Police Cars Extravaganza - Part 6: The Police of the Rising Sun

In the mid-1970s, Japan introduced a national regulation requiring all vehicles sold domestically (JDM – Japanese Domestic Market) to be limited to a maximum speed of 112 mph (180 km/h) via a speed governor. In 1988, an additional gentlemen's agreement among members of the Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association (JAMA) imposed a power limit of 286 horsepower on all new cars sold.

However, as often happens, bans and limitations had the opposite effect in Japan as well. Indeed, in the late 1980s, illegal racing started flourishing around Tokyo, organized by a secret underground group known as the Mid Night Club. Members were street racers who met every Saturday night on the "Wangan-sen" (also known as the "Bayshore Route"), a 70-kilometer stretch of highway along the coastline, part of the "Shuto Expressway" network. Here, high-speed races took place using heavily modified vehicles. To combat this phenomenon, the Japanese police began recruiting increasingly powerful and unusual vehicles to match the tuned monsters of the Mid Night Club, capable of achieving astronomical speeds.

Let's explore some of the most significant examples.