This BMW 1600 race car that was built by Auto Sport by JIRI in the summer of 1972. It was originally campaigned by Dave Nicholas and John Magee with a beautiful yellow/black Alpina style livery with pig cheek fender flares front and rear in 1971.
Unfortunately, during the first race of the 1972 season at Lime Rock for Trans-Am U2.5 Championship, the left rear stub axle broke, sending the car rolling off the track. It was destroyed. The team got a used 1968 2002 from another dealer and stripped it. They took everything possible off the wrecked race car. Fortunately, the engine, transmission and most of the suspension pieces were fine. There was no time to redo the pig cheek body work, so the team applied bolt on flares. They removed the roof, cut the roll cage out of the wrecked car, and put it in the new one. The Auto Sport by JIRI Team did two races at the end of the 1972 season with the original 1600 motor. There was a weight reduction benefit if they used the smaller 1.6-liter engine but the loss of power over the 2.0 liter was apparent, so a larger motor was built and installed before the 1973 race season.
In 1973 they had an extremely fast and reliable car. The team won 3 races, finished strong in another 3 and won the IMSA Camel GT under 2.5-liter championship (both manufacturer and drivers' championship).
The same race car was gently restored by the original driver, Dave Nicholas, and can be seen at vintage races on the East Coast and Midwest.
(Photo by Dave Nicholas at Lime Rock in 1973)