The Gnarliest Racecars That Have Gotten Banned

Innovation is one of the key factors that every motorsport discipline needs to stay competitive. Without designers creating groundbreaking cars, races would quickly become dull, and new motorsport legacies could never be created. However, new technical advances are not always welcomed by race organizers. Some of these innovations are seen as too effective, giving one team an unfair advantage over their opponents. Some are simply considered too dangerous, with the potential gain in speed not worth the added risk to the lives of competitors, fans, or both.

Whatever the reason they were booted out of racing, there are plenty of cars that got banned before they could really demonstrate their true potential. From rallying to NASCAR, every discipline has its fair share of controversial car bans, leaving fans to wonder how the sport would have progressed if these exceptional race cars were allowed to continue competing. A few managed to find a second life in another racing series or as collectors' items, but most of them simply ended up consigned to the history books.

The Mosler Consulier GTP might not have looked good, but it was brutally fast. Developed by Warren Mosler, a former hedge fund executive who set up his own car company in 1985, the Consulier GTP was unlike any other American car of its era. It sported a monocoque chassis, a lightweight carbon-kevlar body, and a small 2.2L four-cylinder engine that made 175 horsepower in stock form. The original idea was to make a production run of up to 200 road cars per year, while the racing variant of the car competed in IMSA events. However, after two dominant wins at Lime Rock and Laguna Seca in 1991, IMSA slapped the car with a large weight penalty before eventually banning it from competition entirely.

To add to Mosler's woes, the road car struggled to find buyers due to its high asking price and questionable looks. It's thought that only 83 examples of the car were ever built before it was axed in 1996. If that wasn't enough, Warren Mosler had also publicly attacked the editors of Car and Driver magazine, who had claimed that a stock Corvette was faster than the Consulier GTP. Mosler claimed that the magazine had used a worn-out example of his car for testing, but the negative publicity that the back-and-forth generated no doubt exacerbated the car's sales failure. Examples are rare to find today, but one appeared on Bring A Trailer in 2018, selling for $55,000.

The only six-wheeled car to ever compete in Formula 1, the Tyrrell P34 initially proved to be very competitive. Almost every other car on the grid at the time was using the same engine, transmission, and tires, making it tricky to find a truly game-changing advantage. Derek Gardner, the designer of the P34, went back to an old idea he'd had when working on an IndyCar design — perhaps six wheels were better than four. The idea turned out to work very well, as the two smaller front wheels cut down on lift and allowed Gardner to reduce the amount of front aerodynamics needed on the car. This effectively gave the car a power boost over the rest of the grid, to the tune of around 40 horsepower extra.

The car showed great potential and took home its first win after just four races, although eventually, its unique tire layout caused its competitiveness to wane. Tire supplier Goodyear had continued to develop its full-size tires throughout 1976 but had not worked on the P34's smaller front tires, leading to a grip imbalance between the front and rear of the car. The car was retired in favor of a more conventional four-wheeled design the following year. A few years later, in the early '80s, the use of six-wheeled cars was banned altogether, bringing an underwhelming end to what could have been a revolutionary development in Formula 1.

The Plymouth Superbird was built to rival the Dodge Charger Daytona, and like the Daytona, only got a very short time in the limelight before it was unceremoniously banned. It was originally conceived as a way to entice Richard Petty back to Plymouth after he'd left for Ford, with Plymouth executives flying out to Petty's house to ask him what it would take to get him back. His answer was simple – he wanted a car that was as revolutionary as the Dodge Charger Daytona, and so the Superbird was born.

Petty did indeed return to racing with Plymouth the following year and saw huge success, but NASCAR was having none of it. The Superbird was legislated out of the competition alongside the Charger Daytona, ushering in an era of NASCAR that would no longer be defined by faster and faster cars. As a stock car, the Superbird was also sold to the public throughout its time on the track, and today the road-going cars are highly sought after among collectors. WWE legend John Cena is among the lucky owners to have been able to get his hands on one.

The "T-Rex" Monte Carlo, developed by Hendrick Motorsports, holds the unfortunate title of being one of the most promptly-banned cars in motorsport history. It was only declared legal for a single race before its innovative design was banned by NASCAR for being too good. The car debuted at the Lowe's Motor Speedway all-star event in 1997, with Jeff Gordon behind the wheel. After cruising to a decisive victory, the car was scrutinized by race inspectors, who in the end had to agree that the car was legal under the current season's rulebook. However, the team was reportedly asked not to use the car again at any NASCAR-sanctioned event.

Hendrick Motorsport has argued that the car would never have been banned were it not for the fact that superstar Jeff Gordon left his competition so far behind in that single race. Strangely enough, the unique setup of the #24 car was originally discovered partially by accident, as Ray Evernham explained that the idea of lowering the front to increase the aerodynamics was not a deliberate one, but rather an experiment during testing. The team only fully realized why the car had been so successful after the race had finished, but by that point, it was too late.

The Chevy Corvette C4 proved itself to be very good at SCCA Showroom Stock GT racing. So good, in fact, that every other manufacturer in the series threatened to walk away if Chevy wasn't banned. Porsche, in particular, was instrumental in getting the C4 out of the series, as it had previously enjoyed a dominant run in the years leading up to the Chevy's debut. Things changed in 1985, as former series competitor John Powell recalled in an interview with Hagerty: "The Corvette beat Porsche 29–0 from 1985 to 1987."

After rivals including Porsche issued the series with an ultimatum, race management caved in, and the C4 was given the boot. However, it wasn't all bad news, as the Corvette racing teams eventually formed a separate racing series called the Corvette Challenge. This new, rival series ended up attracting big-name sponsorships and allowed for a $1 million season purse, which at the time was very unusual. ESPN even ended up striking a deal for TV coverage of the Corvette series, giving the upstart championship a wider reach than the original series the car had been kicked out of.