Photo : D.R. - Toyota Motorsport GmbH

Toyota could not have dreamed for better than the two victories of the TS030 Hybrid in the FIA World Endurance Championship, at the 6 Hours of Sao Paulo and Fuji, approaching their 75th anniversary, in late 2012 there will be an exhibition in Paris, at the 'Rendez-Vous Toyota' in the Champs-Elysées.

But first a brief history; in the mid-1930s, while Japan was just emerging from the Great Depression, the young Kiichiro Toyoda saw the potential for mass production of mainstream cars. After years of perseverance, he finally convinced Toyoda Automatic Loom Works (then manufacturing looms) to create a car department. Under the leadership of Kiichiro, the small division grew quickly and detached from its parent company Toyoda in 1937 to become Toyota Motor Company. Seventy-five years later, more than 200 million vehicles have rolled off the assembly lines of Toyota. And every day, 320,000 men and women working in factories and various Group entities around the world in a spirit of continuous improvement ("kaizen" in Japanese).

In the run-up to the 3rd of November, the official date of their 75th anniversary, Toyota have introduced a new slogan "Always a better way", and have organized a number of European events including the Rendez-vous Toyota Champs-Elysées  Paris, an exhibition  that will go on until December with some of the greatest cars in the history of the marque.

Visitors can see full sized classics of Toyota in perfect condition, such as Land Cruiser FJ25 1958, Corona 1964, the Sports 800 of 1965, 2000GT 1967, the Corolla Sprinter 1968 and Celica 1600 GT 1970. Also at this exhibition are many models in 1:43 scale loaned by a private collector from the first saloon (model AA) to the iconic racing cars, such as the Ralt Toyota, which allowed Ayrton Senna to win the British Formula 3 Championship in 1983.

(From Toyota press information)

Photo : OYAMA-CHO (SHINOZUKA, JAPON),   FUJI SPEEDWAY, 6 HOURS OF FUJI, FINISH, 14th OCT 2012. Kazuki Nakajima takes the chequered flag in the penultimate round of the FIA World Endurance Championship, accompanied by team-mates Alexander Wurz and Nicolas Lapierre.