One of the best examples of superior power-to-weight was when intrepid racer Jim Hunter became the first Aussie to win Mexico’s famous Baja 1000 off-road race. That was in 1987, when he entered his home-built 351 V8-powered XF Falcon ute with an emphasis on lightweight construction, from its chrome-moly space-frame chassis to its torsion-bar independent suspension and minimal componentry. Jim figured the American vehicles often broke because they were too heavy and the US teams said his ute was built too light for Baja and would not last the distance. He proved them all wrong by winning the hotly-contested Class 6 (for mass production-based cars) after an intense race-long battle – in a car of his own design and construction in its first competition outing! And a lot of his design ideas in that ute have since been widely copied.I’ve long held the view that Jim Hunter is one of the great unsung heroes of Aussie motor sport.