975 Opel Manta, was acquired off Craigslist in 2019 by Joshua Liem and Corrine Currie of Garden City, Michigan. Doing all the restoration work themselves, they transformed the car from a track battered shell into a “Hot Wheels worthy ride” in six months, and doing all the work themselves, according to the Hot Wheels Tour news release.

The car…
… and the couple who restored it

It retains a 1.9-liter 4-cylinder engine and is believed to be one of only 6 Opel Mantas registered in Michigan and one of fewer than 200 in the US.

By impressing the judges in Detroit, the car advances to the national finals this fall, an event that will turn one home-built vehicle into a Hot Wheels toy.

The next regional Hot Wheels Tour stop is scheduled for September 18 in Houston, Texas.

Larry Edsall
Larry Edsall
A former daily newspaper sports editor, Larry Edsall spent a dozen years as an editor at AutoWeek magazine before making the transition to writing for the web and becoming the author of more than 15 automotive books. In addition to being founding editor at ClassicCars.com, Larry has written for The New York Times and The Detroit News and was an adjunct honors professor at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University.

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