It’s been well documented that I have a particular fascination with this Civic. I’ve had the pleasure of following this car from Tokyo all the way to California and every time I see it, I always take a ton of photos of it. Something about how it all comes together is just incredibly intriguing to me. Even the whole concept of Spoon having a turbocharged Civic is a mind-fuck. When Aaron from Spoon Sports USA informed me that he was bringing the car over to the U.S. to compete, I was excited. I never thought that it would actually happen so seeing it run at Buttonwillow was crazy. Not only that, it was incredibly quick and everyone seemed to be genuinely surprised by how well it did. I found myself following the car around for much of the day and below are all the extra photos of it that you didn’t get a chance to see in my previous two posts covering Super Lap Battle. You rarely get to see this car in this much detail and most of you will never get to see it in person so I hope this helps you to get a better grasp of it. I literally had people texting me and calling me after Super Lap Battle because they didn’t believe it ran the times that it did and they wanted to know more about the car, like there was some huge secret about it that no one knew. Honestly, it is what it is… an old time attack vehicle with minimal aero, a turbocharged K20 engine, Motec engine management, and a good driver. It is just an incredibly well-assembled time attack build. In Japan, the car used to have nitrous oxide injection as well but it isn’t allowed here for competition so it was removed. And to end all speculation, this is indeed the old 5Zigen Time Attack FD2 Type R that lapped Tsukuba Circuit in Japan with an incredible, record-breaking 58.222 lap time. As you can see, it has been re-tooled a bit with minor changes, a good amount of maintenance, and a Spoon Sports front fascia.

I’m happy to see it do well in the U.S. and look forward to what the future holds, as the plan currently is for the car to stay here for an extended amount of time. Take a gander at the photos, click on them to see the photos in higher-resolution, and then make sure to watch the uncut on-board video of it at the bottom of the page. Huge thanks to Aaron and Tommy from Spoon Sports USA for making this all happen and especially to Daijiro Yoshihara for providing the rare video footage. Please provide photo credit if you plan to share this anywhere else. Thanks for viewing and enjoy….

The Spoon Sports FD2 in action at Buttonwillow CW13….

Dai Yoshihara getting strapped-in…

The rear of the FD2 with its carbon fiber inner taillight inserts and aggressive canard/diffuser set-up….

Brembo front brakes, Advan race compounds, and 5Zigen wheels…

Carbon fiber rear window insert and rear over fenders…

The FD2 is cowl-less so the motor can be seen from the windshield down….

Old school 5Zigen bucket seat….

Here’s a rare glimpse at the completely-flat bottom of the FD2….

Yokohama Advan racing slicks…

Yoshihara powering the Civic to an impressive 01:48 lap time…

The trunk has no hinges and is actually held down with pins for easy removal…

Inside is the filler neck for the custom fuel cell…

Aaron fills the Civic with race fuel as Yoshihara looks on…

Aaron making sure the trunk is aligned as he re-installs it after fueling-up….

Aaron and Dai chat before his final session…

The Spoon FD leaving the pits….

You can see the door is still its OEM white finish but is completely gutted for weight-savings….

The repaired front splitter came apart and ultimately ended their day at GTAxSLB….

As promised, here is the exclusive uncut clip of the Civic in action at GTAxSLB thanks to Daijiro Yoshihara. You previously saw a short snippet of this footage from my Vlog covering the event. The camera shifted so the video is not perfect but as far as I know, this is the only onboard footage of this car in action to-date…

If you want to see even more of this Civic including engine bay shots and more, make sure to check out the link below to see older photos of it when I visited Spoon Sports/Type ONE earlier this year…

The Chronicles 2014 Japan Trip Coverage… Part 9: A Visit To Spoon Sports And Type One…